


Rose Fangs and Wolf Thorns

by OUATLovr



Series: Rose Fangs and Wolf Thorns [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Abuse, Accidental Plot, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Character Study, Dark, Eating Disorders, Eventual Series Happy Ending, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Femslash, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Joffrey is his own warning, Long, Manipulation, Miscarriage, Other, POV Multiple, Pregnancy, Rape/Non-con Elements, Ripple Effect, Secret Relationship, Slow Build, Slow Burn, accidental epic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-29
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2018-07-18 22:32:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 317
Words: 683,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7333300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OUATLovr/pseuds/OUATLovr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"'Valar morgulis,' they say," Margaery murmured. "But we are not men, my Sansa. And we are survivors."</p><p>Margaery marries Joffrey, and becomes Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Sansa remains.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. SANSA I

_"I am his, and he is mine, from this day, until the end of my days."_

And, with a ceremony and a feast, Margaery Tyrell became Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, wife of Joffrey the Illborn.

In another life, there might have been a reckoning, for all the ill works of that wicked boy; there might have been a death at another wedding, another king felled, this one as he so justly deserved.

But there was not, this day.

Instead, Queen Margaery passed a goblet of wine to her husband, who drank from it, and she saw a missed opportunity when nothing happened, as she too drank from the goblet a moment later.

Perhaps a part of her wished that it was poisoned, despite her partaking of the same wine her new husband drank. Perhaps she didn't care at all, one way or the other.

Sansa would not know. She would never know, though she would always wonder.

It was not the sort of question proper young ladies asked queens who professed to love their husbands, after all. And, too, it was not the sort of question that Sansa believed Margaery would ever answer.

Sansa did not know how long the torturous feast continued, when false smiles turned brittle, and food that had turned stale in her mouth became rotten.

She heard the remarks that her lord husband continued to make, both under his breath and to the king's face, as the king continued to order him to refill his wine, heard even the Queen Mother bid her son that perhaps it was time to find a new passtime, lest his guests grow bored.

She heard Joffrey's laughter at that, and saw the way Margaery doted over him, letting him slip an arm around her waist and whispering amusing nothings into his ear until he forgot about tormenting his uncle and half of the guests at his wedding for a few short moments.

Sansa Stark did not realize that she was clutching her meat knife with her fist until Shae, ostensibly here to help feed so many guests, slipped it out of her grasp under the guise of pouring her some wine.

"Drink, my lady," Shae said, her voice soft and pitying, and Sansa shoved the cup away for that.

"I'm not thirsty," she snapped at her serving girl, reminding herself with a wince of the early days, when Shae had been sent to work for her, but not enough for her to apologize for the words. She was not entirely sure how she felt about Shae these days, anymore than she had been then, and so it didn't matter. 

Nothing mattered. 

She noticed the Queen Mother's eyes on her, then, cold and piercing, and struggled to hold down a flush, turning instead to the King and Queen once more.

She wasn't sure if Shae would have believed her, if she'd told the woman that she had no intention of burying the knife in Joffrey's neck, or his chest, as her brother Robb had died.

She never had the intention of following through; she hadn't since the fateful day she'd attempted to push Joffrey from the ramparts, as they stared up at what remained of her father's body. She had learned then a horrible lesson, that she would never have been able to manage such a feat.

She knew that Arya would probably call her a coward, for refusing to follow through, and perhaps she was, but she never would have lifted the knife. Not really.

It was comforting, though, to hold onto it.

"And shall we be having the bedding ceremony, Your Grace? Or are you not enough of a man to parade yourself before your subjects?" Tyrion asked, mildly, interrupting what had no doubt been another speech from Joffrey, by the looks on the Tyrells faces, about the upcoming night. Ser Loras especially looked livid, and Sansa was abruptly reminded of her warnings to Margaery, that to marry Joffrey would be a mistake, of how Margaery had laughed this off with the simple explanation that her brother would, of course, protect her.

Sansa blinked, glancing at Joffrey, aware that she had not been following the conversation.

She did that these days, sometimes. Her lord husband would often tell her over their breakfast that her eyes glazed and she didn't respond to him for minutes at a time. She wondered if it was noticeable to anyone else.

Joffrey glared at Lord Tyrion, and opened his mouth, but Margaery spoke first, placing a hand on his arm that he looked like he wanted to shake off, but didn't.

"His Grace has honored my wish to bare myself only before him," the new queen said, in that sweet, musical voice Sansa had so often observed her using, in an attempt to bring Joffrey down from his anger. "He is very kind to do so."

"Yes," Joffrey said, rather stiffly, straightening his collar. "She is my queen, after all. There will be no bedding ceremony to embarrass my queen."

Margaery's smile widened, as if he had just offered her a sweet. "Your Grace is so very kind to me. I only hope that I please you, tonight."

His eyes traveled down her form in a way that made Sansa feel sick. Or perhaps that was the wine. "Oh, I think I shall find you...very pleasing," he murmured, and Sansa wondered how Margaery managed not to blush at those words, or, at the very least, at his tone.

She did not, however, bat an eyelash.

Joffrey turned back to his captive audience, a leering grin on his face as he wobbled, and Margaery was forced to take his arm to keep him from falling on his arse.

It would not have looked very kingly to do so, after all.

Sansa wondered why Margaery did not simply let him fall, as Joffrey shoved out of  her grip and announced to the audience at large, "My queen and I shall retire now. Feel free to...continue the festivities. My uncle shall serve as cup bearer to any who claim him."

He let out a drunken giggle then, one that sounded almost mad but not quite, and Sansa imagined his head on a pike, instead of her father's.

"Come, my love," Margaery murmured, just loud enough to be heard, "I am quite tired from these festivities. You are a gentleman to leave them early on my account."

And then they were gone, and Sansa wondered how many bruises Margaery would wear, in the morning. How many of them would be visible.

Part of Sansa was wickedly relieved that she did not face such a vile fate, yet she easily tempered this thought with worry for her friend's own fate, now.

She didn't know how long the sweet-tempered Margaery would last, as Joffrey's bride.

She knew that Margaery was better at the game than she, but still she worried, for no one could ever outlast Joffrey.

"Well, there they go, then," Tyrion said, returning to his seat, and Sansa wondered if he was deliberately not thinking the thoughts that kept plaguing her mind.

That, not so long ago, it might have been she, walking off to the bedding chamber with Joffrey. The thought made her shudder visibly, and Tyrion sent her a look of concern. He'd been doing that more and more lately, looking at her in such concern that she ought to have been made of glass.

"Would you still care to go and rest, my lady?" he asked, his voice that oddly gentle tone that he seemed to reserve only for her, the one that she hated to hear because it only served to remind her that her husband, for all that he was an imp and scarred, was the least monstrous of his ugly family.

She took his proffered hand, grateful when he did not mention how she was shaking.

"I would be glad to," she told him, not meeting his eyes, and allowed Tyrion to escort her from the wedding and back to the chambers that she would never call home without a backward glance.

No one tried to stop them.

She would not know how much of a queen she had looked, in that moment.


	2. SANSA II

When they returned to their chambers, Tyrion looked rather lost, as he glanced at her, as if he felt that he should try and comfort her but did not quite know how.

It was a look she was becoming all too familiar with, from him, and Sansa was still unsure whether it relieved her or disturbed her.

She felt oddly reassured that things had returned to the way they should be when he turned and passed out on the little sofa by their bed, instead.

If he hadn't, she might have felt compelled to apologize to him for Joffrey's treatment of him, and she certainly didn't want to.

She didn't want to be comforted, after all. 

Her most comforting moments were when she was alone, or when she was with Margaery, although those moments had grown less comforting as she realized that Margaery, like everyone in King's Landing, had a reason for her attentions, at least to some extent, and, in any case, had less and less time for her as the days drew closer to her wedding to a madman who hated Sansa as much as he lusted after her.

She was alone now, or as alone as she could hope to find herself in a city with Lannister's eyes and Lannister's ears, and glad to be gone from that horrid excuse for a wedding, glad to no longer be watching Joffrey mock her brother's death and laugh at her husband.

She didn't know how long she stood there, in the plain chambers of Tyrion Lannister, still absently holding the glass of wine she had never relinquished from the wedding feast, which had the whole time seemed out of place, to her.

She wondered if Tyrion had ordered that she have a glass so that he might drink it, or because he knew that this day would be painful for her.

She knew that her husband had endeavored to make their union as painless as possible for her since the day of their wedding, but somehow, she could not believe him capable of such a kindness.

Still, she had never been given wine before, at such gatherings. Sometimes, Cersei was cruel and made her drink, only to laugh when she sputtered it everywhere.

She had not choked on her wine, today, though she almost found herself wishing that she had.

There was a knock on the door, their door, and Sansa glanced up, setting aside the goblet of wine and calling out in a voice which betrayed her with its cracking, "Yes?"

She was half-expecting Joffrey to walk in, tired of his beautiful bride already and wishing to rape his lady aunt now, instead.

The door opened, and Shae stepped into the room, eyes taking in Tyrion, collapsed on the sofa, and Sansa's face, though she mercifully didn't comment on how pale she was as she shut the door behind, miraculously maintaining her balance despite the bundle in her arms.

"I brought more food, m'lady," she whispered, revealing a small, silver platter full of little cakes and cheese. "You left early, and I thought you might be hungry."

Sansa forced her eyes to soften from the glare she had no doubt that they were in. "I'm not hungry."

Shae nodded, not put off in the least. "Well, I'll just set them there, then, m'lady," she said, dutifully stepping into the room to set the platter on one of the cushioned tables. "Would you...like anything else?"

There were a great many things that Sansa Stark would like, but she knew that Shae could not fulfill any of them, knew that this self-pitying was unbecoming of her, when her friend was surely suffering not very many halls away.

"You could...sit for a while, if you like," she said, noncommittally, and pretended not to notice the way that Shae smiled as she sat beside her at the window overlooking the water.

"That one is from Braavos," Shae said, pointing out at the ship that was just a speck on the horizon, the sails too small to see from here.

They had not played their game in a while, the one where they guessed which ships came from where; Sansa had tired of that game after Shae had explained away the morbid amusement she'd gotten from it, but she forced a smile.

"Is it?" Sansa asked, taking a bite of lemon cake and pretending not to notice Shae's triumphant smile, pretending that she cared about this insipid game anymore, now.

The food Shae had brought her were lemon cakes, after all. Her favorite, once, and she might as well eat them now, seeing as they were here.

Shae nodded enthusiastically. "And it's carrying roses, today. To commemorate the wedding. Just stuffed full of them. The sailors have been dumping them overboard since they left port." She snorted, something about that particularly amusing to her, though Sansa didn't bother to ask why.

Another day, Sansa would have laughed, for she had no doubt that the Queen of Thorns would resort to such frivolities, considering the lengths to which she had gone to prepare for the wedding. Just to show to all and anon that the Tyrells had the money to be so careless.

"I don't want to play that game today," she told Shae finally, when Shae had pointed out another two boats full of Tyrell roses, and Shae glanced at her and then shrugged in acquiescence, doing as she always did when Sansa asked something of her.

Shae was perhaps the only person in King's Landing who did as Sansa wanted without question, and that scared her as much as it relieved her.

"You missed Lord Tyrell's rendition of the Bear and the Maiden Fair," Shae said suddenly, and Sansa glanced at her out of the corner of her eye. "Wasn't very good, but it was amusing. You might have laughed."

Sansa couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed. "Oh?" she asked tiredly, pretending interest.

Shae must have noticed, for she did not elaborate. "Almost made up for the rest of the wedding."

That did get a faint giggle out of Sansa, the laugh drier than she liked. "It was horrible, wasn't it?"

Shae's lips twitched. "Yes, it was."

Sansa hesitated then, wanting to ask something of Shae but not certain how her request would be perceived. "Shae...do you think that you could find a way to check on the Lady Margaery tomorrow? That she is...all right? Only...she is my closest friend here in King's Landing, and..."

Shae gave her a knowing look. "I'm friends with one of her ladies," she said finally, "I will ask after her."

Sansa nodded. She had expected nothing more, after all, and she doubted that even this would truly appease her strange worries.

Cersei had more than once told her that a woman could not afford to care about anyone but themself, and Sansa found herself caring about Margaery anyway, even though she knew that Margaery did not care about her quite to the same extent.

She needed something to distract her.

"Where do you come from, Shae?" Sansa asked abruptly.

Shae raised a brow, affecting bewilderment at the question. "Come from, m'lady?" Her accent gave her away, though, and Sansa kept on.

"You aren't from here. You have a strange accent, and you don't know the things that maidservants are supposed to know," she said, tone light. "And I see the way you look at Lord Tyrion, and the way he looks at you. I may be young still, but I'm not blind."

For the first time since they'd met, Shae's cheeks almost looked stained with a blush, but perhaps she had merely been drinking. "Sorry, m'lady."

Sansa smiled. "Don't be. You're a very beautiful woman and he..." she broke off then, unable to come up with a suitable lie. The truth was, Sansa had no idea what would attract any woman to her lord husband, and so could not think up a falsehood to spin, in this moment. Every time she looked at him, she saw only a Lannister, and a half man.

Shae laughed. "He isn't all bad, m'lady. Surely you've realized that by now."

Sansa hesitated. "He...he is kind to me," she admitted shyly, and Shae looked like she wanted to smile at that, but didn't.

"I came here from the North," Shae said, and Sansa raised a brow.

"I am from the North, and you don't sound North-born at all," she chided, and Shae smirked.

"I didn't know you paid such attention to my accent," she teased, and something about the words rankled Sansa, though she couldn't have said what it was.

"I am from Lorath," Shae said suddenly, and Sansa blinked at her.

"I've never heard of it," she admitted, after a long moment. In fact, it sounded familiar, but Sansa was too tired, with a sort of bone tiredness, to think too heavily upon the matter.

Shae laughed. "That would not surprise me. It is one of the Free Cities. Like Braavos, but no one in King's Landing cares about Lorath because they've no trade with the Westerosi. They...prefer piety above all else."

Sansa cocked her head at the other woman. "How did you end up here?"

Shae did laugh, then. "Can't imagine me praying to the gods at all hours of the day, can you?"

Sansa blushed. "I didn't mean..."

Shae waved a hand. "You did, but it's true. I didn't like it there. I ran away when I was younger than you. Traveled to Volantis and Pentos. Then, to Westeros. I always wanted to travel, when I was a little girl."

Sansa squinted at her, imagining that the story was rather longer than she'd made it sound. "What is it like, there?" she asked quietly.

Shae bit her lip. "Different," she said finally, and then shrugged. "Not better or worse, just different. Warmer."

Sansa snorted. "I can't imagine anywhere warmer than King's Landing."

"Well, that's because you're from the North,"  Shae said, affecting a shiver. "I was always freezing, there. Too warm-blooded."

Sansa smiled wistfully. "I suppose it would feel different now, to visit there."

Shae shrugged. "I don't think it would. Your blood never quite forgets itself, even if the rest of you does."

Sansa did not have long to ponder that, though she shivered at the words, wondering if they were some strange omen, or if that was just her imagination running wild. A cleared throat from behind them made her jump, nearly dropping the lemon cake she'd been eating as she turned to see her lord husband sitting up on the sofa, watching the two of them with something almost like fondness in his eyes.

Or perhaps it wasn't fondness. She could never quite tell, with the Imp.

"I seem to have taken a bit of a nap," he said, with a little, self-deprecating laugh that Sansa had grown quite accustomed to hearing, from him. She hated it. 

"What did I miss?" his eyes focused on the food, and Shae laughed, holding out the tray for him to take a bite, and then holding it out to Sansa once more.

Sansa pretended to not be privy to Shae and Tyrion's plot to fatten her up, as she hadn't been eating as well since her mother and Robb's death, but their methods were rather obvious at the best of times. Still, they were endearing, and so she usual pretended to allow them.

Today, Sansa shook her head, and Shae bit back a sigh.

"Perhaps we could play a game," Tyrion suggested then, seeming to have picked up on Sansa's mood, voice a tad too cheerful.

Sansa did sigh. It was not that she did not appreciate his efforts; after all, as she had told Shae, he was kind to her. She simply couldn't trust them.

"I'm rather tired now," she said softly, and then glanced toward the bed.

Her lord husband had made the suggestion, some time ago, that perhaps a bed could be moved into the other corner of the room, that they might each sleep undisturbed. He had so far been gracious enough to always sleep on that little sofa in their little chambers, especially when he was drunk, which Sansa was terribly grateful for, even if she had never mentioned as much to her lord husband. Still, the bed had never arrived, because sometimes Cersei came here to gloat, and she would certainly have something to say about it, Sansa's lord husband had claimed.

Even her chambers as simply Lady Sansa, daughter of dead traitors, had been larger than the ones she now shared with Lord Tyrion, and she often wondered at that, that a dead traitor's daughter should be treated better by the Lannisters than their one of their own.

Just another proof that they were monsters, those lions.

Tyrion bit his lip, then, at some secret urging from Shae, Sansa supposed, "Lady Sansa-"

"Perhaps you and Shae could go to the gardens for a while?" Sansa interrupted, infusing a bit of hope into her voice. "Joffrey's sure to be kept busy for at least the rest of today."

Tyrion flinched. "Of course, my lady," he said finally, and Sansa hoped that she hid her breath of relief better than she thought she had.


	3. SANSA III

The Sept of Baelor. Full of stained glass windows and monuments to saints and kings alike. It was perhaps the only beautiful thing left in King's Landing, for Joffrey rarely came here to pray, and anything that had not been sullied by Joffrey's touch was found beautiful in Sansa's eyes.

Sansa wondered if Joffrey thought himself a god, and so did not feel the need to pray at all. She would not disbelieve it, if it were the case.

She prayed, as she always did, for the things she could not voice aloud. The things she knew she could not have.

She had come here to pray for her father's life, when she still thought Joffrey a creature capable of mercy. The Queen Mother had encouraged her to do so, in fact, told her to pray for his tarnished soul, as well, up until the very moment when Joffrey's butcher had chopped her father's head from his shoulders.

When Cersei later spoke of prayer, and how her own father had disillusioned her belief in the gods, Sansa had understood the joke.

But she continued to come here, even if she was not so certain that the gods would hear her prayers as she had once been.

She prayed for Arya, if she was even still alive. For Jon, to forgive her the years she had spent being less than kind to him, if he were even still alive. For poor Bran and Rickon's souls. For the soul of her father. For the soul of her mother and Robb, that the Father would grant them justice and the Mother mercy.

She sometimes went to the Kingswood where the old Heart Tree stood, to pray to the Old God's as her family had, but that task was growing harder and harder still, what with the way the Lannisters wanted always to keep an eye on her, and, after all, she had always found the Seven so romantic, as a child. Her septa had taught her so.

She prayed for justice. For Joffrey's death. For a reason to hope.

And, this time, she prayed for Margaery Tyrell.

She had not seen the new queen since the day of the wedding feast, when Joffrey had tugged his new bride away, half-drunk, and disappeared within their chambers.

That had been four days ago, and, although Shae had promised to bring her information about their new young queen, all that she had been able to ascertain was that Margaery was very busy adjusting to her new role as queen, and rarely saw the lady with whom Shae was friends.

It was hardly a comfort.

A part of Sansa wondered if Margaery was not still holed up within Joffrey's chambers, her body split open and bleeding, already filled with the next Lannister monster, and that was why she had not been seen by Sansa or by Shae.

Her waking eye was haunted by the thoughts of what might be happening to her friend, now that Joffrey could claim her for himself. Her sweet brother Loras would not be there to rescue her from him now, as Margaery had once intimated to her.

She imagined the bruises on that pretty, soft skin. The lashes. She imagined a split lip, a dribble of blood running down the front of Margaery's chin.

She could not imagine the wedding night, and she knew what horrors Jofrrey was capable of.

But she knew that it was not the case. Margaery had just been unable to see her since her wedding night, caught up in the affairs that a queen must see to, affairs more important than befriending a dead traitor's married off daughter.

She knew now that Margaery had gotten close to her because her family wanted Sansa to marry into the Tyrell House, that they might become the Guardians of the North through her, and when the game was up, Margaery hadn't been quite so attentive. Of course, she also hadn't had the time, preparing for her wedding.

Cersei made sure to torment her with such things, when she was deep in her cups and Sansa was nearby to play the victim for her, just as she made sure to torment her with tales of her lord husband the Imp.

But there was something more, Sansa thought, to their interactions than just political games. They had been, were, friends, in some respect, and so she pitied Margaery for what she imagined was happening to her right now.

"It's so morbid in here, isn't it?" a voice at her right made Sansa nearly jump out of her skin, and she turned.

"Ser Loras," Sansa blinked in surprise. "He was not wearing his white cloak, but the green of House Tyrell, and he looked out of place here, in the Sept. "I did not expect to see you here." Then she blushed, realizing what she had said. "I mean..."

Ser Loras chuckled. "It is quite all right, Lady Sansa. I do not usually find myself here." He glanced up at the statue of King Baelor the Blessed, and she almost thought she saw him hiding a sneer. "I've felt strangely pious, of late."

Sansa could well imagine why. She remembered Margaery's words to her, that were Joffrey to ever mistreat her, her beloved brother would not be contained, would fight for her honor.

Sansa had not found the words comforting then, wondering if Margaery's family wanted another bloody war between their noble houses on top of the one they already fought with Stannis Baratheon. Now, she wondered how House Tyrell had managed to contain Loras.

Sansa wouldn't have minded the civil war he might have caused; she wanted to see the Lannisters destroyed, but she did not so want to see Margaery harmed, and she did not want to face another battlefield as she had when Stannis had attacked King's Landing.

"Do you ever wonder," he said suddenly, voice so low that Sansa had to lean forward to hear him, "What could posess someone to do that? To sacrifice all of themselves for a cause?"

She noticed that he was still staring up at that statue, as if he half-expected it to come alive and explain itself to him.

Sansa placed a hand on his arm, and he stiffened at the touch. "I am sure that your sister will be fine, Ser Loras."

He turned, placing his hand over her own and staring down at her for a long moment before murmuring, "You are the worst liar in King's Landing, Lady Sansa. Has anyone ever told you that before?"

Sansa frowned, thinking of the time when Lord Baelish had said something similar. "Yes, they have."

He was gone now, returned to the Vale to marry her aunt Lysa, leaving her feeling even more alone than ever.

He had spent most of the time that she had been here in King's Landing, and while she had not always thought of him as her friend, she had thought of him as someone that she could, bizarrely, despite his reputation, trust, in this horrific place.

She wondered if he would grow to love her aunt as he had claimed to love her mother. If things like love even mattered, in relationships between other people.

When she glanced up again, Ser Loras was gone, and Sansa was alone once more in the Sept.

She sighed, for she did not think she could summon up the effort for more prayers today.


	4. SANSA IV

According to her lord husband, Cersei had been locked away in her chambers since the wedding, refusing to come out and with only Ser Jaime and Lord Tywin allowed to enter her chambers, though her lord husband suspected that the latter was solely due to the fact that Lord Tywin would have the door to her chambers thrown down and would enter anyway.

He followed up this with a comment that she was most likely drinking herself to death in jealousy, said rather gleefully.

Sansa had pretended not to hear that comment, too horrified to really acknowledge it, and had continued picking at her food without eating any of it until Tyrion seemed satisfied enough with his own food and went off to find Lord Varys, for some reason or another that Sansa had only been half-paying attention to.

Sansa briefly entertained the idea of going riding, but she doubted that Shae knew how, as she was not a lady, however much she purported herself to be one as Sansa's handmaiden, and Sansa knew that she would not be allowed to go alone.

Sighing, she decided instead to go walking along the parapets surrounding King's Landing today, so long as she did not go too far, for there were certain things that she did not wish to see, there. But if one did not walk all of the way to the end, they could miss the sight of the heads lining the outer wall.

She told as much to Shae, who insisted on going with her, though Sansa could not say that she was entirely surprised.

Between the two of them, Lord Tyrion and Shae seemed to have made it their mission not to let her out of their sight, recently, along with their mission to fatten her up like a housewife.

It would have been endearing if they were not both loyal to the Lannisters, and therefore another reminder of her imprisonment here.

Though, she supposed, she did not truly know Shae's loyalty. The woman was confusing in that regard at the best of times, and, somehow, that made Sansa almost want to trust her, in a way that Lord Tyrion's friendship did not inspire.

There was no one on the walkway, today, for which Sansa was rather relieved; she found herself growing sick of unwanted company, and Shae, seeming to notice that her mood had not improved with sleep, was not being overbearing. She had not heard anything more about Margaery, though she had gone down to the royal kitchens and knew that Margaery's favorite breakfast had been made this morning, and had told Sansa so while she helped her dress this morning.

They walked in silence for some time, side by side, Sansa gazing over the parapet at the world beyond King's Landing. Shae seemed to realize that Sansa did not wish to speak, much to her relief, and for her own part seemed rather lost in thought.

She had found herself doing an awful lot of walking lately, whether it be here or in the royal gardens, and wondered if she would one day walk herself right off the parapets, and fall into one of the spikes kept there for errant heads.

It was not the first time she had considered such a thing, after all.

"Lady Sansa," a horribly familiar voice said then, sounding almost delighted in much the way Sansa would have imagined the lady's son to be, and Sansa sighed, wishing her husband had been able to tell her that Cersei had emerged from her self-imposed isolation, for all that he claimed to be such a fount of knowledge.

Sansa turned around, forcing a small smile that she knew was not quite as believable as Margaery's always were, but that the other girl would certainly appreciate the effort it took to maintain. "Your Grace."

Cersei's own smile was brittle as she walked forward, two Kingsguard behind her and a half-empty glass of red wine in her left hand. Her other hand moved to take Sansa's arm in her own, and Sansa shuddered at the touch, having to remind herself not to flinch back.

"Walk with me," Cersei ordered, and Sansa found that she could do nothing but comply. She sent Shae a sympathetic look as her maid found herself forced to walk behind the two Kingsguard, head bowed and features twitching with annoyance, though Sansa did not know if it was because of the new position or because of their intruders' presence.

The silence lingered for a long few paces, as Cersei finished off her wine and tossed the empty goblet as though it were nothing more than a clay mug over the short wall, lips twisting into some parody of a smile as they heard the sound of glass clinking and shattering below.

"Tell me, little dove, what do you think of our new queen?" Cersei asked suddenly, tilting her head at Sansa and regarding the younger girl as if she quite cared about Sansa's thoughts, for the first time that Sansa could remember in so long.

Sansa swallowed nervously, alarmed at the sudden questioning, although Cersei was never one to bother with pleasantries. At least, not with Sansa. "She is...very beautiful. And kind."

Cerseri snorted. "Yes, she is that. But is she anything more than a pretty doll? I do understand you've spoken to one another. Is she intelligent?"

Sansa wiped sweating hands on her dress. It would not do to let on about Margaery Tyrell's intelligence, for all that House Tyrell had been no real friend to her since the marriage with Willas had fallen out. The other girl didn't deserve to contend with Cersei Lannister in the same manner that Sansa was now forced to. "I...think so, Your Grace."

Cersei raised a brow. "My little dove," she said, reaching out and pushing a strand of hair behind Sansa's ear, and it took everything Sansa had not to flinch away at the contact, though her insides were roiling. "I hope you understand that I did not ask my son to set you aside out of any ill feelings between us. The Small Council believed that a Tyrell bride would be more beneficial, that was all, and I could not stick up for a traitor's daughter such as yourself. You are still quite dear to me, as an almost good daughter"

Sansa dipped her head, taking advantage of the movement to pull out of Cersei's touch. "I understand, Your Grace."

Cersei's eyes narrowed. "And I do sympathize, with your marriage to my little brother." Her lips curled up into a sneer. "I have always seen something of myself in you, and it has perhaps taught me to treat you somewhat more harshly than I should have."

Sansa blinked, wondered at Cersei's definition of the word. "You have treated me no more differently than I have deserved, Your Grace, as a member of a mostly dead House."

Cersei smiled; it reminded Sansa of the smile a serpent might give, before they struck. "All the same. I want you to know that you can always come to me, have you need of anything." She patted Sansa's hand.

Sansa wondered if the Queen Mother knew that her ploy was so transparent, or if that was the point, since she believed her little dove was so gullible as to fall for it once before.

But Sansa would not do so again, not when the first time had caused her father's head.

Still, it was strangely comforting, to know that Cersei was back to familiar games with Sansa. That the threats and taunting would cease, if only for a little while, because she believed that Sansa still had some use in her.

Even if this was only because she wanted to know about Margaery.

Sansa forced a smile. "I have never forgotten that, Your Grace."

Cersei squinted at her, as if attempting to muddle out the meaning of her words, or perhaps attempting to decide if there was some ulterior meaning to them. Sansa wondered if she would divine it. "Did you know that the Tyrells wished to marry you off to Willas Tyrell, their eldest, the cripple?"

Sansa bit her lip. "I...Became aware of it, Your Grace."

Cersei laughed, her voice taking on a cruel edge that reminded Sansa so much of Joffrey. "They would have sold you like cattle, and you'd be living your days far from here, just a piece in their game. Aren't you grateful you got to marry my baby brother, instead? At least he, for all of his...deficiencies, can...perform, for you."

Sansa flushed hotly. She thought, for a moment, about telling Cersei how she really felt, that surely it was better to be a pawn of the Tyrells than the Lannisters, for they'd no part in her family's brutal murders, but she knew the cost of such a statement.

"Very grateful, Your Grace," she ground out.

Cersei laughed. "Sometimes I believe my lord father agreed to the marriage between the two of you because he was hoping that you would strangle my little brother in his sleep. I certainly wouldn't blame you." She smirked, her voice turning dark with her next words. "If we can't have you, no one can."

Sansa paled, understanding the threat, and soon found some excuse to leave Cersei to the walkway and turn around, Shae following silently behind her, though she could feel the other woman's rising irritation toward Cersei, even as she held her tongue.

Cersei would come upon her father's head soon, anyway, and Sansa found herself not desiring to see that, in the least.

She had gone to look at it, once, since the horrible day when Joffrey had forced her to stare up at it so that he might relish in her pain. She had hardly recognized the man who had once been her father.

A grotesque mask covered a molding, pocked face, eaten away at by the birds, hair all gone, and disgusting patches of skin clinging to the skull.

But a part of her had still recognized her father, beneath all of that, and that had terrified her.

Sansa had not returned again.

She wondered what Cersei would see, when she eventually came upon it. Whether she would see Sansa's secret resolve to not become another head on that wall, no matter how many pretty words that would mean she would have to say, or if she would just see another dead man who had attempted to thwart her and failed.


	5. SANSA V

"The King is back to dealing with the people's grievances, today," Tyrion said lightly as he turned his back while Shae helped Sansa to dress in a light perriwinkle gown and her stockings.

Sansa's heart skipped a beat, and she forced herself to calm under the knowing look of Shae.

"Oh?" she murmured, pretending disinterest, well aware that neither of them believed her for an instant.

Shae moved behind her, tying her gown loosely, as she preferred it, not liking the thought of being stifled inside some gown, having spent enough of her time in a cage already.

"His queen is accompanying him, or so I'm told," Shae whispered to her, and Sansa nodded absently, wondering idly if it had been so long simply because the two were enjoying their newly consummated marriage so much or because they had to wait for the bruises on Margaery's body to fade.

Well, perhaps not quite idly. The thought had been a constant one in her mind since the new queen and king had barricaded themselves in their chambers and declared themselves to be celebrating for all of that time.

"I suppose you will want to go," Tyrion said knowingly, and Sansa flushed.

She had never wanted to go and witness the grievances of the King's people before. They usually ended in pain and agony for the petitioner, regardless of their plight, for Joffrey did so love to have smallfolk to hurt.

When she was Sansa Stark, Joffrey had ordered that she be there, to witness every single sentence being carried out.

When she became Tyrion's wife, she had found herself experiencing a few more freedoms she had not had before, and one such freedom was that Joffrey seemed to forget to order her to go about half the time, and Tyrion insisted that she did not need to go at all the other half.

But Margaery would be there.

She nodded, too ashamed to actually look Tyrion in the eye as she did so.

He sighed, and she realized then that he would likely feel it his duty to go with her, to ensure that Joffrey did not harass her.

She forced a thin smile. "I was going to watch from the balcony," she said, and then paused. "Shae can come with me."

Tyrion looked oddly relieved, at that. "I have another meeting with the Small Council," he told her, apologetically, but Sansa merely shrugged.

She knew that her lord husband wanted to protect her from Joffrey at every opportunity, but as Joffrey had once said, they were all there for his amusement; while Tyrion's presence could perhaps keep her from a beating, he could do little else.

Shae nodded. "Of course, my lady."

Tyrion shot Shae a look that Sansa couldn't quite interpret, before sighing, muttering something about women, and leaving.

When he left, Shae giggled, and Sansa glanced at him, one eyebrow raised.

"You're Lady Lannister now, Lady Sansa," Shae explained, her voice rather low, all hint of humor gone, "You could have anything of your husband, if you wanted it."

She gave Shae a disapprovingly look. "But I don't want anything of him."

Shae hesitated. "Nothing at all?" she asked.

It was Sansa's turn to lift a brow. "Was there something specific you had in mind?"

It was Shae's turn to blush then, though hardly as red as Sansa had ever done. "No, my lady."

It might just have been Sansa's imagination, but she thought that the other girl sounded almost relieved, in that moment.

Their walk to the throne room was a short one, because Sansa was on edge and could not help noticing the many patches of young women they past, whispering among themselves, and could not help imagining that they all whispered of Margaery.

Sansa found herself amidst a rather large group of ladies today, in the balcony, though she was happy to see that Cersei was not among them, rather standing among the crowded nobles below in the throne room, not quite close enough to the Iron Throne to be mistaken for still having a hold over it.

Joffrey lounged like a cat in the Iron Throne, as he usually did, and sometimes, Sansa found herself wondering how he could be so comfortable in that chair, glaring down at his subjects like the terror that he was. He was grinning, too, looking different from the last time that she had seen him, though she could not say just what it was that made him seem different.

Her eyes were not wholly for him, however.

Margaery sat in a high-backed chair just to the right of the throne, prim and proper and every inch the lady, hands clasped neatly in her lap. She was wearing the crown that had been placed on her head on her wedding day, tied into an intricate weave of hair that wrapped itself around her head and cascaded down her back, and Sansa noticed that, woven into it were strands of shimmering gold.

The gown she wore was a dark red; Lannister colors, with green and gold stitching around the low throat, looking like vines reaching up to choke her, Sansa couldn't help but think. The sleeves were sheer and green as well, glinting in the light of the throne room and going just below Margaery's elbows.

It reminded Sansa of something that Cersei might wear, though Margaery wore it better.

She was beautiful, with not a hint of the ugliness that Sansa had been expecting after so much time spent in Joffrey's company.

For a long moment, she was confused as to how that could be; perhaps she was imagining this Margaery, because the truth was too horrible for her mind to bear, but Sansa blinked, and there Margaery remained, as beautiful and untouched as she had been a moment before.

"There, you see?" Shae whispered in her ear, centering Sansa once more. "Your queen looks quite well."

Sansa nodded absently, still confused, remembering a half-dozen threats Joffrey had made to her, about what he would do to her on the night of their wedding, back when she had still been engaged to be married to him.

Then she realized Shae's wording, and blushed. "She is not my queen."

Shae huffed a laugh. "Of course, my lady."

Sansa rolled her eyes, the tension leaving her for a moment before Joffrey was speaking, and she found herself straining to hear, despite that normally she shied away from his words out of revulsion, if nothing else.

"One of my people has a grievance for me," Joffrey announced loudly, waving an impatient hand, and a man in rags, clearly one of the smallfolk, was shoved forwards by two Kingsguard then, nearly quaking in his boots.

Sansa sighed.

Joffrey rolled his eyes toward Ser Meryn. "If this one bores me as much as the last one did, Ser Meryn, you'll bring me his boring tongue, and his cock. We'll see which one is more useful on my supper plate. Who is he?" Joffrey asked, looking bored already.

Ser Meryn dipped his head, his voice sending a shiver down Sansa's spine as he responded just loudly enough for her to hear, "Yes, Your Grace. A peasant we found besmirching the Queen's name in the streets," he supplied, always so helpful to his king. "You ordered anyone besmirching your queen's name to be arrested."

Sansa raised an eyebrow at that, wondering at the cause behind such an order, for Joffrey had certainly always enjoyed hearing a bit of cruel gossip about Sansa, when she was his lady.

Joffrey turned a cold glare on the man standing before him, the damned man's fear making more sense now, though of course it was healthy to maintain when standing before Joffrey, and Sansa could see a bit of excitement in the king's eyes.

It had been a little while since he'd had someone to torment, judging by the state of Margaery's skin.

"How dare you speak ill of the queen?" Joffrey demanded, "Of my queen? Tell me, peasant, do you not enjoy having your head?"

He laughed then, loud and ringing, at the threat, at the little man cowering in response to it.

Joffrey glanced at Margaery and, almost not in time, the girl laughed as well, her laughter warm and musical and full in the Great Hall.

Sansa thought that she might be sick.

Prince Oberyn, standing not so far away, looked equally so, though not by Margaery's reaction, perhaps, so much as Joffrey himself. He bent down, whispering something in Ellaria Sand's ear, before looking straight up at Sansa.

Sansa flushed and glanced away.

The arrested man was still talking, and she forced herself to focus on his words.

"Your Grace," the little man said, not quite daring to look up at his king. "The Good Queen Margaery promised the scraps of the wedding feast to the smallfolk of King's Landing," the man said, voice growing louder with each word.

Sansa wondered why the smallfolk ever bothered coming before their king with complaints anymore. Hadn't they learned their lesson by now?

Joffrey waved a hand when the man paused. "I am aware of it," he said, turning and smiling at his queen, who smiled back, just as bright as though he had handed her the sun, with that look. "My lady is very kind."

"She is," the little man agreed, "but her promised scraps never arrived. Many of the smallfolk, well, we were wondering, because so many of us are hungry, why-" his voice broke then, and he swallowed hard.

Sansa's eyes narrowed when she saw the smirk Cersei turned on a very pale Margaery, then.

Joffrey frowned, looking rather bemused, and for a moment Sansa caught herself waiting for him to wonder aloud why in the seven hells he should care about a few dead peasants, or a queen's promise to them, so she was rather surprised to hear him say, "Are you accusing my lady of lying?"

The man hurriedly shook his head. "No, Your Grace, no-"

"Well, why did it never arrive?" Joffrey asked, leaning forward in his chair, suddenly seeming interested in the proceedings.

"We don't know, Your Grace, that's why-"

Joffrey raised a hand, silencing him. "I wasn't asking you," he said, annoyance bleeding into his tone, and the man seemed to curl even further in on himself, though Sansa could not imagine why.

There was a long, awkward pause, during which Sansa could have made a clear guess at what had happened to that food, though truly she wondered why Joffrey seemed to care at all.

He had never cared for the plights of the smallfolk before this, and she thought that he would usually have ordered off the man's head by now, rather than simply hinting at it.

"Ah," a bumbling voice from the back of the crowd of nobles sounded then, and Sansa watched Maester Pycelle's slow progression to the front of the throne room warily, for she knew that he was always for the Lannisters and would not dare to speak an ill word of Cersei, but that he would not dare to do anything the king did not wish, either.

How a few scraps of food were so important, Sansa did not know, and she glanced once more at the Queen Mother, this time in confusion.

If her lord husband were here, Sansa had no doubt that Lord Tyrion would be making some witty remarks about the gravity of this situation, and that perhaps she might be doing something far more entertaining than watching Cersei.

Cersei looked almost as pale as Margaery had, at the mention of the missing food, her hard glare directed toward Maester Pycelle too far away for his old eyes to see, though Sansa had a clear view of it.

"It appears there has been some confusion as to that matter, to no one's fault," the maester said, clearing his throat and glancing around awkwardly, but seeming to come to the conclusion that he was on his own here, when Cersei did not even deign to look at him. "And perhaps that is why the food never found it's destination."

Joffrey once again looked bored, slouching in his throne and picking at his fingernails. "Well?"

"The Queen Mother gave orders for the scraps to be given to the dogs, while the queen ordered for the scraps to be given to the poor," the maester said sagely, as though his words were the beginning of all wisdom, and Sansa barely refrained from rolling her eyes. "There was simply...confusion."

Joffrey's eyes narrowed on his mother for a long moment, but then he turned to Ser Meryn once more, evidently wishing to be done with this display. "Then I have a solution," he said, a dark glee filling his voice which instantly made Sansa nervous. "Slaughter the dogs, and give them to the poor." He laughed. "They can eat them, instead!"

"Your Grace..." the pathetic little creature standing before the throne began to beg, falling to his knees and holding his hands out in supplication.

Sansa sighed once more.

Joffrey lofted to his feet, glaring. "Silence! I've not done with you yet. You still insulted my lady. What did he say, Ser Meryn?"

Ser Meryn was only too quick with his answer. "He called Her Grace a liar and accused her of being a lying whore, as well."

"There," Joffrey said, frowning. "And you are neither of those things, are you, my lady?" He didn't wait for a response. "So," he said, glaring at the man on the floor, "I ought to make an example of you. Perhaps...yes, perhaps I will have your tongue and cock cut off. After your head. What do you think, my lady? Will your name survive that?"

Joffrey turned, leering at his queen now, and the whole court seemed to freeze as Lady Margaery stood, walked to stand beside her husband.

She held out her hand, and he took it, and Sansa wondered how she could voluntarily touch such a creature.

"I think that you are most wise, my love," she murmured, with that bright smile she used when talking about how she cared for the smallfolk so.

Then she leaned forward, and kissed him on the mouth, an open kiss that had Joffrey arching toward her, looking almost desperate when she pulled away.

Sansa was beginning to understand why their new queen was not covered in bruises, this woman such a contrast from the kind woman who had befriended her almost immediately upon coming to King's Landing, reminding Sansa eerily of how even Cersei had been kind to her, in the beginning.

Ser Meryn reached out and dragged the accused to his feet, blubbering and begging.

Sansa felt her breakfast coming up in her throat just as Margaery and Joffrey stopped for air, and the next grievance came forward.

She understood, to some extent, why there was so much relief when Margaery was married to Joffrey rather than Sansa. It was not because the nobles of King's Landing cared at all about her, but rather because Margaery had a way with Joffrey that none other could understand.

Sansa understood that, to some extent, Margaery was meant to control him, to keep him from doing anything too horrid whilst serving as a petty distraction while the Small Council ruled Westeros in his name. Which was why he was dealing with rabble rousers insulting his queen rather than more important matters, such as the war with Stannis Baratheon.

She was supposed to curb his tendencies for sadism, certainly, not encourage them. Not join him in them.

"I...need to leave," she told Shae, who nodded in understanding, after searching her face.

"Of course," she murmured, going in front of Sansa to clear the way rather more quickly, and Sansa followed after her, glad that the proceedings below were too interesting for any eyes, for once, to be on her, instead.

But then she turned in the doorway, one last time, and saw their new queen's eyes following her, their indiscernible depths clouded.

Sansa wondered, as she walked away, which Margaery was the real one.


	6. SANSA VI

"Your friend the new queen seems to be making quite a stir at Court," her lord husband said as they dined together that afternoon. The meeting of the Small Council had gone much faster than usual, and this perhaps due to the fact that their king was back to his

Sansa swallowed, the food in her mouth suddenly dry and tasteless. "So she is."

"There's bets going around, probably not appropriate for young ladies such as yourself, wondering how she manages to keep Joffrey on the leash she has him on," Tyrion went on. "Or how long it'll take for the Two Terrors to kill everyone in King's Landing. I do not think it was anyone's intention to give him a queen who would _not_ reign him back."

Sansa took a long sip of wine.

He gave her a long, knowing look. "Lady Sansa, the new queen is just as much a subject of these games as the rest of us. Perhaps more so."

Sansa knew that, of course. Knew that Margaery laughed and smiled prettily at the horrid little creature she was wed to because to do otherwise would be foolish, would endanger her very existence. Knew that Margaery was smarter than she had been in doing so, and that Joffrey listened to her more so than anyone.

But it was still horrifying to see Margaery laugh at another man's distress, to see her kiss Joffrey after he had done the things he'd done, to think of her lying in his bed and telling him that he was the king in her pretty tones, encouraging him...

"We are to have a visitor, tonight, over supper," Tyrion announced presently, and Sansa blinked up at him from where Shae was combing her hair.

"Oh?" she affected an air of disinterest, for usually when her lord husband had a visitor, it was someone like Lord Varys or Ser Jaime, and she was kindly bid to go wander the gardens, or whatever it was that she did all day, while they talked alone.

She was not normally invited to such gatherings herself, and, for the most part, Sansa was pleased to miss them.

"Prince Oberyn Martell," Tyrion said, giving her a long, searching look. "He, ah, rather invited himself."

Sansa blinked at him. "Ah. Would you like me to leave then, when he arrives?"

Tyrion hesitated. "I think, my lady, if you are willing, that a fresh face would do you good." He cleared his throat. "Be warned though, that Prince Oberyn is rather...different from most lords whom you might be used to."

Sansa squinted at him. "He's not the only lord I know who frequents the brothels, my lord."

Tyrion cleared his throat a tad more loudly, this time. "Yes, well. All the same. It is very likely that he is visiting us because he wants something of us. Do remember that he is known as a viper."

"You are known as an Imp," Sansa pointed out, not quite sure whether she was teasing him or not.

"Yes," he agreed, glancing at her cautiously, as if he did not understand where her words were going, either.

She smiled, presently. "Don't worry. I won't give you cause for concern. I have no interest in the Prince of Dorne."

She was Sansa Stark, after all. She was terrible at playing politics as the rest of King's Landing did, and Dorne was so very far away.

Tyrion looked relieved. "Good," he said, and she glanced at him with a raised eyebrow. "I mean..."

Sansa snorted. Then, "I was wondering..." she chewed on her lower lip nervously, "If you would teach me how to play that game from the Free Cities?"

He blinked at her, looking rather surprised. "Cyvasse?" he clarified, and Sansa nodded, forcing a smile.

He had mentioned the game in passing more than once, having gotten it from the ships newly arrived from Pentos, a strategy game that the Pentoshi and the people of Dorne loved and that had not quite caught on yet in Westeros, for here they liked games with higher stakes.

Sansa had blown him off each time, not wishing to be forced into his company alone long enough for the duration of a game.

"I think...it is a very thoughtful game," she said carefully. "I could use something else to think about."

Tyrion stared at her for a long moment, and then clapped his hands together. "Yes," he said, rather too gleefully, she thought, and wondered with a small pang of guilt easily pushed aside whether he had not found anyone else in King's Landing to play this new game with. "Very well."

He hurried over to where the board and pieces were stashed in a drawer in the far side of the room and brought them back to their dining table, and Sansa sat down once more, smoothing out her skirts and pretending, for a moment, that she was as good an actress as Margaery.

At least her husband was easily pleased, though Sansa had a feeling that was due more to her harsh treatment of him in the beginning of their marriage than because her agreeing to spend time with him now.

She had come to accept that her husband did not want her carnally, and was just as willing as she to keep what could hardly be called their relationship platonic, and was still able to be kind to her when others were not looking.

She did not understand it, of course, for Cersei had once told her that men wanted nothing from a woman than what was between her legs, but she had come to accept it nonetheless.

"How do you play?" she asked skeptically, looking down at the many different pieces, hers jade and his ivory, as her husband sat down across from her and began arranging the pieces on the board.

"It is a game of strategy," Tyrion explained, "And everyone may play it a bit differently. The goal of the game is to kill my king before I kill yours, and to defeat as many of my pieces as you can before then with your own."

It reminded her of one or two games she had played back home, in Winterfell, though they had looked much different than this one. Much simpler.

Perhaps her lord husband thought that she could learn something from this game.

Perhaps she could.

Sansa squinted at the checkered board as her husband finished setting up the pieces, and then reached for his wine.

She reached out then, not entirely sure what possessed her, and put a hand on his pudgy arm. "Perhaps...wait until the game is over," she said quietly, remembering Shae's words that she could ask what she liked of him and he would be like to give it to her. "Keep your head clear."

He stared at her for a long moment, and then laughed, low in his throat. "It is a dangerous thing, to tell a Lannister to set aside their wine," he said, and Sansa swallowed hard. He seemed to realize then, that his joke had fallen flat, and sighed, pushing the wine to the side of the table and glancing at it mournfully every two or three turns.

Sansa breathed in relief.

She had not been able to make herself comfortable around those so comfortable with wine after seeing its effect on the Queen Cersei, and no matter how hard he tried, Sansa still imagined Lord Tyrion filling with drink and forcing himself on her.

She remembered his pretended drunkeness at their wedding, how he had startled her so when she realized that he was not as drunk as he claimed.

And she felt something...almost warm inside her, at the sight of him doing something just for her, even though she knew she should not care at all.

Very few people indulged Sansa Stark these days, though.

It took her a few turns to get the hang of the game, Tyrion patiently explaining why she couldn't make certain moves or why he had been able to take one of her pieces, and Sansa unsure whether she was beginning to understand better or simply becoming more confused.

"But...that's the elephant," Sansa said finally, dumbfounded, as his last elephant took her dragon. "Why is it so powerful?"

She had heard of elephants, read about them. They lived in the South, in Essos and the lands beyond that. They were great, huge creatures, lored for their wisdom but not for their strength, sometimes ridden into battles but generally deemed too docile for actual fighting, unlike dragons and horses.

Tyrion gave her a pained smile. "I think that the creators of this game understood that, as in life, there are pieces that can become useful because they are overlooked."

Sansa glanced up at him, wondered if that was some secret code that she did not understand, and was startled by a knock on the door to their chambers.

She had not realized how long they had been playing the game, and she glanced toward the door, realizing she was in fact hungry.

Her lord husband sighed, getting to his feet and walking to answer the door with one last hesitant look back at Sansa.

Prince Oberyn and his lady friend, Ellaria Sand, or, the 'Dorne bastard,' as she had Cersei call the woman more than once, stood just outside the door, the prince whispering something in Ellaria's ear that made her trill a laugh.

Sansa stood to her feet, once again smoothing down her dress and feeling foolish that she had gotten so wrapped up in the game that she had forgotten they were having guests.

Her mother would have reprimanded her for not at least changing before greeting them, for not being a better hostess, even if only this small chamber in the Red Keep partially belonged to her.

That thought quenched the sudden feeling of hunger in her stomach.

Ellaria Sand was beautiful, as she always was, dressed in an almost-sheer golden gown with no sleeves and a plunging neckline that accentuated her dark skin, her hair pulled back into a severely beautiful netted wrap, and her eyes lined with black.

Her lover was equally as beautiful, Sansa could not help but think, blushing when he turned his gaze on her. His shirt was open, revealing a finely toned, lean chest, and Sansa found herself having a difficult time not looking at the fine hairs there.

"I hope that you do not mind that I have brought my paramour, Ellaria," Oberyn said, his voice deceptively mild, as he stepped into their rather cramped quarters.

Tyrion shook his head, even sending the woman a wide smile. "Not at all, not at all. Welcome, my lady."

She snorted. "I am not a lady. I find myself being called that far too often, in this place."

Sansa had been told that Arya more resembled her aunt Lyanna than anyone in their family, that she was the spitting image, and acted quite a bit as she had back then, too.

Tyrion glanced between the two of them, looking unsure. "My apologies, then," he said, voice one that Sansa recognized as slightly amused.

Prince Oberyn turned to her then, nodding his head demurely.

"Lady Stark," Prince Oberyn greeted her, his voice rather stiff.

Tyrion did not bother to correct him on the title, for which Sansa was rather relieved, even as she awkwardly curtseyed and took her seat, not quite looking at either of their guests.

She had never been Lady Stark, after all. That was her mother, dead now, and she had been wed to Lord Tyrion before she could be named Lady Stark in her mother's stead.

As if anyone would have allowed that.

"Prince Oberyn. Ellaria Sand," she said primly, and ignored the flush on her face when she heard his lady's trill of quiet laughter, quickly quelched.

Sansa had been told that Arya more resembled her aunt Lyanna than anyone in their family, that she was the spitting image, and acted quite a bit as she had back then, too.

She wondered, if, when Prince Oberyn looked at her, he saw her aunt, anyway.

"You are playing cyvasse," Prince Oberyn said suddenly, squinting at the board that still lay out on the table, the pieces still in place.

"Attempting to," Tyrion quipped, with a self-conscious grin. "I am afraid neither of us are quite skilled at it as your people must be, in Dorne."

"That is not what I have heard of you, Lord Tyrion," Prince Oberyn said coolly, "Or are the rumors of your work at Blackwater Bay unfounded?"

Sansa could not be sure, but she almost thought that her husband looked embarrassed at the compliment.

It must have been difficult, to be the hated child of the Lannisters, growing up.

That thought, of course, reminded her of Jon, of how he had grown up, and her sympathy for her lord husband vanished in the next instant.

Still, she found herself suggesting, "Perhaps we should eat," and clapping her hands for Shae and Pod to bring their food.

Her husband looked somewhat relieved. "Yes, of course," he said, and Shae and Pod suddenly appeared, making Sansa wonder if they had been there the whole time, and, if so, why they had not intruded earlier.

Her hsuband certainly was not one to stand on ceremony.

The food was simple enough fare, Sansa thought when they were all sitting to eat it, Tyrion and Sansa across a low table on the floor from Ellaria and Oberyn, who did not seem at all put out to be seated on cushions. Rice and roast goat and peppers and other vegetables, as well as a roll of bread each and a glass of wine.

Sansa had found it rather disconcerting, the first couple of times, though she found it much more comfortable to sit on the floor, now.

After all, it took much longer for her lord husband to stand from the floor than it did from a chair, and she could usually get to her feet before him.

Her lord husband and Prince Oberyn were speaking of Small Council matters that held no interest for her, despite that she knew on some level that they should. She had spent so long pretending to be the empty headed little dove, finding politics dangerous and thus uninteresting, that she was beginning to become afraid that it was the truth.

And Ellaria Sand was staring at her, unblinking and intently, with an expression on her face that Sansa could not quite read, but which disturbed her nevertheless.

She picked at her food with a fork, trying very hard not to meet the other woman's eyes.

"I have decided to remain a little while longer in King's Landing, though the wedding is over," Prince Oberyn said, and, though she had not dared to lift her eyes to meet his, Sansa got the distinct impression that he was staring directly at her, too, "I have business here yet."

She wondered if Prince Oberyn looked at her and saw Lyanna Stark, even so.

Tyrion cleared his throat, not seeming to notice. "My father has appointed you to the Small Council permanently, I understand, as an honor to Dorne."

Prince Oberyn sounded amused as he said, "Yes. I would be remiss in my duties to His Grace if I left so soon, without annother appointed in my place of suitable rank."

"There are very few who can match the title of prince," Tyrion pointed out amiably.

Oberyn smirked. "Indeed, there are not."

"However, with the end of the wedding, there is no real reason for you to stay," Tyrion said, and, for some reason that Sansa could not understand, he sounded almost sympathetic, as if anyone would want to stay in this place. "Your presence can be felt just as fully here as in Dorne."

"I found the ceremony distasteful," Oberyn spoke up, voice and eyes hard. Sansa had begun to wonder if he would not speak again, and jolted when he did. "And I would not have come were it not a slight upon our king to do otherwise."

"Our new king is very young," Tyrion said, sounding almost like he was flailing, then, and Sansa took pity on him, before the Prince and his paramour could go on.

There was not much that one could say to excuse the actions of Joffrey the Illborn, anyway.

"The Queen looked beautiful," Sansa said, causing three sets of eyes to turn to her, before remembering that she didn't like such attention and slinking down in her seat.

"The decor was lovely," Ellaria agreed, "Did the Tyrells fund it?"

The hidden insult was there, and Sansa wondered if her husband simply didn't see it or chose to ignore it. She suspected the latter.

"Queen Margaery is much beloved by her family," he said, instead of answering, though Sansa supposed that that was an answer in and of itself.

Oberyn nodded. "Her brother, Lord Willas Tyrell, has intimated as much to me in our letters."

"You write to him?" Sansa asked in some surprise, before remembering her resolve not to care about such things, and flushing.

Margaery had wanted to marry her to Willas Tyrell, ship her away to Highgarden where her claim to the North could be exploited without Lannister interference. Cersei Lannister was now to marry Willas. He held no more interest to Sansa.

Oberyn eyed her, looking just as surprised as she had been by the question. "We have a mutual love of horses," he explained, and Sansa nodded, as if that explained much more than it did. "I understand that you and Queen Margaery are friends in much the same manner."

Sansa flushed, though she wasn't certain why she did so, wondering what the Prince had meant by that.  "Yes," she agreed, "We..." she paused, suddenly unsure how to finish that sentence. They were friends, yes, but were they still, after what Sansa had seen in the throne room?

"My condolensces, then," Prince Oberyn muttered, and Sansa's eyes widened while Ellaria elbowed her paramour.

"You must forgive my lover," she said, leaning forward, "He has no sense of discretion."

Prince Oberyn laughed lightly. "As if you are any better, my dear."

Ellaria laughed, and the conversation steered into safer waters.

Sansa found herself wondering what it was like, to love someone as wholly as these two seemed to love each other, even when neither was bound by the weight of a marriage.

She started as Lord Tyrion reached forward to refill her wine, and he paused, glancing at her in some concern, and he was not the only one to do so.

He removed his hand from the wine flask, and Shae stepped forward to refill her cup instead, Sansa blushing crimson before  taking a long gulp of the stuff, figuring she rather needed it, now.


	7. SANSA VII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahh! Sorry for the long wait, guys. I've been super busy lately, but I'll try not to leave you guys hanging for so long again.

When one recieved an invitation to dine with the King and the Queen, it would be foolish to refuse.

That was what Sansa told herself as she let Shae tie up her hair into an elaborate bun that might have rivalled one of Margaery's own hairstyles, let her dress Sansa in a gown of pure blue starlight, what she thought as she slipped into a pair of pale white slippers.

Her lord husband blinked when he saw her, standing from where he had been sitting on the sofa, swallowing loudly into the ensuing silence, and Sansa blushed, glancing down at her hands and thus being able to pretend she didn't see the look Shae shot his way.

"Right. Uhm, Lady Sansa, you look..." he cleared his throat again, and then offered his arm out to her. "Shall we?"

Sansa lifted a brow at that, wondering, and glanced down at his trousers, to see them tented. She blushed and quickly looking away, though she did offer up her arm.

Behind her, she could almost hear Shae steaming, and bit back a smile at her fierce protector's annoyance.

The meal was to be had in one of the many extra dining halls connected to the King's chambers, which Sansa had once thought so exciting and now found as frivolous as her husband seemed to.

Shae could not go with them, of course, for there would be servants there for that purpose, and Sansa had seen the rather heated argument that she and Lord Tyrion had gotten into over it, and wondered why her lord husband allowed a servant to speak to him that way, even as she felt a sort of warmness within her to know that someone cared as much as Shae did.

In the end, propriety had won out, and Shae had not spoken a word since, save for to Sansa in soft whispers about her clothes and hair.

Sansa did not know how many were attending, beyond the members of House Lannister, but she hoped that the gathering was small.

She did not wish to be stared at by the Prince of Dorne and his lady again. Their stares were damning, reminded her that she was not just a sad, hopeless girl in King's Landing.

They were nearly to the already loud dining hall when they were intercepted.

Sansa stiffened upon seeing the white cloak of the Kingsguard, but her lord husband smiled widely, seeming to forget her presence completely as he walked forward to greet his brother.

"Jaime. I see we're both late."

"Tyrion," Ser Jaime said, grinning impishly at his little brother as he joined them. "I am surprised you showed up, after the last one."

The words were harsh, though their tone was not, but her lord husband did not seem at all offended by them, as Sansa imagined he might have done had Cersei or Lord Tywin uttered them.

Tyrion instead raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. "It was a royal summons."

Jaime had the grace to look slightly chagrined. "The King's in a good mood. I think this new queen is...good for him."

Sansa flinched.

Tyrion smirked. "She certainly seems his equal."

Ser Jaime cracked a smile at that, and then gestured with his golden hand for them to proceed him.

Sansa had not seen the Hand since his return to King's Landing, and could not help but to glance at it, hoping he did not see her stare, as she passed him.

She wondered if it was indeed made of solid gold.

The servants pulled the doors to the dining hall open, and they stepped through, Sansa taking a deep breath and blinking when she noticed Tyrion do the same.

"Ah, Uncle!" Joffrey's loud, nasally voice shouted out as they entered, and it took Sansa a moment to find him, amidst the sea of blonde hair surrounding the rather large dining table.

She was strangely relieved to see that, beyond Margaery, there were only Lannisters here, though she did not know why it should be a relief, to find herself in a den of lions.

"We were beginning to think you wouldn't come," Joffrey said, a veiled threat in the words, "But of course I know you would never disappoint my new bride."

Tyrion dipped his head to Margaery, and then started toward his seat, pulling Sansa along beside him, and she barely refrained from stumbling as she followed.

Thankfully, Joffrey seemed too preoccupied with Lady Margaery to continue tormenting his uncle.

Ser Jaime sat down to Sansa's side, beside Cersei, which didn't surprise Sansa, though she was somewhat glad for the barrier, for she was not quite as frightened by the Kingslayer as she was by Cersei.

Tyrion took a seat between Sansa and little Prince Tommen, Sansa noticing that the three of them were as far from Joffrey as it was possible to get, at this table.

"Uncle Tyrion," Tommen gave his uncle a wide smile as Tyrion sat down beside the boy, and Sansa could not help but smile herself.

Tommen was such a sweet child, despite being part of such a horrible famliy, that she could never find it within herself to hate him.

She wondered when that would change.

The thought turned Sansa's previous resolve to indifference for the party about her, and she sighed as the courses were brought, and the wine poured.

In her mind, the Rains of Castamere played loudly.

She picked at the food on her plate, for suddenly the meat appeared bloody.

The others had begun eating with relish, however; Ser Jaime with an appetite that made  her nose twitch as she glanced quickly away from him.

She hardly remembered the knight who had come to Winterfell and gone to fight against her brother Robb, but she did not think she could quite compare him with the man who had finally come back, years later, and it was not just because of the hand.

She supposed that, after years in captivity, one would eat whatever they could get their hands on.

The thought was, strangely, funny to her, for, while Ser Jaime scarfed down every last piece of the food on his plate, she, still a captive, could not bring herself to take a single bite.

She noticed Lord Tywin giving her an assessing glance then, and took a long sip of bitter wine, not meeting his eyes.

Sansa did not think that Lord Tywin had ever relaxed, for he sat as stiff and alert now as he always did in the throne room, picking up his silver fork and knife almost daintily when he cut into the quail on his plate.

The chatter about them had died down as they ate, but Sansa could see the way the Queen Mother was itching to speak long before she turned her attentions fully on the Lady Margaery.

Cersei sent Margaery a cold smile. "I imagine you are finding your new life very exhausting, Lady Magaery. You are...quite pale."

Margaery glanced up, smiling brightly across the table. Sansa did not know how anyone who had spent any extended amount of time in King's Landing could smile so.

"Oh, on the contrary," she said, all too sweetly. "I find I am having far too much enjoyment in my first days of wedded bliss to my beloved king to even allow myself to succumb to tiredness."

Tyrion guffawed into his drink, and Cersei pursed her lips.

"I felt that way too, at first," she said, and Tyrion looked to be choking, then, "But it will pass. Being a queen is not so glamorous as those first few lovely days."

"I think she was referring to the nights," Tyrion muttered, and Sansa coughed into her sleeve, Lord Tywin sending them a stern look from across the table, as though they were recalcitrant children.

Joffrey ignored them. "My queen," his arm wrapped posessively around Margaery's lithe waist, "will have a different experience from yours, Mother. And she'll be quite content."

Margaery smiled at him, dimples puckering her cheeks. "Quite so, my love. I already am."

"I expect I'll have a child in my queen's belly by the next moon," Joffrey said, squeezing Margaery's arm in what strangely looked like affection.

Cersei smiled coolly, taking a long sip of her wine. "I am glad for you, Your Grace."

He smirked, attention focusing on Sansa now as he let go of Margaery. "Perhaps you'll have a Lannister babe by then, too, and the both of you can deliver together. They could be brothers."

"In spirit only, I'd imagine," Tyrion said mildly, a warning in his tone that Joffrey would no doubt forget to heed.

"Oh, yes," he said, his eyes dancing with mirth, "Like Mother and Cousin Lancel."

Sansa figured she'd missed out on that particular joke, if the way Ser Jaime's one good hand clenched was any indication.

"More meat pie, my love?" Margaery interrupted then, smiling her dazzling, fake smile to her husband and holding out a platter.

She had never smiled that way to Sansa, and Sansa found herself relieved, for, though it was a beautiful smile, even she, less adept at court games than anyone at court, could see that it was not a genuine one.

It was not like the smiles that Margaery gave her as they walked the gardens, nor like the smiles that she gave her when they were gossiping, nor like the ones she gave her when smirking about one of their little secrets.

Those were real. And they had been for Sansa, even if she might never see them again.

This Margaery was not.

Somehow, knowing that seemed to help with the horror she had been feeling at Margaery's expense and provocation, over the last few days.

Joffrey turned to his queen, smiling in a way that was almost shy as he opened his mouth and ate the food off of the fork, and Margaery's eyes danced.


	8. SANSA VIII

Joffrey was laughing when Sansa stepped onto the dais, where she had been summoned, interrupting a live performance by actors that had no doubt come a very long way to perform before their child king.

She wondered if it was because he had seen her, or the performance he watched was so amusing.

No one else was laughing.

There were courtiers milling about as well, sitting in long chairs and sofas, partaking in grapes and other snacks, but, as always, it was Margaery who caught Sansa's eye, seated in the same loveseat as the king, eating candied roses out of his hand and wearing a gown made of pure silver, its plunging neckline not serving as enough of a distraction to their young king.

Sansa hardly noticed those around her, as she stepped nimbly forward and curtseyed before Joffrey, as she was meant to, her face burning, for she knew well what was coming.

She had already endured Cersei's taunts when she awoke this morning, the woman not even giving her the time to prepare herself to face the cruel world about her before bursting into her room to speak of them.

_"My father has summoned Tyrion," she said, brushing into the room and glowering at the bed that Sansa lay in as though it had done her a personal grievance. "To speak with."_

_Sansa flushed, pulling the sheets up around her and wondering where Shae was. "I do not know-"_

_"He wants to know why there isn't a Lannister baby in your belly," Cersei said, and Sansa wondered if it was possible to be drunk this early in the morning, before the sun had even risen._

_If Cersei ever stopped being drunk._

_"My brother isn't exactly known for his chasteness," Cersei continued, ignoring the way that Sansa had suddenly paled, "So, you see, it's most strange. Perhaps, despite all of his whoring, he really is impotent."_

_Sansa was flushing crimson, by then._

_Cersei eyed her coldly over her glass of wine. "If I were you, I would hurry it along in any way I could, little dove. Before my father gets it into his head that there must be a witnessed consummation to your tragic little marriage."_

"I heard my lord grandfather reprimanded my uncle for his ill treatment of you today, loudly enough that everyone heard, I think."

Joffrey giggled, squeezing Margaery's hand. Hard. Their new queen, however, merely smiled; though today it was rather brittle. "Something about...Oh, what was it, my lady?"

"Lord Tywin believes that the marriage between you and Lord Tyrion is not what it should be. Is not...wholly genuine," Margaery responded dutifully, and was rewarded with another candied rose placed on her tongue, and Sansa indulged in a black moment of hate toward the other girl, even if she knew that there was naught else that Margaery could do.

Joffrey giggled, standing to his feet and seeming to forget his lady wife. "What, my lord uncle isn't whetting his cock on you? I find that hard to believe. Settle this matter for us at once, Lady Sansa."

"My lord husband is most dutiful in his actions toward me," Sansa lied, and it wasn't really a lie, not truly.

He was kind to her, as a husband ought to be, and, she knew, protected her from Joffrey as best as he was able.

She had not seen him since the day before, and knew that, had she, he would have comforted her in all of this, reassured her that he had no wish to take advantage of her in such a way, that he would find some other way out of this.

But she had not seen him.

And she did not know that for certain.

Joffrey smirked, leaning forward until his bowed lips pressed against her skin, making her feel sickly. "Does he rape you each night, hoping to put a Lannister baby in you?"

Sansa shivered, swallowed hard. "Your Grace-"

"My love, perhaps we should continue with the entertainment before the food grows cold-" Margaery spoke up then, but Joffrey raised a hand, silencing her, eyes never leaving Sansa's.

"Answer me."

"Yes, Your Grace. He...he does his duty."

"He rapes you," Joffrey corrected, grinning gleefully. "Every night. Say it."

"He rapes me," Sansa repeated dutifully, not meeting her king's eyes, wondering what would happen to her if she killed him now, in front of so many witnesses.

She saw Prince Oberyn Martell, sitting with his paramour, as her eyes flitted from face to face, watching her intently, as he had when he had dined with them just a few nights earlier.

She would use the fork on his plate. Stab it into Joffrey's neck, and watch the fevered light die in his eyes.

The Kingsguard wouldn't even have time to stop her; he was standing so close now.

"Mayhap you don't like the idea of having a dwarven babe," Joffrey mused then. "I've told you the story of how my uncle ripped through my grandmother. Maybe you'll have a dwarven babe too, if he gives you a child, and a Lannister will finally kill you." His eyes sparkled. "Do you wash out your cunt every night, so his seed won't take?"

Sansa shook her head, eyes wide. "No, Your Grace. I would never-"

Joffrey giggled again. "Maybe someone else could give you a Lannister babe. Maybe you should beg your king to do it himself. At least then you wouldn't birth a dwarf."

Sansa glanced at the fork again, wondered if anyone would stop her if she stabbed it into her own neck.

"To ask such a thing of Your Grace would be presumptuous," Sansa pointed out primly. "I would never take advantage of Your Grace in such a way."

Joffrey's eyes flashed in annoyance, before he waved a hand dismissively. "Well, in any case, you'll have a Lannister babe eventually. And my queen will likely have a son long before that."

Margaery stood, eyes sparkling with love. Sansa thought that perhaps it was the wine in her cup. "I pray daily to the gods for it, my love," she promised coolly, "For I know my duty to my husband."

Joffrey grinned, reaching forward and grabbing Sansa by the chin. "You see? You Starks, for all your talk of honor, you don't know a thing about duty. Your father committed treason against me. Your brother married some whore instead of a Frey; that's why they killed him, did you know? And you. You're supposed to give birth to Lannister babes to sit in Winterfell, and you haven't done your duty, Sansa."

Sansa swallowed, didn't dare to pull away. "I...I will try harder, Your Grace, as I told my husband today."

A lie, but she was getting better at those, she thought.

Hoped.

Joffrey laughed, looping an arm through Queen Margaery's when she reached for him and releasing Sansa. Sansa did not even know when Margaery had moved to stand so close to them.

"Yes, do that," he told her. "Maybe I'll pay you a visit if you don't."

"Oh, this is my favorite part!" Margaery cried gaily then, pointing to the actors who stood silently on the stage, waiting for their king's cue to continue, with a wide smile. "Oh, my love, you must watch."

Joffrey smirked at her. "If my lady insists," he said, guiding her back to their seats, and Sansa breathed a sigh of relief, even though it was short lived.

On the stage, the woman shook herself, remembering her part, and fell to the ground. Roses were strewn over her body; thorns pierced her skin, the king no doubt demanding the play to be as genuine as possible.

A nymph of the woods, being choked to death by thorns. Beauty in horrific death.

Joffrey laughed, clapping his hands together loudly, until the rest of the captive audience did so as well, though perhaps with less enthusiasm.

Save for Margaery, who clapped louder than anyone, her husband included, a secret smile on her face that Sansa couldn't read at all.


	9. SANSA IX

There were times that Sansa spent not locked away in the Red Keep and not walking through the gardens of King's Landing which the new Queen's family seemed to have adopted.

She knew that the Queen Mother would prefer to keep her locked away in the Red Keep at all times, and no doubt Joffrey would prefer to keep her in the Black Cells, but her lord husband and, surprisingly, Lord Tywin seemed to agree that this was not wise. There were those who still loved the Starks, and Westeros needed proof that their last Stark was alive, after all, and so, occasionally, Sansa was allowed out, with an armed escort and a servant, of course.

Before, when Princess Myrcella was still in King's Landing, before she had been sent to Dorne and the Queen had taken even more liberties with her toment of Sansa as a result, Sansa had often travelled with the girl into the city, or through the gardens.

She had much more freedom as a lady of the Princess' entourage than she now had, but she found that it was still very much worth it.

She had managed to avoid her husband since that fateful day when his father had taken him to task for not filling her with child. Shae was surprisingly helpful in that regard; Sansa would have thought the woman would have encouraged her to speak with him, to be reassured that he meant her no harm, but she had not done so once.

Today had been another opportunity to avoid her husband, one that Sansa had gladly taken, leaving before he had woken from his place on the sofa, a bottle of wine at his feet, and asking Shae to help her ready herself.

Her favorite dress, the pink one, had to be taken in.

Shae had held it together with pins, for Sansa had nothing else that fit better, just now.

Shae had not gone with her, however, for she had other duties within the Keep, and so Sansa had gone accompanied by one of the Tyrell handmaids, and she felt on edge around the other girl, who, beyond a few pleasantries, was largely silent.

They walked down the streets of King's Landing, and Sansa passed out alms to the poor, though she was painfully aware of the fact that she had far fewer of those now than she had in the past.

She did not know how far she walked before she came across Oberyn Martell.

She had not meant to traverse this part of King's Landing, on the outer edge of Flea Bottom, though she supposed that her daydreaming had taken some part in that.

He was leaving the whorehouse that was commonly known to belong to Lord Baelish, a cool smile on his face and a spring in his step as he walked, not a trace of guilt in him.

Sansa flushed, wondering if she should move to the opposite side of the road and hearing the Tyrell lady tut behind her in disapproval.

She wondered what Ellaria thought of this, for surely she must have known, given that Oberyn had a reputation for such things.

Did she pine away in their chambers, wondering what she had done to displease her lover, that he might find pleasure in another? Or did her legendary Dornish fire come forth when he returned to their chambers, demanding an explanation? Or perhaps she truly didn't care, as the Dornish were rumored not to, for she had another lover of her own.

Sansa wondered how that was possible, when the rest of Westeros took such matters so importantly.

She glanced up, and Prince Oberyn was standing right in front of her, a look on his face that she did not wish to interpret.

"Lady Sansa," he said, voice deep and somehow sympathetic, and Sansa flinched away from the sound instinctively.

"Prince Oberyn," she said lightly, not meeting his eyes and walking a bit faster, nonplussed when he began to walk faster as well, to catch up with her.

"How our little king treated you yesterday was disgraceful," Oberyn said then, and Sansa's eyes widened as she glanced back at her armed guard. Too far away to hear, but close enough to make her nervous as to their presence when others insulted the king.

More often than not, she was the one to pay for such things.

"Lady Rosamund," Sansa spoke up then, "Go and see that our escorts are well from the long journey."

Oberyn raised a brow, but Lady Rosamund seemed more than happy to flee, sending Oberyn an untrusting look.

"You cannot say such things," Sansa reprimanded softly, once they were more or less alone. "It is treason to question the king."

Oberyn sent her a rougish grin. "Is it?"

Something about the way he said those words made her flush. "Prince Oberyn-"

Prince Oberyn stepped forward, until he was standing so close that she could feel the heat from his body.

She took a step back, instinctively.

"Tell me truly, Lady Sansa, do you want to leave this place?" She stared at him. "The Lannisters can't keep you trapped here forever. In Dorne, we do not hurt little girls for sport. I think you would be much happier, there."

Sansa Stark of a year ago would have taken that offer. She was not even sure that she now would not take it. She wanted nothing more than to leave this horrid place, to escape King's Landing with whomever offered first.

But Dorne was in the south, and she did not want to escape only to go further from her homeland than she was now. Her dreams of late were filled with images of Winterfell, of home, and she knew that, if she ever left King's Landing, there was only one place that she could go.

And she had learned, in the past year that everyone wanted something; the Prince of Dorne would not offer refuge to the heir of Winterfell unless he wanted something out of it.

"I..." she stared at Prince Oberyn for a long, searching moment, before forcing a smile. “I am quite as content here as I think I would be anywhere, Prince Oberyn, though you are most kind to make such an offer."

Prince Oberyn looked shocked by the response, and then smiled sadly, cocking his head at her. "When you are lying, Lady Sansa, you betray the truth in your eyes. You would do best not to look at others then. Even had I not witnessed proof that you are unhappy here, your eyes give you away. You hate it here perhaps more than I."

Sansa felt her throat close with a sudden nervousness. "Prince Oberyn-"

"I have no wish to bring you harm, Lady Sansa," he interrupted, voice gentler even than her lord husband's, than Margaery's. "We in Dorne..."

"King's Landing is not Dorne," Sansa interrupted, surprised at her boldness. "I cannot imagine such a place."

She met his eyes, then.

Prince Oberyn nodded. "My sister, Elia, lived here for many years," he said, clasping his hands behind his back. "She was...so fiery, my dear sister, but so kind. I did not like the thought of her living here amongst the dragons. She was changed by them. Cowed, I think, though I only had the proof of this in her letters to me. And she died here." He looked up, met Sansa's eyes. "Your brothers are gone, sweet one, but I do not think that they would want you to die here, amongst the lions."

And really, what other choice did she have now? Perhaps it would be better to die amongst vipers, rather than lions.

Sansa felt breathless as she whispered, "Yes."

He lifted a brow. "Yes?"

"Yes, perhaps I would like to see Dorne," Sansa whispered, her voice shaking, and she hoped he understood the weight of her decision on her, "For a little. It won't be my home, though," she glanced around, seeing Lady Rosamund walking back towards them, "Just as King's Landing has never been."

Oberyn grinned at her. "I see that you have not lost your fieriness, Lady Stark."

She didn't smile. "It's Lady Sansa, Prince Oberyn," she corrected mildly. "Just Sansa."


	10. MARGAERY I

"Lady Sansa," Margaery breathed, in some surprise, coming to an abrupt halt and nearly causing her ladies to walk into her from behind.

Sansa stiffened, coming to a stop as well. "Your Grace," she said finally, after a long pause during which Margaery was worried the other girl would say nothing to her at all. She curtseyed lowly, not meeting Margaery's eyes.

Despite Sansa's words to her, Margaery still found herself disappointed. There had been a time when Sansa felt safe enough around her to simply call her Margaery, rather than by a title. When she had considered Margaery enough of a friend.

She had known beforehand at every instance where she had been forced to interact with Sansa since the wedding, knowing that her newfound place at Joffrey's side could hardly be taken well by the girl.

And, it could be admitted, in the safety of Margaery's thoughts, that there was a part of her that did not want to speak with Sansa, did not want to interact with her, seeing the anger smoldering just beneath the girl's surface, the betrayal.

Perhaps it was cowardly, but Margaery had never known herself to be particularly brave, not in the way that others counted bravery.

And yet, here she was, standing before Margaery with that look of recrimination that was slowly changing into one of bemusement as Margaery continued to stare at her in silence.

Margaery cleared her throat, glancing away first, gesturing for Sansa to stand. There were no platitudes today, no words that Sansa need not bow before her.

Margaery was her queen now, after all, and she suspected that Sansa would not have listened to such words, anyway.

"And where are you going in such a hurry, my lady?" she asked sweetly, ignoring the titters from her ladies behind her.

Sansa flushed. "I...to the library, Your Grace. Forgive me, might I continue?"

Margaery bit back a sigh. "Of course, Lady Sansa."

Another time, she might have invited Sansa to come with her as she walked, but she did not today, for she suspected that neither of them would enjoy the walk, nor would Sansa enjoy the outcome.

"Come along then, girls," she told her ladies, lifting her chin and passing Sansa as the girl remained in her curtsey to the side of the hall, doing her best to look as small as possible. "We shall leave the Lady Sansa to her devices."

Margaery Tyrell was not supposed to like Sansa Stark. The girl was naive and still put her hope in fairy tales, and did not understand that those who called themselves her friends were only so because it was convienent for them.

Margaery had only gotten close to Sansa because she was the only other young lady at Court near to Margaery in age, and such was expected of her, and because she knew that her family was thinking of a connection of a more permanent nature with the last heir of Winterfell.

Yet she had seen a secret sadness in Sansa Stark's eyes, in those early days when she had attempted to know the other girl, when Sansa had attempted to push her away, and that had drawn Margaery to her, despite her knowing that it should not.

And, like all people drawn to what they could not have, Margaery had pushed her away with one hand while reaching for her with the other.

She suddenly found herself even less enthusiastic about going to meet with the Queen Mother, per the woman's request. She was not sure that she could now play the part as well as she had been expecting to do so.

The long, winding walk the rest of the way to the Queen Mother's chambers was undertaken largely in silence, her ladies seeming to realize her sudden mood, though she was glad that they did not question her on it.

She might have taken the opportunity to pretend herself sick and return to her chambers, just so that she did not have to play games with her new goodmother this morning.

A member of the Kingsguard stood outside the Queen Mother's chambers when they arrived, leaning against the door and dozing softly.

Margaery cleared her throat subtly.

The Kingsguard - not Jaime Lannister today, and Margaery confessed herself rather surprised at that - stared at her with an almost bleary expression. "Your Grace?"

"The Queen Mother requested my presence," Margaery told the guard sweetly. "I believe she had some matter that she wished to speak of?"

The guard gave her a cursory glance, and then dipped his head. "I will go and see if Her Grace is ready for you."

Margaery did not let her smile slip until he had gone into the Queen Mother's chambers and closed the door behind him.

If Cersei thought that she could demand her new queen's presence at her whim, and then leave her waiting in the hall like some servant, she was mistaken.

A moment later, the door opened, and the guard bowed lowly. "Her Grace will recieve you now," he told her calmly, and Margaery forced her smile to return.

"Thank you," she said, sweeping into the Queen Mother's chambers alongside her ladies.

The door swung shut behind them, a rather ominous sound. Margaery could not shake the feeling that she was going to her own execution, rather than a meeting with her goodmother.

The Queen Mother's chambers had been...moved, after the marriage of Margaery and Joffrey. Margaery now resided in Cersei's old chambers, though she spent most of her nights in Joffrey's, for, while her husband did have a voracious appetite in the night, she also found herself uncomfortable sleeping in the same rooms where Cersei Lannister had once slept.

She hoped that Cersei felt just as uncomfortable in her much smaller chambers here. They certainly looked far less appealing.

Cersei was standing before a table ladden with food, dressed in a simple red dress with a lion embriodered on the bosom, her hands clasped together in front of her.

If Margaery didn't know that the Queen Mother was completely incapable of such an emotion, she might even say that Cersei was nervous.

That, in turn, made Margaery very nervous indeed.

"Your Grace," Cersei said, in a voice that hid her disdain for the young woman before her, "I thought we might speak while we broke our fast?" she gestured to the table, sitting just in the corner of her chambers.

Margaery gave her a dimpled smile. "I was hoping that you would suggest that," she confessed. "I am quite famished."

Cersei's smile was frozen on her face as she moved to sit, and then seemed to remember that she was not the highest ranking woman in the room any longer, and must first wait for Margaery to sit.

Margaery did so, slowly brushing out her rose covered gown and gesturing for her ladies to sit as well, a subtle smile on her face when she noticed that, once they had all sat, including the Queen Mother, they seemed to take up far more of the little room than she had first thought.

She was not above such petty vengeances, when they were undertaken in the safety of Margaery's own mind.

Cersei's servant moved forward to begin pouring their drinks, hands almost quivering as she did so, and Margaery thanked the girl, prompting her ladies to do the same as the serving girl moved back into the shadows.

She introduced her ladies to the queen, who eyed them with clear irritation, no doubt annoyed that so many of them had come at her invitation to Margaery, but smiled all the same.

They were all Tyrell ladies, and thus she had no reason to pretend to befriend any of them. Margaery knew that she had already given up on that account some time ago.

Her ladies were largely silent as they began to pile their food onto their plates, and, after a moment's hesitation during which she wondered if Cersei was foolish enough to poison them all in her own chambers, Margaery began to do the same.

Sweet cakes and rolls and slices of meat, along with goat's milk, made up the majority of the meal.

Margaery speared a piece of meat with her fork, taking a bite and then turning to Cersei with a smile. "This is very good," she told the older woman. "The cook is to commended."

Cersei dipped her head. "I am sure that a servant might pass along the message."

Margaery took another bite of a sweet roll before eyeing the jug filled with goat's milk in the center of the table.

"Oh, but we should have some wine brought," Margaery said, voice infused with bemused sweetness. "I know that it is too early in the day for my ladies and I to fully enjoy it, but you need not deprieve yourself on our accounts."

Cersei's smile was brittle as she dipped her head. "I am quite fine without it this morning," she told the other woman. "But you are most kind to think of me."

"Nonsense," Margaery said, gesturing to Cersei's serving girl. "Go to the kitchens and find the Queen Mother some of the finest wine you can," she instructed the girl, who glanced from her to Cersei with wide eyes, before curtseying and hurrying out the door.

Margaery bit back a half-smirk, turning to Cersei once more. "Now, I hope you do not take offense at my presumption, but I was wondering what it was you wished to speak with me about?"

Cersei glanced at the ladies surrounding them, and then pursed her lips. "I hope that you were not kept in angst, over such curiosity."

Margaery shook her head, smiling widely. "I confess myself much too preoccupied with the demands of my new position to remain fixed on one thought for very long, no matter how troubling."

Something about those words made Cersei smile, a real smile that had Margaery fighting back a shiver. "The trials of a queen."

"The trials of a queen," Margaery repeated, with a smirk. "My ladies can certainly attest to that."

Cersei sent an interested look at her ladies, that time, and seemed about to say something else, when the door opened and her serving girl returned from the kitchens with a jug of wine in her hands.

One of Margaery's ladies, Reanna, laughed softly. "Did you run all of the way from the kitchens, my dear girl?" she asked the serving girl, as she hurried forward to refill the Queen Mother's cup.

Cersei's smile was brittle as she took her first sip of wine.

Margaery wondered who had been punished and how, for moving the Queen Mother so close to the kitchens that her serving girl could be there and back so quickly, and found herself rather pitying them.

"Would any of your ladyships like some?" Cersei's serving girl asked finally, after an awkward pause in which she glanced at her mistress helplessly.

Margaery's ladies declined, as did Margaery, sending the girl a knowing smile. "No, but I do thank you for your efforts, my dear. I am afraid it is simply too early for my ladies and myself."

Cersei set down her wine glass with a flourish that almost could have been considered a slam.

Her serving girl hurried back into the shadows.

"As to what I wished to speak with you about," she said then, clearing her throat until she seemed certain that she had Margaery's attentions.

She need not have worried; she had never lost them.

"Ah, yes of course," Margaery said with a smile. "Do pray continue."

“There are several matters that I wish to discuss with you,” Cersei murmured. “The first being what happened in the throne room the other day. I wish to apologize – I did not know that you had already proposed a destination for the scraps of the wedding feast.”

Margaery blinked, hiding her real surprise. “Oh,” she said, chewing on her lower lip. Well, that is quite easily forgiven, for I too did not know of your intentions for the food. I only wish...Well, I only wish that they had not gone to such waste.”

“You do not approve of Joffrey’s decision concerning that event?” Cersei said, leaning forward with all of the subtlety of a bloodhound chasing a scent.

Margaery pursed her lips. “It is not that, for I have found myself ever unable to disagree with any of His Grace’s decisions. He is a most wise ruler. I only meant that I have a great desire to help the smallfolk of King’s Landing, ever since learning of how they nearly starved during the Battle of Blackwater Bay. I wish that they might have had more kindness bestowed on them from the very beginning, that I had been here earlier to help them in that regard, for I care so deeply for their woes. But...” she glanced up at Cersei through hooded eyes. “You said that there was another matter.”

“Ah, yes.” Cersei blinked, seeming almost bewildered by Margaery’s speech. Margaery wondered if kindness to anyone besides herself had simply never occurred to her, as it had not to her son.

"I...confess myself concerned for you, my dear, as any new goodmother might be," Cersei said, in that honeyed voice that might have once worked on Sansa Stark, but that Cersei was foolish to believe would work on anyone else. "My son the King is not exactly...Well; I hope that you are settling in to your new position as queen without many troubles."

Of course that was what Cersei had summoned her here for. She had been making veiled attempts to learn what she could since the day of their wedding, and even before then, about Margaery and her relationship with Joffrey.

Margaery had learned from one of her servants that Cersei had even attempted to bribe the girl, and, when that had not worked, threatened her, into telling what the bed sheets had looked like on the morning after their wedding.

And it had not even been the first time that Cersei had attempted to turn Margaery's loyal ladies against her. The women in the room with them now could all attest to such.

She had let her poor serving girl send them along, of course, because there was nothing that Margaery had to hide. And, after all, the Small Council would ask for them eventually.

Cersei's expression had been unfailingly pinched, ever since.

"His Grace has always been kind to me," Margaery lied winningly, patting the queen mother's arm, wondering if the Queen Mother was aware of her own transparency in repeating these questions so many times. Likely not. "My knight in shining armor. I have no complaints."

"He treated the Stark girl like a princess too, in the beginning," Cersei said, through a tight smile, snatching her arm away.

Margaery's smile was wide and bright. "I am not Sansa Stark, Goodmother."

Cersei gave her a long, searching look. "No, you are not," she agreed finally. "Who are you, Lady Margaery?"

Margaery bit back an even brighter smile. "I hope to be a loving and dutiful wife to my new husband," she said serenely, "And a good and kind queen."

Cersei's expression flickered; she was not as good at hiding her true emotions as Margaery had learned to become. Not as good as she thought that she was. "I am sure that you will be, Lady Margaery, for as long as you are queen."

Margaery leaned forward, intimating secrecy though her ladies sat all around them. "It is so good to hear you say so, Goodmother," she told the woman, smiling nervously. "I want so very much to have your approval in all things, for you are so important to my husband the King, and I wish to make you as important to myself, as well."

Cersei lifted her glass of wine in a mock toast. "To family, then," she said coolly, and Margaery lifted her glass of goat's milk, as well.

"To family," she agreed, smiling as their glasses clinked together. "May it always be counted on."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First Margaery chapter, though I'm afraid she wouldn't let me too far into her head, and there was very little interaction with Sansa just yet. Some things just can't be rushed, after all, and our two queens had to compare their claws.


	11. SANSA X

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the kind words about last chapter. I was rather nervous about my first Marg POV, and your responses to the chapter were definitely a relief!

She had told the Queen that she was going to the library.

A lie, and Sansa, unlike most in King's Landing she knew, felt something like guilt for saying it, but she had been afraid that, had she not made up such an excuse, Margaery would have insisted that she follow her, or simply perhaps spoken to her longer, and Sansa could not bear such a thought.

It was only after the lie had sprung and Margaery had already been on her way that Sansa considered what she should do with her time, instead.

She had not taken to stories, however, not since Joffrey had cut her father's head off and she had realized that life truly wasn't like the songs, that it never could have been, and that all of her stories had lied to her so cruelly.

But she could not return to her quarters with Lord Tyrion. He had not yet managed to sit her down since the horrible tale of his meeting with his father had spread throughout the Keep, and Sansa had no intention of giving him the opportunity to do so.

She felt paranoid, pretending to go to sleep earlier now, keeping her eyes closed and hardly daring to breathe when he entered their chambers in the evenings, her back turned to him, and waking early in the mornings, bidding Shae to dress her hurriedly that she might avoid her lord husband.

It had not been easy, avoiding him so completely, though she suspected that he was also allowing her to do so, no more ready to speak over what they must than she.

And Sansa had no desire to speak of it at all.

Even if she knew that her lord husband would not touch her in such a way, as he had once promised, she did not want to give him the opportunity to break her trust, not if she could help it. Not when Joffrey and Lord Tywin breathed down his neck at every second.

And if that meant avoiding him for the rest of the duration of their marriage, then Sansa was quite content to do so.

She sighed, forcing herself to turn her thoughts on better things.

If she could avoid her husband for much longer, she might not have to worry about having the conversation ever.

She would not be remaining in King's Landing until she died, she now knew.

For the first time in a long time, there was hope, even if it was an unknown hope, one that could be just as bad as here.

But then Sansa reminded herself that nothing was just as bad as here. Dorne would be her safe haven, for however long she needed to be there.

Sansa smiled, and then looked up, noticing the eyes of a servant boy on her, and quickly hid the expression, knowing it would only cause her trouble.

She felt like a child with a secret, or perhaps a criminal with understanding of a crime yet to take place, carrying the secret knowledge of Oberyn's proposition to her with an excitement and wariness that had not taken hold in her since her father had once told her that he intended that she and her sister should return to Winterfell, without her ever having married Joffrey.

That thought was somewhat sobering, but Sansa vowed to herself that she would not make the same mistake of revealing the secret to anyone, before they were gone long from here.

She would miss Shae, she thought, and maybe Margaery, and perhaps young Tommen.

Dorne, she had been told, was lovely this time of year, and she hoped that that would make up for it.

"You're smiling today," a voice that instantly made the smile fall from Sansa's face called out to her, and Sansa froze, not daring to turn around, perhaps in the hopes that she had merely imagined it.

Joffrey siddled up behind her, his two Kingsguard hanging back in silence, and Sansa closed her eyes, biting back the sigh that wanted to spring forth.

She suddenly found herself feeling rather foolish, that she had allowed Margaery to go on without her, instead of taking the woman's clear intentions for peace between them.

"Your Grace," she murmured, finally turning to him, and forcing a welcoming smile. "Indeed, I am."

"Practically glowing," Joffrey drawled, reaching out and running the backs of his knuckles across her cheek.

Sansa reminded herself that she was not a rabid dog, and therefore could not bite his fingers. "Thank you, Your Grace. Now if Your Grace would be so kind-"

"Are we to expect a happy announcement from my uncle soon?" Joffrey asked, lips twitching in clear amusement.

Sansa blinked at him in confusion, and Joffrey leaned forward, though he did not lower his voice as he asked, "Has he finally put a child in you, then?"

Sansa found herself blushing crimson. "No, Your Grace. I...that was not..."

Joffrey smirked, hand going down to rest over her clothed abdomen, and Sansa felt her breath hitching in fear. "Well, have you given any thought to what Lannister will give you a child, Lady Sansa?" he grinned, his putrid breath nearly making her gag. "Would you like me to more than he? I know that you love me so deeply, after all."

Sansa swallowed hard, finding her mouth suddenly wollen.

"Well?" he asked, pinching her, and then the words came.

"I would think that Your Grace would be more concerned with putting a child in your own wife's belly, rather than in mine," Sansa said carefully, sending a silent apology to Margaery in her mind.

Joffrey's face darkened. "You little bitch!" he snapped, and then called to Ser Meryn.

And why was it always Ser Meryn walking with him, Sansa thought, in some despair.

She knew that all of the Kingsguard were obligated to follow their king's commands, though when it came to Sansa, they did so with varying emotions, some even seeming apologetic with their actions.

But Ser Meryn seemed to derive much pleasure from his abuse of Sansa, much more than the simple carrying out of his king's orders would demand.

"Lady Sansa has insulted her king, Ser Meryn," Joffrey said, and he was nearly shouting now. "She must be punished."

Ser Meryn did not hesitate, and Sansa cried out more because it was expected of her than because of the actual pain, by now, as the flats of his knuckles smacked against her unbroken skin.

Joffrey giggled. "Where's your lord husband now, Lady Sansa? I see there's only me."

Sansa sucked in a ragged breath, afraid that she was about to cry.

Joffrey did not deserve her tears, she reminded herself, lifting her chin defiantly and preparing herself for the beating she knew was still to come.

"Your Grace."

She glanced up, wondering who would have the opportunity to view Sansa's shaming today, only to blink in surprise as her lord husband approached them, as though Joffrey's mentioning him had somehow caused him to appear.

She had not thought she would be relieved to see him, the next time she did.

No, no, he mustn't draw attention to himself like this. If he did, then Joffrey would become annoyed with him again, as he had at the wedding, when her lord husband had proved himself no more immune to Joffrey's torments than anyone.

"Uncle," Joffrey looked intrigued, rather than annoyed, which made Sansa feel rather more sick than the stinging slap had, even as she reached up to wipe at her cheek.

Thankfully, her hand did not come away wet.

Her husband glanced at her, his eyes narrowing with a knowing look as he turned back to the king, giving his nephew a defferential little bow that she knew he would avoid if he thought he could.

"Your Grace," he said stiffly, "I wonder if I might borrow my lady wife just now? There is...something which I need to discuss with her."

Joffrey glanced between them, before frowning. "No," he snapped irritably, "It's not all right. I was still punishing her. She disrespected me."

Her husband frowned, and, despite herself, Sansa felt herself shiver, reaching up to pull her wrap more tightly around her thin shoulders. "Well," he said finally, thoughtfully, "I do believe that what I mean to discuss with her will be far more punishing than any beating you might give her. And, indeed, that she is my lady wife now, and any...disciplining she needs will come from me, not you."

For a moment, Sansa thought that Joffrey would rail and stomp his feet and order Ser Meryn to slap her husband as well, and she held her breath.

But Joffrey surprised her by waving a hand, annoyance still clear on his face, but something else rather like bored amusement there as well.

Amusement was always dangerous, from someone like Joffrey.

Sansa realized then that they had observers, a few nobles still milling about the hall because they had recognized the chance for another Sansa beating, she supposed, and who were making no efforts to hide thier observation.

Joffrey, King or not, did not want to dispute her lord husband's claim to Sansa in front of so many people, even if they all knew him for the sadist he was.

"Very well, uncle," Joffrey said, glancing sideways at Sansa, and she realized then what had him so amused as his eyes slid down to her flat stomach. "See to her as you see fit."

Sansa felt a thrill of terror then, for surely he would come to watch them through some window in their bedchambers, wanting to know what sort of "punishment" her lord husband had devised for her, and they would be found out, and her lord husband would be punished for his lies.

But Lord Tyrion held out his arm to her with a grim expression on his face, and Sansa took it daintily, daring to breathe again for the first time as they turned their backs on Joffrey and walked away.

Behind them, she could hear Joffrey muttering something to Ser Meryn about finding his queen "this instant," and then the sound of Ser Meryn's boots, marching steadfastly in the other direction.

She breathed a sigh of relief.

It was not until they had returned to their chambers and the door had shut behind them that either spoke, and then it was for Sansa to ask innocently, "Has your council meeting let out early today?"

Tyrion sighed, scrubbing at his face and sinking down onto the sofa, reaching for his nearest bottle of brandy, conveniently sitting on the table before him, despite her disapproving look. "There was no council meeting today." He sent her a rather forced smile. "All's well with the realm, at least until tomorrow. Lady Sansa..."

Sansa was struck with the rather overwhelming urge to sit down, seeing the look in his eyes. Instead, she asked, "Perhaps we should ask Shae to send out for some food?"

Her husband sighed again. "Lady Sansa, there is a matter that I believe we need to speak about."

She no longer felt very hungry. "I..."

"And I do believe you know what matter I'm referring to," her husband said quietly, expression gentle as he held out one hand to her, as though trying to soothe a frightened animal.

Sansa straightened her back and lifted her chin. "Perhaps you should simply say it, my lord."


	12. MARGAERY II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something I've always found interesting about Margaery, more than anything else about her (because I could go on forever about that) is how she changes her personality, even just a bit, to better suit whomever she's around, including her grandmother and Loras, who she has no reason to manipulate. With Loras, she's a bit more playful, while with her grandmother, she lets a bit more of her worry show. I tried to incorporate that a bit here; I hope she doesn't seem out of character.
> 
> Also, so many of you have been asking about the pregnancy tag, when what I've really been waiting for is questions about the character death tag, hehe.

There were very few times when a queen was ever alone. She always had about her ladies, to serve her and be companions to her throughout her days, and one of whom often slept at the foot of her bed at night with a knife, to protect her from attackers or to witness if the queen attempted such a thing as adultery.

And, beyond them, she had a member of the Kingsguard assigned to her, usually one of great honor and gallantry whom she might be familiar with.

And, in the times when she had neither about her, she had the King.

So to find herself suddenly alone was a phenomenon that a queen rarely experienced, and which left Margaery both relieved and wary, for she could not dispel the vague fear that Cersei might stupidly attempt to kill her, despite the other's recent overtures of friendship.

She had found herself alone in a narrow and dark corridor, lost in her own thoughts, and she paused, her breaths sounding loud in the silence of the narrow hall, but not alone.

"Your Grace," Lord Varys appeared suddenly out of the shadows and bowed lowly to her, and Margaery sent him a stunning smile.

"Lord Varys. To what do I owe this meeting?" she asked, and he lifted a brow.

"You do not believe that we have merely run into each other coincidentally, each going our separate ways, in an abandoned corridor of the Red Keep where none will overhear us?"

Margaery just smiled.

He sighed. "Your Grace is a most shrewd woman. Unlike some of her predecessors."

Margaery bit back a laugh, and then leaned forward, taking his hands in her own. "I would like to thank you for...that bit of service you did for me, recently. I understand that your interests do not lie directly in line with those of House Tyrell."

"I serve the realm," Lord Varys responded evenly.

Margaery dipped her head. "Indeed. And you are a fine Master of Whispers."

He smiled, stepping slightly out of the way. "You will find in your young life, Your Grace that flattery does not work on men of my...condition."

Margaery smiled sympathetically. "Of course. Then I will speak plainly, Lord Varys. I wish to know that, in the future, I may be assured of...further services. And the Lannisters are not the only ones who pay their debts, as Prince Martell is so fond of saying."

Varys sent her a shrewd look. "I assume you speak to the matter of the food from the wedding."

She smiled. "Indeed."

"That was nothing," he assured. "Merely an attempt to help the starving smallfolk of Flea Bottom. I have little sparrows who took question with the lack of food, as well."

Margaery took his hands in hers, and Varys stared down at their entwined fingers, his expression unreadable. "I wish to thank you all the same, on the behalf of the smallfolk, who are very dear to me. I do believe you have done more for them than anyone can be led to believe."

Varys pulled his hands away. "Is there another duty you require of me?"

Margaery's smile widened. She opened her mouth to speak, and-

"Margaery!" Loras called, coming out of nowhere and grabbing her by the arm. "I've been looking everywhere for you. I-" He blinked, seeming to notice Lord Varys for the first time. Margaery supposed that the Spider had a way of hiding in the shadows; it was why he was where he was. "Lord Varys. I did not see you there," he said, voice far more stiff, now.

Lord Varys bowed. "I shall leave Your Grace with your most devoted brother," he informed the Queen.

Margaery smiled. "Perhaps we might continue our conversation another time, then?" she asked sweetly.

Lord Varys nodded. "Perhaps, Your Grace."

And then, with a blink, he was gone into the shadows once more.

"Loras," Margaery scolded, taking her brother's arm, "That was very rude."

Loras rolled his eyes. "The Spider can speak to you any time. I haven't spoken to you in far too long."

Margaery gave him a long look. "You were guarding me just this morning. You've been guarding me since the wedding. If you aren't more careful with the Kingsguard roster, someone will notice. Most likely the Lord Commander who makes these rosters."

Loras did not seem concerned by this. "Yes, but we haven't talked in all of those times," he said irritably. "You've been far too...preoccupied."

Margaery raised a brow, turning and leaning against the bannister behind her. "Very well, brother mine. What do you wish to talk about? I have..." she glanced around, and then remembered that there were no windows, here. "Very little time before I am missed, I am sure."

Loras blinked at her. "Oh? And how did your little lunch with Cersei go?"

Margaery smiled brightly. "As well as I expected it to. She is a most...devoted woman, to her children."

Loras didn't look amused. "She's a bitch," he muttered resentfully.

"You only say that because she almost became your goodsister," Margaery chided half-heartedly. And then, in a lower voice, "You should be more careful, Loras. The walls have ears everywhere in King's Landing, but especially about the Spider. We are dearest friends with the Lannisters now, since the Battle of Blackwater."

He lifted a brow. "Truly? I thought you would have charmed even him by now. You spoke for more than a few moments, after all."

Margaery laughed; she wondered if Loras could hear the hollowness of it, for his next question was far removed from their current conversation.

"How is marriage treating you these days?" Loras asked, smirking at her, but she could hear the underlying concern in his voice.

She knew that he had been meaning to ask this question from the moment of her marriage, the first time he could get her alone.

Margaery let out a soft sound, standing from where she leaned against the rail and beginning to walk once more. "Exhaustingly."

"Margaery," Loras hissed, moving forward to take her arm again and letting him lead her down the rest of the narrow hall, into the harsh sunlight of one of the Red Keep's covered gardens. "Does he hurt you?"

Margaery smiled at her brother. "It's fine, Loras. Let it go."

Instead of doing so, Loras lurched to his feet. "I'll kill that little bastard," he muttered, reaching for his sword.

Margaery put a hand on his arm, glancing around them surreptitiously. "That is treason, brother," she hissed at him. "Please. Let it be."

He stared at her. "You are my sister. I won't allow him to defile you like that, or the Lannisters to torment you as they do Sansa Stark. I..."

She smiled sweetly, stepping forward and letting him pull her into an embrace, sword hand still awkwardly holding the sword. She leaned forward, until her lips were touching his ear, and whispered, "I can handle one little boy."

He pulled back, blinking at her. "And can you see the future?"

She smiled, reaching out and brushing back some of his curls. "Sometimes, brother, sometimes."

They continued walking then, arm in arm, as they used to in Highgarden, before the troubles of the war had hit, and Margaery reached out, plucking a Lion's Head from the flowers as they passed it.

"No," she said suddenly, and her brother glanced at her as she began to pluck the petals from the flower, watching as they fell to the ground at her feet and she walked over them.

"No?"

"No, he doesn't hurt me," Margaery supplied. "He...enjoys hurting things, in front of me, I think."

She felt Loras' arms tighten around her and hurried on, "And...he likes to watch me. But he doesn't..." she glanced up at her brother. "He hasn't touched me, not once, since we've been wed. Not...in any way that could lead to pain. He is not a fool, and has been a most considerate husband." She gave him a knowing look. "You stood outside our chambers on our wedding night, dear brother, and every night since. You know that nothing that should not have happened took place."

Loras grimaced. "Yes," he finally admitted, and Margaery smiled.

"There, you see?" Had her brother been watching her more closely, he might have seen the lie in her eyes but, as it was, he was placated with what he wished to hear.

"I still don't like that you must be married to him at all," he muttered petulantly, and Margaery bit back a laugh as the last petal fell to the ground.

"Well," she said, "That makes two of us."


	13. SANSA XI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because this is a merge of both the books and the show, some elements of this story are from the books while some are from the show, and some are a weird fusion of both. This chapter deals with events from the night of Sansa's wedding as they took place in the books, so if anything seems unfamiliar to any show watchers, that's probably why.

"Sansa," her husband said quietly, "Please speak to me."

Sansa moved the cyvasse piece, not meeting his eyes. "I do not see that there is anything to say, my lord. You have made yourself most clear, and, as your dutiful wife, there is no complaint that I can make, so I do not see that I need _say_ anything. I am most grateful that you have...suffered in silence for this long."

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose, pushing back from the game of cyvasse. "You understand why I suggested it, I hope?"

Sansa bit her lip. "Every wife must endeavour to give her husband a child, of course, and especially a son-"

"Sansa."

"It is only my duty to do as my husband asks of me now-"

"Sansa."

She glanced up, finally meeting his eyes. "Yes?"

Tyrion flinched at her tone. "If I don't give you a child, and believe me, I am wont to do so myself, my father and Joffrey will find other, new horrible ways to torment you. I only suggest this now because Joffrey is not above doing horrible things to women-"

"You only suggest this now because now you must face a bit of that torment yourself," Sansa interrupted acidly. "Because now, there is trouble in it for you."

He reached out to take her hands, but Sansa pulled away, glaring at him scorchingly. "Would you like me to stop arguing with you and to take off my clothes, my lord? I can do it myself."

Her husband flinched again, sighed, pulled his hands back. "That is not it at all, Lady Sansa," he said finally, voice still, somehow, gentle. "I only wish to protect you. A Lannister baby _will_ protect you. Proof that we...That we are a true marriage will protect you. My father-"

"Wants nothing more than to have a Stark son to claim Winterfell and the North, and then he'll have no more need of _me_ ," Sansa interrupted coolly. "Living or otherwise."

Her husband blinked at her, and Sansa felt suddenly self-conscious. "I'm not just a stupid little girl, like I was when I first came here," she snapped at him. "I do understand what my brother's death means. Why, suddenly, everyone was so quick to wed me."

There was less trouble in this situation for Sansa, now, than there was for her lord husband. Prince Oberyn would take her from here, she felt sure, before she could be impregnated by a Lannister.

He had to.

He would take her to Dorne the moment he could find the opportunity to leave this horrible place, and she must be ready at any moment, for he had not told her more than that, _when_ he would leave.

Tyrion grimaced. "Of course. I didn't mean to suggest-"

The door slammed open then, and Shae stepped into the room, holding a tray full of food that made Sansa ill just to look upon it. Her fiersome glare found Tyrion, and Sansa found herself rather grateful not to have to face the brunt of it as she stalked into the room, fiery anger radiating off of her.

She walked forward in silence, however, slamming the tray down on the table next to the game's board with a loud crash that made Sansa jump.

Shae sent her a look that was almost apologetic before reaching out to pour Tyrion some wine from the flask she had brought into a waiting cup, slamming the partially glass cup down by his hand, near enough that Sansa almost flinched at what could have happened.

Tyrion, however, merely sighed.

"Would my lady like some food?" Shae asked then, turning a forced smile on Sansa.

Sansa shook her head, not at all hungry.

Shae nodded, picking up the tray of food once more. "I'll just return this to the kitchens then, if that will be all."

Her accusing stare turned on Tyrion. He didn't dare protest.

"I'll be back soon," she promised Sansa, in a slightly softer voice, before it hardened once more. "To ensure nothing ontoward happens."

The door slammed behind her.

"I won't force you to do anything you don't want to do," Tyrion said, and Sansa nearly gagged at the thought of doing as he suggested, remembering their wedding night, but nodded dutifully. "But do try to understand that I merely suggested it for your safety, my lady. I wish...I wish that there were any other way to protect you."

Sansa looked deliberately away, wishing that Shae had left some food so that she could distract herself by playing with it, even if she had no intention of eating it.

Tyrion sighed, tipping over his king. "I find I have no more desire to play," he told the room at large. "I shall be dealing with...Whatever it is Master of Coin is actually supposed to deal with, if anyone has need of me."

Sansa very much doubted that _she_ would.

It had been a fear, of course, that he would make such a decision after the conversation with his lord father; why else had she made such a point to avoid him, whenever she was given the opportunity?

But she had thought it a misplaced fear, an irrational one that his words would soon soothe from her mind, and they could go back to their strange not-quite-friendship, as they had been before.

Now she understood why Shae had not attempted to hinder her, in her avoidance of her lord husband.

She had thought it because Shae wished more time alone with Lord Tyrion herself, but now she saw the truth, and wished she could be sick.

Her lord husband wanted a child in her belly, just as Joffrey and the rest of the Lannisters did, and they would certainly not be satisfied if she refused them now. It was a husband's right to demand such a thing of his wife, after all, even if he was a monster and she would rather die.

Her lord husband had said that he would not force her to do anything she did not want, but she remembered their wedding night all too vividly, when he had told her to strip and had touched her breasts while she held back tears, and she knew that wasn't true. Not entirely.

And, while he had stopped himself before he could put a child in her then, that was what he was asking of her now.

A child.

She had not tried to stop him, then. Had told him that he was her lord husband and she was a woman flowered, and had fully expected the Lannister monster to take her then, in a rough parody of what her septa had told her would happen on her wedding night.

She would not try to stop him now, either, she knew, much as the thought of a child horrified her.

Because he would simply do it anyway.

She remembered what Joffrey had taunted her with, wondered if a dwarf's child would also be a dwarf, shriveled and horrifying and just as much of a monster as the rest of his family.

She knew that, if she refused, the Lannisters would take what they wanted from her anyway. That she was the last heir to the North, and they would not waste that opportunity by letting someone else attempt to claim it.

She had been a fool to accept Prince Oberyn's proposal to take her back to Dorne with him without asking any questions, whether they were about his character or his plans for her when she arrived in Dorne, but she realized now that such questions didn't matter.

Even if the Martells only wanted her for the same thing the Tyrells had, the same thing the Lannisters had, at least she would not give birth to a Lannister baby.

So long as Prince Oberyn took her from this place _soon_.


	14. SANSA XII

She was not speaking to her husband any longer.

He had twice attempted to broach the subject of their need for a child, a subject which Sansa refused to speak about at all, whether with him or the Lady Shae.

She had refused to keep speaking to her lord husband after their next supper, though she had resolved not to avoid him any longer. She had nothing else to say to him, after all, but she need not fear anything else he might tell her.

She was a Stark, and did not cower in fear from the lions, but nor did that mean she had to acqueise to them, if she could help it.

If Lord Tyrion wanted a child of her before Prince Oberyn made known to her his plans to leave the capitol, he would have to force one on her.

And her lord husband seemed resolved not to do that, so Sansa considered herself safe in her punishing silence.

At least from him.

Shae was being just as punishing, or so Sansa assumed, for the other woman treated her lord husband only with dark looks and snappish replies, and he had slept every night on their sofa, rather than somewhere else, as he sometimes took to doing.

It made her rather pleased with the woman.

But Lord Tyrion was not the only one demanding a child of her. The Lannisters wanted one; wanted a child for Winterfell, and the terror that left Sansa awake at night - whether or not tonight would be the night that Joffrey slipped into her chambers and raped her - was as present as ever.

But it had been the night last, in her dreams, that she had realized that it was not the threat of a rape by a Lannister that terrified her - for that, she could hold her head high and know that this was just another crime of the Lannisters against her, against her family.

No, for her dream, while she slept just a few paces away from a Lion, had been one tormenting her just since Lord Tywin had demanded a child of his son.

In it, she had survived a birthing, though the child had to be cut out of her, lest it rip its way out, and she held the babe in her arms, a tiny little thing with a bowed spine and a large head.

Marked as a dwarf already, and Lord Tywin, who had stood in the birthing chamber the entire time, turned away in disgust as Joffrey laughed and pulled the baby away from her, demanding to be the first to hold his cousin.

He'd been beautiful, though, like Joffrey had been beautiful the very first time that Sansa had ever seen him.

She had told herself that she could love him, and pretended that his eyes did not glow red like Jon's direwolf Ghost.

Her lord husband named him, because that was his due, and Sansa pretended that a Lannister name on her child did not send her stomach roiling as he was placed back into her arms.

And then he'd grown, fast, though it became apparent again that he was a dwarf when he stood at her stomach, and she knew that he was the age of herself when she had come to King's Landing, even if she did not know quite how this was.

He was a far greater torment than Joffrey, for he had come from Sansa as well as from a Lannister, and every dark deed he did was a product of her raising him, as well as a Lannister. He carried a part of her inside of him, a part of the wolf, and yet still was a lion. Just seeing him made her feel ill, even in her dream.

"Lady Sansa?" a voice, cutting into her thoughts. Shae, waking her from her nightmare as she thrashed and screamed in her bed, but it was Lord Tyrion's face she saw when she woke, and that only made her scream anew.

"Lady Sansa," Ellaria Sand stood in front of her, a concerned look on her face as she gave Sansa a little shake, pulling her out of the horror of her thoughts and back into the throne room, taking her arm and, in effect, forcing Sansa to walk alongside her. "I wonder if I might have a word, child, if you are well?"

Sansa knew next to nothing about Ellaria Sand, beyond that she was Prince Oberyn's paramour, had birthed three of his children, and spoke her mind when she wished, unlike most of the women of King's Landing.

She wondered if the lady had learned about her conversation with Prince Oberyn, about his offer to her.

She wondered if Ellaria was jealous, would be angry that her lover had made such an offer to Sansa, though, really, she had nothing to be jealous of.

Sansa had no wish to make an enemy of no one that she was not already an enemy of, and she did not think she would like being an enemy of Ellaria Sand.

Sansa forced a smile, rather queasy still. "Of course, my lady."

Ellaria gave her a mildly reproving look. "I told you, my dear, that I am hardly a lady."

Something about the way she said those words made Sansa blush and want to look away, though she forced herself not to. "My pardon..."

Ellaria just laughed again. "My Oberyn tells me that you and he had an interesting conversation, the other day, in the city."

Sansa swallowed, a feeling rather like wary excitement washing through her. "Yes," she breathed, barely able to speak more than that. "Yes, he wanted to know my thoughts on...cities."

Ellaria's eyes flickered with amusement, and she reached up, brushing back a curl that had fallen in front of Sansa's face. Sansa flinched, and the hand disappeared as quickly as it had come, a sad look replacing the amusement. "I understand that you had some he found rather intriguing."

Sansa glanced around them, noticing once more the many people surrounding them, courtiers wanting gossip like vultures, men waiting for a chance to speak with their king.

At Joffrey, seated on the Iron Throne as though it were just any other chair, his queen seated to the side of the throne, where Cersei used to sit when she still fancied herself as ruling in Joffrey's name, laughing at something he had just said, while Cersei found herself relegated to a chair on his other side, eyes cool and, it seemed to Sansa, watching her.

Nowhere was safe for this sort of conversation, but especially not here.

"My-Ellaria," Sansa said, blushing slightly at the usage of only the woman's name, "I don't think-"

"A message, for the King!" a voice shouted from the back of the hall almost before the double doors of the Great Hall had swung open to accomodate him, and a man ran into the room, sweating and wrapped in badly fitting chainmail.

He pushed past the lords and ladies still standing in his way, bowing as he came within sight of Joffrey, even as the Kingsguard moved to surround him, pushing Sansa back against the other ladies as they did so, into Ellaria, who reached out to wrap a hand in hers.

Sansa glanced down at their entwined hands, wondering if Ellaria thought the news would be something that she would need comfort for.

Wondering when the last time she had recieved comfort had been.

"A message for the King!" the messenger repeated, stubbornly attempting to push past the wall of Kingsguard knights.

Sansa knew, as Ser Jaime Lannister reached to draw his sword, that the man would not succeed in doing so.

"Wait!" Joffrey called, jumping to his feet and grinning down at the messenger. "I'd like to hear what he has to say. The message is for me, is it not?"

Ser Jaime lowered his arm, and the messenger bowed gratefully to the King once more.

"Joffrey, my love, why don't you let the guards take care of this messenger," Cersei suggested then, her voice oily.

Joffrey ignored her completely, turning back to the Great Hall at large. "Well?' he demanded of the messenger, and Sansa wondered whether the man would wet himself right then and there, with the quaking he was doing under the king's stare.

"The Blackfish is gathering an army to lay siege to the Freys. They will lose it unless they are sent reinforcements," the messenger recited dutifully, and Joffrey lifted a brow.

"The claim the Freys got when they slaughtered that Stark pretender and his wife and lady mother for us?" he asked with a grin, sending a smirk in Sansa's direction.

It was through sheer force of will that she did not react. And, perhaps, the arm squeezing hers.

"The same, Your Grace," the messenger said quietly, and Joffrey's grin grew.

"Well then," he said, still leering at Sansa, "You seemed so serious. Is it so bad? We ought to help them, don't you think, Lady Sansa?"

Sansa gulped, shaking off Ellaria Sand's hand on her arm and stepping forward, giving her king a curtsey. "Of course, Your Grace," she murmured dutifully.

Joffrey laughed loudly in the silence of the throne room. Prince Oberyn shifted on his feet near the other members of the Small Council.

"My love," Cersei said with a patience that must have strained her, smile frozen on her face, "You should allow the Small Council to deliberate over this. They will find a solution, I am sure of it."

"Why?"

Cersei glanced at her eldest son in surprise; he did not normally contradict her in the throne room, Sansa thought with a start.

Nor did he care much about the policies of a king.

She wondered how the messenger had gotten past the guards, to speak with the King directly. She knew from her lord husband that such was not usually the case, for the less Joffrey knew, the better the Small Council deemed it. A special effort was made to ensure that he knew as little as possible.

Cruel as she had deemed it when her husband told her, allowing him to torment and play with his subjects in King's Landing as he willed was better than allowing Joffrey to make  any decisions of real importance.

"My love?" Cersei tilted her head at him, smile frozen on her face.

Sansa resolved to remember that expression, the next time Cersei tormented her.

Joffrey tossed his head. "They've only botched it up so far. Brynden Tully should have died with the rest of his degenerate relatives. Why should I allow them to continue to let him live? I am the King, not they, and they make me look like a fool for doing nothing. I ought to have them all burned to death."

The hall fell eerily silent at those words, and, a moment later, even Joffrey seemed to realize the mistake he had made in uttering them, paling and inching back toward his precious chair.

"Our Lord Hand is the Lord of Casterly Rock," Margaery said into the silence, her voice mild. "And forged this deal with House Frey. I am sure that he might be able to offer some perspective to the King on this matter, though of course the final decision should be yours, my love, not the Small Council's."

Joffrey blinked, giving Margaery a look that might almost have been grateful, if indeed he was capable of such a thing, and then glanced at Tywin. "Well?"

Lord Tywin stepped forward, eyes on Margaery as he spoke.

Cersei appeared to be smoldering, if the glare she sent Margaery was anything to go by.

Sansa hid a smile behind her sleeve as she pretended, rather unsubtly, to cough, quickly finding her way back into the shadows and next to Ellaria once more.

Ellaria looked disgusted. "He should not have asked you such a thing."

Sansa shrugged, for Joffrey's tormenting words were always better than the beatings she recieved at the hands of his Kingsguard.

"His Grace did no wrong, for he merely asked what we all knew to be the truth," Sansa said quietly, neck heating.

Ellaria bit her lip. "Lady Sansa-"

"I...I should go, Ellaria Sand," Sansa said, remembering why she had wanted to get away from this woman in the first place when she recognized Lady Rosamund, watching them with interest. "I am overtired."

Ellaria's expression turned to one of sympathy. "Of course you are, my dear girl. Should I walk you?"

Sansa swallowed. "I can find my way," she said softly, and Ellaria finally seemed to understand, smiling at her kindly (as her mother used to) before turning away, disappearing into the crowd once more.

Sansa forced herself to flee the room without running, picking up her skirts and walking daintily, as though she had not a care in the world.

It was not until she had come out into the hall that she realized she was not the only one who had made an escape, and she bit back a gasp, slipping behind a pillar lest one of her other greatest tormentors take notice of her.

Cersei did not appear to notice her at all, however, her attention arrested by another innocent.

She wondered if Cersei simply couldn't bear to let go of the illusion that she had lost control of her own son, and had fled the Great Hall for that reason.

"Lady Reanna," she said, in that smooth voice she used when she wanted something of someone else. It had never been directed at Sansa, save for when she had told the woman about her father's wish to leave King's Landing and Cersei had demanded more of her, and later, when she had demanded that Sansa write to her mother and brother, but she had heard it often enough, since.

"Your Grace," Reanna said, dipping into a curtsey. "You wished to speak with me?"

Cersei smiled. "Yes, I sent a message for you some days ago. Have you been avoiding me, child?"

Reanna swallowed, and it was then that Sansa saw how painfully young she was, and remembered where she had seen her before.

She was part of Queen Margaery's retinue, one of her handmaidens who had accompanied her here from Highgarden.

Sansa held her breath.

"No, Your Grace. The Queen has...many demands to be met, since the marriage. I was going to-"

Cersei waved a hand dismissively. "No matter. I more than anyone understand the needs of a demanding queen. We can speak now, in my chambers. Come."

Lady Reanna hesitated. "The Queen will need me soon, I think-"

Cersei's eyes hardened. "Come, Lady Reanna. I have something of a...private matter to discuss with you, that cannot be discussed here. Your queen has her other ladies to attend her, when the Great Hall is dismissed."

Lady Reanna swallowed again. "Of course, Your Grace."

Cersei smiled.

Sansa did not move until they had turned a corner and were gone entirely from her sight.


	15. SANSA XIII

Queen Margaery had sent Sansa an invitation to sew with her and some other ladies.

The words, as Sansa read them on the short missive a servant had brought her, before disappearing once more, almost made Sansa laugh hysterically.

She remembered a time when she would have been delighted to receive an invitation to sew with the Queen, to show off everything that her dear septa had taught her.

Chaos was brewing throughout the Seven Kingdoms, there were whispers that Stannis Baratheon intended to gain more men so that he could march on the North, and the Lannisters wanted a baby from Sansa. But still, the ladies would sew, as if nothing was amis.

Somehow, she managed to contain it.

The invitation was not to the royal gardens, as Sansa had thought they would be, but rather to Cersei's chambers, and Sansa shook, wondering if the invitation, even if it was written in Margaery's smooth, sprawling hand, was in fact a product of what she had seen, the other day. A trap, for her.

But there was no ignoring it. One did not refuse the Queen, after all.

She simply wondered what other reason Queen Margaery would have for being in Cersei's chambers. She knew, simply from observing them and from the few hints she had gotten from Margaery, for more than that would have endangered them both, that the Queen Mother and Margaery were not at all what one would consider friends.

She did not think that Cersei had friends, while Margaery attempted friendship with everyone. Sansa could have easily predicted that they would not get on well.

The sewing party was to start in less than an hour, and, for a moment during which she attempted to forget that she was a captive here, and not a guest, Sansa panicked.

She did not know where Shae was.

After a terrible break of fast that morning, during which there was very little speaking, and Sansa had noticed the round black circles about her lord husband's eyes, Tyrion and Sansa had gone their separate ways, and Shae had disposed of their meals, Tyrion's completely gone, and Sansa's half-eaten, if that.

Shae had helped her get ready for her day, before that, but Sansa had not seen her since, and she could not wear her day dress to see the other ladies.

She sighed aloud, walking over to her wardrobe full of clothes and rifling through it.

She had precious little in the way of gowns now, for Cersei saw no more reason to provide her with items traditionally meant to pamper, such as an excess of gowns, now that she was nothing more than a captive here, and saw only that her gowns did not ill fit her and thus embarrass House Lannister.

She had the one with golden leaves on it, elegant and light purple and very much her favorite, but Sansa pushed this one aside, for she did not wish to wear it today. Not in the Queen Regent's chambers, where Cersei would be watching her with laughing eyes.

She chose a light blue gown near the back of her wardrobe, plain and elegant enough to be worn to this sort of thing, and began undoing the back of her dress, wincing as her fingers came into contact with the light scars there from Joffrey's beatings, as she did not have Shae to do it for her.

She hated touching those. Knowing that it was likely that they would never fade away, but today Sansa's fingers stroked them awkwardly, her body shuddering inadvertently at the touch.

She remembered every stroke, every blunt edge of a blade, every back of a hand, and what perceived crime it had paid for.

She remembered the day her lord husband had bade her strip and touched her breasts, and wondered what he might have thought had he touched her back, instead, had seen the scars his dear nephew had inflicted there, if that would have aroused him in the same manner.

And then she banished such thoughts from her mind and continued to undress herself, her hands fumbling and awkward, for this was something that she had, rather to her shame, come to depend on Shae for completely.

When she wore nothing but her smallclothes, Sansa turned to the blue gown and stepped into it gingerly, as though the scars still hurt her, though in fact they did not.

When she was dressed, she elected to leave her hair as it was, as the elaborate hairstyles that Shae usually did were not something that Sansa was capable of.

She glanced at herself in the mirror, and then sighed.

There was a knock at the door, and Sansa, thinking that it was a servant, called out, "Yes, just a moment."

The door opened anyway, and Shae stuck her head in, looking Sansa up and down with something very much like suspicion in her eyes.

"That is not the dress I helped you into this morning," she said, and it took Sansa a moment to realize why she would look as angry and suspicious about such a thing as a changed dress, and she blushed fiercely.

"Queen Margaery has invited me to sew with her," she said quietly, glancing down at her hands and hoping that Shae did not interrogate her further.

But, to her surprise, when she looked up, Shae was smiling. "Good," she said, her accent slightly thicker than normal.

Sansa blinked at her, and Shae went on, "I'll walk you there."

Sansa nodded. "All right," she said, because she knew that Shae wished to walk her there out of a desire to protect her, more than anything.

Shae left her at Cersei's chambers, the handmaiden giving her an odd look and telling her to send for Shae if she had need of anything, stressing the words a little too hard, and then the guard outside of Margaery's chambers - Ser Loras, and she nodded stiffly at him - opened the doors for her, and she left Shae behind.

Margaery was not the only one in Cersei's chambers. Of course, Cersei was there as well, but Sansa was rather surprised to see Olenna Tyrell, and at least a dozen other ladies of various houses, crowded into the little room and knitting away.

She could not imagine who had thought it would be a good idea to cramp all of these young women into Cersei's new chambers, as Queen Mother, rather than Queen.

"Lady Sansa," Margaery stood to greet her, taking both of Sansa's hands in her own and forcing a contact between them.

Sansa swallowed hard, pulling her hands away the moment she had the chance to do so without seeming discourteous.

"We were worried that you were not coming," Margaery went on, seemingly oblivious to Sansa's discomfort.

Sansa glanced around at the assembled ladies; at Cersei, who had not even glanced up when she entered the room, too intent on her sewing, it seemed, though Cersei had often told her that sewing was a peculiar habit of femininity that Cersei loathed far more than idle gossip. At Lady Olenna, watching her coolly, and at the other ladies in the room, Lannister and Tyrell both, as well as the ladies of a few Tyrell banner men.

She doubted that any of them was particularly concerned about her, whether or not she came when the Queen invited her to something.

She made her excuses, citing that her lady had been late that morning and thus had caused her lateness, which caught Cersei's attention, and sat, taking the bit of sewing that Margaery offered her with a quick smile, relieved to stuff her nose into it.

She had not been invited to such an occasion for some time, before Margaery had arrived in King 's Landing, certainly, she who seemed to enjoy it rather much, for, even when Cersei was forced by propriety to make it appear as though she did something other than run the kingdom behind her son's back, she loathed of the "traitor daughter's" presence at such things. She would much rather invite Sansa somewhere to mock her or torment her in some new way, and Sansa rather liked to sew.

Sansa wondered if it was because the Queen Mother's black heart ever felt guilty, or if she merely hated to act nice to Sansa, in the presence of others.

Sansa assumed it was the latter. She had never known Cersei to feel guilty about anything.

"You ought to have your servant flogged, lest she ever be late again," Cersei said then, not looking up from her work. 

Sansa flinched, knowing from Shae that the woman was hardly kind to her, and suspected her of something, though Shae had not told her what.

"Yes, Your Grace."

It had made her wonder at Shae's relationship with Tyrion, however; did she pretend to love him because he protected her from some crime that Cersei wanted justice for, or did they truly care about each other, as the days before her husband's proposal that they have a child seemed to suggest?

Margaery smiled widely at the Queen Regent's words, though something in her eyes seemed, to Sansa, to be dead.

"Her Grace is most wise, of course," she said coyly, and Sansa bit back a laugh despite herself. "We were just discussing whether or not it would be prudent for me to embroider a lion or a rose onto my sewing. I believe I shall turn it into a new pillow. The Queen Regent suggested that I somehow incorporate both, by linking them together."

"Lady Sansa doesn't care about such mindless things," Lady Olenna cut in then, saving Sansa from an answer.

Cersei's eyes flashed, but Sansa spoke first.

"Oh, I don't mind, my lady."

Cersei did look up then, giving Sansa a look like she couldn't quite understand why Sansa would pretend at playing nice with anyone, as if she hadn't known that Sansa had been doing it since she learned what Joffrey really was.

"Nonsense," Lady Olenna tutted. "There are far more interesting things afoot in King's Landing than what to put on the front of a bloody pillow. Sansa, has your impish husband given you a child yet?"

Sansa blinked.

Sansa had not spoken to the Lady Olenna since the engagement to Ser Willas had been called off in favor of the engagement to Lord Tyrion, and thus felt rather awkward, knowing the woman's hawkish eyes were on her, watching her with a dangerous precision.

She had almost forgotten the woman's sharp tongue.

"I..." Sansa flushed a deep scarlet, and glanced back down at her work, now undoubtedly botched.

"Have some fruit, Lady Sansa," Lady Olenna said then, "You look absolutely parched. Doesn't your husband make sure you are fed?"

Sansa blushed and reached forward into the fruit bowl Lady Olenna pushed toward her, took a grateful bite of pomegranate, though she knew that it certainly would not save her from furthering questioning.

The juice dribbled down her chin, and she spent an exaggerated amount of time wiping at it with her kerchief as the other ladies stared at her.

She set the pomegranate aside, only half eaten, her appetite leaving her as quickly as it had come.

Margaery leaned forward, taking Sansa's hand in hers again, and Sansa wondered if she could feel how it shook. "Lady Sansa is not so used to speaking such things so upfront, Grandmother," she admonished. "Not like us Tyrells."

"Lady Sansa and I have spoken about many such matters on occasion," Cersei spoke up then, and Sansa wondered if she could crawl into the floor and die, to avoid such a conversation.

She understood the obsession, to some extent. There had been no new gossip in King's Landing since word of Lord Tywin's intent for Sansa to birth a child had gotten out, and so the ladies flocked about her, awaiting new gossip.

But she did not understand the constant questioning, as though she had something to hide that must be brought forth with each new conversation, or the way that all of the ladies present seemed to lean forward, like vultures in wait.

"I...Have had my moon's blood this month, my lady," she told Lady Olenna, much to the sighs of the ladies about her.

"Ah, well," Cersei said, a wicked look in her eyes, "Perhaps next month the gods shall bless you, my sweet little dove."

Sansa forced down a shudder. "I pray it so," she said sweetly, and something flashed in Cersei's eyes that still made Sansa feel rather proud.

"I myself expect to have a child soon," Margaery spoke up then, in a low voice, and Sansa sent her a grateful look. "The King is very...passionate. But what can one expect? He is half a stag, and half a lion."

The ladies laughed at this, all save Olenna, who was watching Cersei. Cersei's own smile was rather cool, though it was present.

Sansa wondered what that meant, even as she forced a smile at the joke, the thought of Joffrey being...passionate to Margaery making her feel ill.

She glanced at the half-eaten pomegranate, sitting there with its juices dripping onto the table, seeds and insides visible, and thought she felt nauseous.

It looked like the inside of a body, like blood.

"Lady Sansa?" she blinked, realizing that Margaery had been calling her name. "Are you quite well?"

Sansa swallowed hard. "I...think I might merely have swallowed a seed, Your Grace. I will be quite fine."

Margaery gave her a long look. "How many times have I told you, Sansa, you needn't call me 'Your Grace,' so formally, when we are not formal here."

Cersei cleared her throat. "I hardly think it appropriate to give such liberties to the daughter of a dead traitor, my dear gooddaughter."

"Oh," Margaery glanced up at her, face small and vulnerable. "I didn't..." she glanced back at Sansa. "I have only been in the capitol for a little while, Your Grace. I suppose these things still confuse me."

Cersei dipped her head. "Understandable. There are so many rules of etiquette, here, that are not so observed in Highgarden."

Margaery's smile turned wicked. "Yes, of course, goodmother. For instance, I hardly know whether to call you Queen Mother or Dowager Queen, these days," Margaery said sweetly, and Sansa choked.

Cersei sent her a glare that, had it been capable of killing her by itself, would have done so.

"My pardon, my ladies," Sansa apologized, setting aside her knitting. "Perhaps I swallowed more than one. Might I have some water?"

Lady Olenna gave her a shrewd look, reaching toward the table too far away from where Sansa sat for a large cask of liquid. "Some summer wine, I think," she said, gesturing to one of the servants to bring Sansa a cup and pour for her.

"Queen Mother is quite fine," Cersei said, her smile brittle now, and Margaery sent her a relieved look.

"Oh, thank you for telling me," she said smoothly, going back to her sewing. "Though I hope that I might still call you goodmother, between ourselves."

Sansa thought that was going too far, that, in the next moment, Cersei would call the guards and have Margaery's throat slit.

And then she realized what was perhaps the point of all of this, that Margaery was the Queen now, not Cersei, and to do so would have been treason.

Cersei bared her teeth more than smiled, then. "Of course, gooddaughter. I would want nothing less."

The door swung open then, startling Sansa nearly into dropping her cup of wine, and Lady Reanna swept into the room, her face red as though she had been running, and a servant shut the door behind her as she curtseyed to her queen.

"Reanna," Margaery said, a touch of annoyance in her tone, and with none of the understanding she'd had when Sansa had arrived late, "Where have you been this morning?"

Reanna cast a skittish glance at Cersei before pulling her eyes back to her queen. "I...felt a bit under the weather, Your Grace. It won't happen again."

Margaery glanced at Cersei even as she spoke. "See that it does not."

Lady Reanna dipped her head once more and found her way over to the other assembled Tyrell ladies whose names that Sansa was still unsure of, picking up a bit of embroidery and setting fast to work on it as if to cause those around her to forget her absence as quickly as possible.

Sansa saw the look on Cersei's face, and wondered if they did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long...The next chapter's a bitch, and I wanted to get that one mostly done before I got this one out. But...Next chapter's also the chapter I /think/ everyone's been waiting for? So...


	16. MARGAERY III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right, I'm not completely sure about this chapter, but I've been agonizing over it for long enough now, so I'll leave it in your gentle hands, dear readers.

Lady Reanna was late again, this morning. Margaery had turned to ask why she had not yet served her morning serving of warm milk for her breakfast, and discovered that Reanna was not there.

Margaery had an intolerance for lateness. It was one of the only complaints that her ladies and servants could ever make of her, for timeliness was a form of power.

Reanna had been making a habit of lateness, recently.

Margaery would have to have a talk with her, the next time she did see the girl.

"What is it, my queen?" Joffrey asked, from where he sat beside her at the breakfast table. Behind him, Loras stiffened, sending Margaery a concerned glance, but she smiled to placate both of them at once.

"Nothing, my love. Only, one of my ladies who usually attends to me at the break of fast is not present, but it is nothing." She motioned for Lady Rosamund to step forward and take Reanna's place, which the girl did quickly, pouring her milk.

Margaery took a small sip and relished the taste.

There were few enough things in life that someone in Margaery's position ought to get attached to, but she had always enjoyed the taste of warm milk first thing in the morning, with a sprinkling of honey in it.

"The pretty redhead?" Joffrey asked, and Margaery set the cup down quickly.

"Yes, my love. She is of one of the vassal houses loyal to House Tyrell. Lady Reanna."

Joffrey nodded, then, "I don't see why you keep her around," he pouted. "It's an honor to serve my queen, not an obligation. If she can't see that, you ought to let me chop off her head and find someone better for you."

Lady Rosamund went rather stiff as she set down the pitcher of milk and moved back into place behind Margaery, alone today.

Margaery reached out, placing her hand over her husband's. "A most wise counsel, my love. I shall have to think on it; she was once a most loyal friend to me, but I suppose..."

Joffrey sniffed, pulling his hand free of hers. "Even the most loyal of friends can turn, once one comes into power. Look at the Starks, who were loyal friends to my father."

Margaery nodded serenely. "Yes, their capacity for treason often worries me. They managed it so quickly, after King Robert's death, when Lord Stark had the whole of Westeros convinced that he was King Robert's dearest and closest friend."

Joffrey raised a brow. "Yes," he said slowly. "The man was a treasonous degenerate, no doubt. He saw an opportunity for power and took it, without thinking of the damage he would cause. But look at the Starks now!" Joffrey laughed gleefully. "I've taken all of their heads, save for Lady Sansa's. Maybe I'll take her head soon, once my lord uncle's filled her with another dwarf!"

Margaery smiled coolly, having heard the same threat towards Sansa at least twice a day since her marriage to Joffrey. "I would just...I wish that there was some way I could feel safer, now that I am a queen. I do not know who to trust, if friends may turn so easily."

Joffrey leaned forward then, suddenly intent as he lifted Margaery's chin and bade her to look at him. "Trust me," he told her, voice oddly sincere. "I will cut off the heads of anyone who even thinks an ill thought toward my queen, and my Kingsguard will protect you to the death. You have my word."

Margaery smiled. "I am so relieved to hear that, my love. I know that I should not be bothering you with such worries, for you have so many other, more important matters to attend to..."

"You are my queen," Joffrey interrupted her, almost sounding incredulous. "There is no one more important to me."

Margaery smiled up at him underneath her lashes, and took another sip of her slowly cooling milk.

The door opened then, and Lady Reanna walked into the room, looking slightly flustered as she bowed to the King and curtseyed to the Queen.

"Where have you been, _Lady_?" Joffrey demanded, before Margaery had even opened her mouth to get a word in, and Margaery frowned into her cup. "My queen was most wroth."

Reanna swallowed, glanced at Margaery. "I am so sorry, my King, my Queen. I...I overslept, this morning. I have no excuse."

Joffrey looked like he intended to bid Loras to cut off her head then and there.

Margaery stood to her feet, smoothing down her dress. "I would like a private word with you, Lady Reanna, now that I've finished my meal and you've finally appeared." She turned wide eyes on Joffrey. "Assuming, of course, that that is all right with Your Grace?"

Joffrey waved a hand. "Of course, of course." His eyes narrowed on Reanna. "This time."

Lady Reanna shivered as she hurried after Margaery, and Lady Rosamund was left behind to clean up Margaery's break of fast, alone with Joffrey, it seemed, for a moment later, Loras appeared in the hall, shutting the door to Joffrey's chambers behind him.

"Hadn't you better stay and continue guarding the King?" Margaery asked her brother coyly.

Loras looked like he was attempting the better part of valor by not grinding his teeth to dust then and there. "His Grace has Ser Boros arriving in just a few moments, and understands your desire for protection at all times," he told her, and Margaery hesitated for a moment, before nodding and sweeping down the hall.

"My lady, I truly am sorry-" Reanna went on, and Margaery stopped, holding up a hand. Reanna fell silent.

"I am going to the library now, Lady Reanna," she told the girl, not unkindly. "I have been reminded during the break of fast that there is something requiring my attention to be sought there. You may go."

Reanna lowered her head. "Your Grace," she said, before dipping into another curtsey and hurrying down the hall.

"That was rather harsh," Loras commented, coming up to stand beside her. "She's only been late, what, twice now?"

Margaery narrowed her eyes at Reanna's retreating back. "Three times," she stated, absently. "I really do wish to go the library, however, and I have you to protect me. I shall not need another lady."

Loras raised an eyebrow at her. "You aren't fond of reading ancient tomes, Sister," he said then, sounding slightly suspicious, and Margaery sent him a wide smile.

"I have recently acquired a taste for it," she told him, and he simply raised a brow. She sighed. "There is someone who will most likely be there at this hour whom I would like to speak to," she told him, and began walking once more.

Loras' long legs quickly kept up with her, and Margaery sighed, knowing there would be more onslaught of questions the longer that they walked.

"Are you speaking of...a certain spider?" Loras asked, lowering his voice.

Margaery rolled her eyes, glancing around them. They were alone in the hall, but if one of Varys' spiders had been here, Loras' lowered voice would not have stopped them from overhearing.

"And why would I do that, Loras? The Master of Whispers and I have nothing to say to one another."

"Nor, I suspect, do you have anything to say to anyone within the royal library," Loras pointed out, and Margaery's lips quirked into one of amusement, despite herself. "What was this urgent thing that Joffrey reminded you of?"

Margaery raised a brow at him. "Perhaps it was my warm milk that reminded me, Loras. It does have a way of waking me up, in the morning."

Loras rolled his eyes, fondly, and pushed the hair out of his eyes. "Give me some credit, dear sister."

Margaery gave him a coquettish smile instead, and Loras sighed, following after her the rest of the way to the library in the customary silence between a Queen and a member of the Kingsguard.

Or, at least, Margaery had found it so, during her short time as Queen. She wondered if they had been instructed not to speak with her unless absolutely necessary lest they bring into question her honor, or if they merely chose not to engage the wife of the King.

Either way, it was probably wise not to encourage them to do otherwise, save for Loras.

Margaery paused outside the door of the library. "No one is really here, this time of the morning."

"Marg-"

"You can guard me just as well from out in the hall, to ensure I have no visitors," Margaery said, giving him a placating smile. "This is...something I would like to do alone. It is not that I don't trust you," she said, at his look, "Only, this is a conversation of a somewhat private nature, and I worry that your presence will be...troublesome, for the other party."

Loras raised a brow at her. "I would think, after your impassioned speech to Joffrey, that that is the last thing you would like, to be left without protection for even a moment."

Margaery shrugged. "Well, then...pace, or something," she told him, before stepping into the library and shutting the door purposely behind her.

She heard Loras sigh as the door shut, but then she was no longer thinking of Loras much at all.

Sansa Stark was sitting in a corner of the library, as Margaery understood she did every morning at this hour, attempting to make herself look as small as possible, curled up with her knees in front of her and holding a book before her.

Margaery glanced at the cover, almost hidden beneath Sansa's gentle fingers, raising a brow at the title.

 _The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms, With Descriptions of Many High Lords and Noble Ladies and Their Children_.

A mouthful, to be sure, and not Sansa's usual fare. Margaery could remember long days in the sun of the royal gardens, watching Sansa read the lyrics of the Songs she had never quite been able to give up, despite her insistence that she no longer believed in them.

Margaery had a feeling she knew why the other girl read it, anyway.

Sansa held the large tome as though it were just any other book, and not bursting in her hands.

"An interesting read," Margaery said, smirking slightly as she plopped down onto the chair beside Sansa's.

The girl jumped, slamming the book shut and blushing profusely as she moved the book behind  her, as though that would undo the damage of Margaery having already seen it. "Queen Margaery. I didn't realize anyone else was here. I..."

Margaery nodded, sympathetic in an instant. "Of course. Would you like me to leave?"

Sansa swallowed, looked away. "That hardly matters, Your Grace. I have no more claim to this library than you."

"I told you before Sansa, just Margaery," Margaery said, smiling gently at her.

"The Queen Mother-"

And suddenly Margaery was turned toward her, staring intently at her, so close that she could feel Sansa's sharp intake of breath.

"Cersei isn't here," Margaery pointed out, looking about them exaggeratedly. "And as Joffrey likes to say, _A queen can do as she likes_."

Sansa, despite herself, almost looked amused. It was a vague amusement, the kind that Margaery had sometimes seen on Sansa's face when a Lannister said something foolish. "I don't think that's it."

Margaery shrugged.

They sat in silence for a long moment, Margaery watching the contents of her cup swirl as she waited for Sansa to speak again, wondering at the merit of the drink that Cersei found so comforting.

She supposed that she did not blame the woman. She had been prone to drink more often than not, lately. It came with being in such close proximity with Joffrey, so often.

She found herself wondering what Sansa was thinking, for the other girl was simply sitting, not looking again at the book since she'd noticed Margaery's presence.

She missed Sansa's candor. Her honesty. Sansa was one of the only people in King's Landing brave enough to carry on an honest conversation, one that did not require the usual deciphering of words.

"All black of hair," Sansa said presently, her voice tired, and Margaery blinked, glancing up at her.

"I'm sorry?"

"The Baratheon line before Joffrey's birth. The Queen wanted this book burned, when Joffrey was crowned," Sansa said, her voice quiet, not meeting Margaery's gaze as she nodded to the book, now set back on the table where it would usually be found.

"It was the last thing my father touched, before he committed treason. I think she thought that there would be something incriminating, in it. She had Grand Maester Pycelle read it through, twice, just to be sure. Lord Tyrion convinced her not to. It's one of only two copies in the world, after all, and to burn it would look suspicious."

Margaery had not known that, but it sounded like something Cersei would do. She opened her mouth to say something, though, in this moment, she didn't know what it would be.

That was a startling realization, for someone who always had a response to her surroundings.

She was sure that there were two things that she was supposed to say. If she was certain they were not being overheard, she was supposed to offer comfort, and perhaps shock, at the confirmation of what had killed Sansa's father.

If she wasn't, she was supposed to reprimand the other girl, or steer the conversation into safer waters.

"I am glad that she did not burn it, then," she said finally, and Sansa blinked up at her, forehead furrowed prettily.

"I'm not," she said finally, with a little shrug. "It did not save my father, but only killed him."

" _Valar Moghulis_ ," Margaery said, and Sansa looked at her. "It is High Valyrian. It means-"

"All men must die," Sansa whispered softly, almost choking on the words. "Forgive me, Queen Margaery, but I should not have-"

Margaery nodded. "But your father should not have been one of them. The Lannisters were...wrong to kill him. From what Renly told me about him, he was an honorable man, and did not deserve such a death. And...I am sorry for your loss. I don't know if I ever told you that."

Sansa stumbled to her feet, almost tossing the book aside, then. "I should...I should go," she stammered out, refusing to meet Margaery's eyes. "And you shouldn't say such things."

Margaery arched a brow. "Why ever not? I am the Queen, and can say as I will."

"It's _treason_ ," Sansa hissed out.

"Treason. Yes, I suppose it is," Margaery mused, tone almost conversational as Sansa made her way toward the door, hand already on the latch.

Sansa paused, back still to her, and Margaery hated that. Needed her to turn around and look her in the eyes.

Perhaps that need had loosened her tongue a bit too much.

"Do you love him?" Sansa asked, her back still turned.

Margaery thought for a moment. "No."

Sansa blinked at her, looking suddenly wary. "Why do you...Why don't you try to stop him, the horrible things that he does? Do you...enjoy what he does?"

Margaery shrugged. "I don't. I merely...All men must die." She gave Sansa a long look, thought of the years that Sansa had survived at court before Margaery had arrived. "They die when they make war, or honorable mistakes. But we are not men, my Sansa. And we are _survivors_. I saw the way that Joffrey treats you, and I do not believe it is all because of your family did, Sansa. And I am not alone here, in King's Landing. There are things that I must do that I wish I did not have to, just as you do."

Sansa turned to face her, appeared to be thinking about her words intently for a moment, before she nodded. " _Valar Morghulis_ ," she repeated Margaery's earlier words.

Margaery gave her a small smile.


	17. SANSA XIV

"Lady Sansa," Margaery greeted her with a wide smile as she walked into the new queen's chambers, having been summoned there just after breaking her fast.

For some reason that Sansa was not sure she understood, nor that did she want to understand, the Queen still retained her chambers within the Maidenvault. She wondered, often, if it was a threat from Cersei, or if Margaery felt safer here, surrounded by her Tyrell family and banner men, rather than closer to Joffrey's own chambers.

She wondered how many nights the new Queen actually spent within the Maidenvault, now that she was married to Joffrey, and then shook such thoughts from her mind, remembering that she and Margaery were now friends, and to think such thoughts of her dear friend would be unbecoming.

"Margaery," she greeted, remembering herself just in time before calling the other woman 'Your Grace,' as Margaery seemed to have a particular aversion from hearing that title from Sansa's lips.

"I thought that we might take a turn around the Red Keep, or perhaps the Sept of Baelor?" Margaery asked her sweetly. "I find myself growing tired of the royal gardens. Too many flowers can do a rose harm, after all."

Sansa smiled at the little quip. "I would love to, Y-Margaery," she said, and, if it was at all possible, Margaery's smile seemed to grow as she reached out and took Sansa's arm, leading her from the room as Ser Loras and two of her ladies followed behind them.

Seeing the ladies reminded Sansa of the strange interaction she had witnessed between Cersei and Lady Reanna, and she opened her mouth to bring it up, but Margaery cut her off, turning to her suddenly and asking, "Have you yet had a tour of the Maidenvault?"

Sansa swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry, though she did not really understand why, Margaery's body flush against her own, they were standing so close. "No, I have not. The Queen Mother wished to put me in here when I was betrothed to Joffrey, but my father would not have me far from him. And...After..."

"Say no more," Margaery told her, not unkindly, as her features twisted in sympathy, and Sansa wondered how much of it was real.

She wondered if she would always be wondering such things about Margaery.

She, unlike Sansa, had not lost a father before, and could not possibly know what it was like, not really, though Sansa had seen grief in the other woman's eyes days before, when they had spoken in the library and reached their tenuous understanding.

Their interactions were still strained. Sansa might have forgiven Margaery the moment she saw the understanding in the other girl's eyes, might have known that Margaery saw a similar understanding in her own, but she still didn't know if she could trust her.

Didn't know if she could spend the rest of her time in King's Landing watching a friend stand beside Joffrey as his queen, smiling prettily when he spoke of cutting off the heads of half a dozen smallfolk from Flea Bottom who had started a riot.

Didn't know if she could allow herself to become friends with Margaery Tyrell once more when she knew that she was going to leave here soon, the moment the Martells did.

But they were not as strained as Sansa had expected them to be. It was...surprisingly easy to go back to the way things had once been, between the two of them, when Sansa had not thought that Margaery was just using her and Margaery had not been married to Joffrey.

"Do you know the story of King Baelor the Blessed's sisters?" Margaery asked as they walked, arm in arm.

Sansa blinked. She had heard it before, of course, a little from Joffrey when he'd explained his reasoning for putting Margaery and her family here, and the rest of it perhaps from her septa, though she did not remember, but she shook her head, anyway.

There was something about Margaery that made her wish to listen to whatever the other woman wished to say, no matter what it was about, though she was rather curious as to why Margaery had brought it up, now.

It was a passing strange subject to discuss between the two of them, even if it was part of this tour that Margaery was giving her.

"They say that he was so pious that he believed that feeling such a thing as lust for his sisters would be a great sin," Margaery said, as they walked out into the corridor and passed what she quickly explained was Ser Loras' rooms, just across the hall from Margaery's own. Sansa had always heard the story from her septa as him worrying that he might fall in love with his sisters, but then, she had been so very young, then. "And so he had his three sisters locked up in here, in the Maidenvault, where they would not provide a temptation to him."

Sansa raised a brow, and felt safe enough around the other woman to ask the question which she had always wished to know. "Did it work?"

Margaery blinked at her, pausing in their little tour outside of her father's chambers, and then barked out a laugh. "I don't know," she said finally, still chuckling, and then, "I suppose that I would find it...rather difficult to believe, if it had."

Sansa blushed, remembering what her lady mother had once told her when she asked about why Jon's presence was tolerated in Winterfell, if he was a bastard as she had been told by her septa and the cruel boys who picked on Jon in the stables.

That men could not be inhibited by the sort of rules that women, and especially ladies, must abide by in matters of propriety. She wondered if that was what Margaery had meant.

"And this is where my lady grandmother sleeps," Margaery was saying, when Sansa refocused her attention on the other girl, just outside the Lady Olenna's chambers. "She's been...spending an awful lot of time in there, lately. More than she does in the gardens, now."

Sansa blinked in concern. "Is she well?"

Margaery stared intently at the closed door to her grandmother's chambers for a moment, before turning back to Sansa with an almost too bright smile. "Of course. Merely tired of Lannisters for company, I suppose."

Sansa certainly sympathized.

Margaery showed her several more rooms, unexciting in their appearance and use, parlors and a dining hall that the Tyrells used amongst themselves, as well as a sewing room far superior to Cersei's chambers, and a room that the Tyrell guards had begun to use as an armory, if Sansa could tell anything of an armory, before Ser Loras quickly shut that door and ushered them on with a stern look toward Margaery.

"And here is where most of my maidens sleep, save for my pillow friend, Elinor," Margaery gestured to several doors at once, and suddenly, they were at the end of the Maidenvault, and Sansa blinked, realizing that the corridor was rather small indeed for the Tyrell host. She wondered if the rooms were much larger than Lord Tyrion's, and then realized the foolishness of such a thought. Of course they were; Margaery was the Queen, after all, and could have only the best, no matter how little Cersei liked the thought.

Margaery clapped her hands together, as Sansa had noticed she did when she wished to move on, either in conversation or in body.

"Giving you a tour is not half as fun as I thought it would be," she pronounced then, and Sansa felt herself blushing, despite that she did not know why. "The Maidenvault is rather an uninspiring place."

"I am sorry, Y-"

"I think we ought to tour my bedchambers, instead," Margaery said, flashing her a smile as she took Sansa's arm and all but dragged her back down the hall, past her ladies and Ser Loras.

"Your Grace-"

The look that Margaery sent her then was almost annoyed, and Sansa flinched under it. "Margaery, Sansa. Come now."

"Margaery," Sansa repeated dutifully, "I do not think that it would be entirely appropriate, for me to go into your private chambers, especially with Ser Loras."

Margaery blinked at her, and then laughed. "Nonsense. My brother will never tell, will you, Loras?"

Loras grinned. "Of course not, Lady Sansa, though if it will make you uncomfortable, I can wait in the hall. But I must guard my sister queen at all times, you understand."

Margaery rolled her eyes in fond exasperation toward her brother. "It isn't as if I will come under threat in my own chambers, Loras. Unless you suspect the Lady Sansa of dastardly intentions?"

Sansa blushed, not wanting to put either of them out. "No, it is quite all right, Ser Loras."

"Wonderful," Margaery said, opening the doors to her chambers. "Then I do not see a problem. Oh!"

Sansa glanced around her, into Margaery's opulent chambers. They were beautiful, far more so than hers had been back when she was the 'beloved' of Joffrey, and even now that she was married to Lord Tyrion.

The walls were made of pure gold, the bedding a dark Tyrell green and the bedchamber itself seemed to go on forever.

The only complaint that she might have had with the rooms, had they been her own, were that there were no windows whatsoever, merely fake ones made of stained glass, but, for some reason, Sansa did not think that sort of thing would bother Margaery.

She blinked when she saw the beautiful young woman sitting on the end of Margaery's bed, auburn hair almost glowing in the dim lighting of the room.

"I did not know you were in here," Margaery told the other girl, and almost looked embarrassed, or as embarrassed as Sansa could ever imagine her looking.

The auburn haired girl stood to her feet, green silks rustling about her as she grinned at the Queen. "I can leave, if you like."

"Sansa, this is my lady Elinor Tyrell, my pillow friend and cousin," Margaery introduced the girl standing by her bed, and Sansa flushed a little, dipping into a small curtsey as Elinor did the same. "Do you mind terribly if she stays?"

"Lady Sansa," she said in greeting. "Her Grace has told me so much about you, though I regret that I have not had the pleasure of meeting you before now, save in passing."

Sansa blinked at her, somewhat surprised at how earnest the other girl sounded. "T-Thank you," she said finally, "And, no, of course not."

Margaery's smile was wide. "Wonderful," she repeated. "I shall have some tea brought up to strengthen us for a walk about the Keep, and perhaps we can play a game while we wait for it?"

Sansa nodded, still a bit too in awe of Margaery's stately chambers to really register what she was saying.

Margaery motioned for Elinor to go for tea, and the other girl walked out into the hall, finding a servant and giving her quick orders for moon tea before hurrying back inside, with a small smirk on her lips.

"My chambers in Highgarden were far finer than this, and I was not a queen then," Margaery said, after Elinor shut the door behind herself, with a wink at Sansa. "Though, I suppose we all must suffer for the sake of the Crown."

Elinor raised a brow. "You mean, we can't all expect to be as spoiled as you are," she teased, and Margaery's laugh was so musical that it made Sansa swallow hard and want very much to hear more of it.

"We mustn't let on about such things in front of Sansa," Margaery mock-chastised Elinor. "She might think us too spoiled."

Elinor laughed again, and Sansa blushed. "Oh, no, I couldn't."

Thankfully, then Margaery seemed to take pity on her, moving toward the little divan on the opposite end of her chambers and reaching behind it.

"I have a game here," Margaery said. "Nothing so very eloquent, I'm afraid, but suppose you would like to play it with me?"

Sansa had hardly played anything, besides when Tyrion had taught her cyvasse, since she had come to King's Landing, and she wondered if she was still young enough to play games, as Margaery and Lady Elinor seemed to be.

And then she remembered that she and Margaery were not so far apart in age, if circumstances, and surely she could manage one game.

Sansa swallowed. "Of course. I would love to."

They sat, the three girls around the game while Ser Loras took up post against the wall behind them, hand on the pommel of his sword and making smirking interjections as Margaery taught Sansa the game and they waited for their tea.

The game itself was fairly simple. It was a board game, like cyvasse, but very different in every other way, and reminded her of some of the games her brothers had liked to play in Winterfell, with sticks whereas this game used golden rods.

The goal of the game was to roll the dice and take as many sticks as one could from the other players.

Margaery was very good at it.

They played until tea came, and then Sansa took the welcome chance to break by sipping at her tea idly as she stared at the board, her intentions rather clear, it seemed, for Elinor laughed at her.

She did not feel the need to blush under the laughter, for Elinor's laugh was sweet and did not seem to be mocking her, as Joffrey's laugh would have.

Sansa had one golden rod yet left to her.

"I am terrible at this game," Sansa pronounced, as Margaery took another of her sticks for herself, heedless of her own tea.

Margaery and Elinor laughed.

"Don't worry," Elinor said, leaning forward conspiratorially, "I was as well, at first, and Margaery is far better at this game then she would have you believe. It is very popular in Highgarden. Hence why she is winning. I have yet to see her lose, save against her brother Lord Willas."

Sansa blushed at the mention of Lord Willas. "Is he...very good?" she asked, and Margaery smiled.

"My brother adores board games, sweet Sansa, almost as much as he does hawks. He has promised to have a game of cyvasse imported from Dorne for me, that we might play it together, as he's heard it is absolutely wonderful."

Sansa thought of the game that Lord Tyrion kept at the little table in their chambers. It was intriguing, but she was just as terrible at it as she was at this one, and did not find it 'absolutely wonderful' as Margaery had called it.

"My lord Tyrion has a game of it," she told them, and Margaery gasped.

"Does he? I can't imagine how he managed to get one from Dorne so quickly. The game has only just taken on there. Oh, Sansa, you must get it for us to play sometime."

Sansa smiled, and pretended that she was still on enough of speaking terms with her husband to ask him for such a favor.

Elinor took another turn, and then huffed into her cup of tea

"Lady Victaria, a distant cousin of ours, once played this game against us when she visited Highgarden, and, after two rounds, she declared it absolutely ridiculous and began breaking her sticks," Elinor said, and Sansa laughed in disbelief.

"Surely she didn't!"

Margaery smiled. "Lady Victaria is a very...stern woman," she said, and then glanced at Elinor with a smirk on her lips. The two burst into laughter.

Sansa glanced between the two of them, noting how very close they seemed compared to how Margaery usually seemed around her ladies.

"Did you live in Highgarden before coming to King's Landing, Lady Elinor?" she asked presently, and Elinor pulled her gaze away from Margaery and back into her tea.

"Yes, milady. I have been a pillow friend to Margaery since we were both very young girls. I was sent to live in Highgarden by my parents, in the hopes of finding a good match."

Sansa smiled, and pretended that she was not jealous, to see the two of them, such good friends and able to confide in one another so easily here in King's Landing.

She'd had Jeyne, before, though Jeyne was gone now, likely dead, Sansa could not help but think, though Lord Baelish had once assured her that her friend would be taken care of.

She had not seen Jeyne since then, though, and Elinor reminded her a bit of Jeyne.

She hoped that the Lannisters did not steal Elinor away as they had her one friend in King's Landing, for Margaery's sake, and as she thought Cersei seemed to wish to do with the Lady Reanna.

"Margaery," she said suddenly, "Where is Lady Reanna?"

Margaery blinked at her, clearly surprised by the question. "She has been rather under the weather lately, poor girl, and has been sloth-like in her duties. I gave her the day off, to rest."

Sansa felt a bit cold, and then Elinor leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, "Between the three of us, I've seen her spending a lot of time around Ser Osmund Kettleblack. I think that her 'illness' recently might be the result of spending a bit too much time abed."

"Elinor!" Margaery scolded, but Elinor hardly looked repentant.

Sansa blinked at that. Lady Reanna was a woman flowered, after all, and Ser Osmund was one of the Kingsguard particularly loyal to Cersei. Perhaps the woman had found out about it, and that was why she had approached Reanna.

Sansa certainly hoped that that was all it was, for she had not liked the look in Cersei's eyes when she had spoken to Reanna, and she did not wish to cast suspicion upon one of Margaery's ladies and friends without more information.


	18. SANSA XV

"I thought you were angry with me," Sansa heard Tyrion say, from behind the door to their chambers as she returned with a slight spring in her step to them after the tour of the Red Keep with Margaery, in which they had somehow avoided Joffrey completely, a feat she did not believe to be a coincidence, and paused where she stood, hand poised to push it open.

She was not particularly sure why she did not simply go in and announce herself, why she paused and waited, when her lady mother and her septa had always taught her against doing such a discourteous thing as eavesdropping.

That was an antic far more befitting of Arya.

Sansa swallowed, and did not open the door, attempting to regain her composure as her mind’s eye traveled to thoughts of Arya, of whether she was even still alive now.

And thus, she could not help but hear the response, a bit surprised to realize that Shae and her lord husband were alone in their chambers, even when she knew that she should not be so surprised.

"I am angry with you," Shae snapped back, and she heard the sound of furniture being moved, wondered what was going on, but did not dare to open the door. "You are the one who made me Lady Sansa's servant. She is a very sweet, very little, girl. If you put a child in her, I shall never forgive you.”

Indignation flared in Sansa for a moment at being called a little girl by a woman whom she'd come to consider as a friend, but then she remembered that, in her own way, Shae was defending her.

It felt so long since anyone in King's Landing had attempted to do so.

Tyrion sighed. "Do you think I don't know that? My father-"

"Your father called me to the Tower of the Hand today," Shae interrupted him, and Sansa's stomach dropped in worry at the other woman's tone. "Again."

She knew, of course, that Shae and Tyrion were...closer, than any maidservant and nobleman had a right to be, knew that the long looks they gave each other and the nights that Tyrion did not spend in his own chambers were significant, though they still went to the trouble to hide it from Sansa, for whatever reason, she knew not.

It was not as though she could tell anyone. Not as though she wished to do so.

She didn't understand, to be honest, why it was so important, that the two of them keep their relationship a secret, even if they could never be wed and Tyrion was supposed to care for her. Grandmaester Pycelle slept with the kitchen girls, and did not bother about which ones they were, and everyone knew of it.

The long silence from inside her quarters caught Sansa's attention, and she was just on the verge on entering once more when Tyrion spoke again.

"Again?" Tyrion asked, sounding somewhere between incredulous and terrified.

Shae made a humming sound. "He called me to the Tower of the Hand before the wedding."

"And you didn't see fit to mention this because..."

Shae didn't answer for a long time, and Sansa found herself wondering if they had somehow sensed her outside their chambers, and were going to pull the door open and accuse her of being the little eavesdropper that she evidently was.

They did not.

"Because it wasn't important," Shae said. "You already knew that he at least suspects what I am, and I am not leaving you."

A long sigh from her lord husband.

"Did he...?"

"He asked me what I was before I was a maidservant to the Lady Sansa, and did not believe me when I told him that I was a maidservant in Braavos. Then, he attempted to bribe me into leaving King's Landing, and, when I told him that I could not leave my mistress, he threatened me." She certainly sounded nonchalant about all of this.

"Shae." A rustling - Sansa did not know if it was a dress, or papers. She strongly suspected the former, however.

"Don't. I don't want to hear it."

"This is precisely why I wanted you to go, to be safe-"

"And who will keep Sansa Stark safe, when I am gone?"

"I thought you were jealous of my marrying her."

"I've changed my mind. And it wasn't her fault."

"I will. Keep her safe."

Sansa thought of hands on her breast, of wishes for a child, and didn't feel particularly safe at all, not by her husband. Not from him, either.

Shae apparently agreed with the sentiment - she snorted loudly. "I would not leave King's Landing and that girl behind for all of the Lannister gold," she said. "Nor even for you."

Tyrion let out another long sigh, and then murmured, "I should never have brought you to King's Landing. You're certainly not worth the trouble. Most whores have the good sense to only be in it for the money."

Sansa sucked in a breath. She had long suspected, of course, given Shae's almost endless knowledge about men, which she seemed to have no shame in sharing, and her long looks toward Tyrion.

But to think that a whore had been serving as her handmaiden these last few months...well, she did not know what to think. Shae had been kinder to her than most in King's Landing, and she could hardly fault the woman for her previous profession, even if her lady mother would have been horrified to hear of that.

It took her a moment to realize that she had lost part of the conversation, and she wondered again if she should simply announce herself, despite the fact that they had been talking about her and that she was such a pitiful liar that she was unsure she would be able to hide her knowledge of the conversation.

And then Shae was speaking again.

"Your father is terrifying."

"I am well aware of that. Shae-"

"I carry a knife with me," Shae informed him, as she had once informed Sansa. She shivered as she remembered that battle, remembered what Shae had intended the knife for, how she had thought that she could never imagine doing such a thing to herself when Shae had told her of it. "He won't be able to hurt me."

"You are hardly fit to take on Lannister guards-"

"I didn't mean _that_."

There was a long pause after that, and, even though Sansa could not see them, she thought it felt pained.

"Varys' offer to go to Essos-"

Shae cut him off easily. "I'm not going to Essos alone. If you bring it up again, I'll slit your throat, my lord Lannister."

Another long pause. “Very well, milady.”

There were other sounds then, and Sansa, though she had never witnessed such things herself, recognized them for what they were and moved away from the door with a sigh, resolving to go to the libraries once more if she could not have her harp now.


	19. SANSA XVI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay in updating; getting ready for college is hard, guys. On that note, updates may not be as frequent as before, because summer's over and all, but I'll try my best. On another note, shameless self-promotion, but if you'd be so kind to check out my new fic, The Lord of Two Queens, you'd be awesome. It's not Sansaery, but it's still got a healthy dose of Margaery in it, and we could all use that. :)

Lady Leonette had taught Sansa the high harp, and she had enjoyed it, at the time, her fingers running over the strings as if they were born to such a practice, as Lady Leonette had told her when she taught her.

Lady Leonette had returned to Highgarden with her husband Ser Garlan now, but had insisted on commissioning a harp for Sansa, before she left.

It had arrived just days after Sansa's wedding to Tyrion, and she had not felt inclined to play it then, for there were no pretty songs to sing then. She had wanted it destroyed, but had suspected that Shae had refused to follow such orders, and now that was confirmed.

It was beautiful.

Made of gold, and she wondered if it was pure gold, if the Tyrells were really so wealthy as all of that, when the Lannisters could barely produce enough gold for the Crown before them, it sat in the corner of the little room beneath the sheet Shae had thrown over it, not even dusty.

Sansa reached out, plucking at one of the strings and gasping as the note resounded through Lord Tyrion's chambers.

It would have been more beautiful, somewhere more open.

Sansa's mind's eye instantly saw the royal gardens, and she called out for a servant.

"I need you to carry this harp to the royal gardens," Sansa instructed him. "Find a place for me to play where I will not be interrupted."

The servant hesitated, and then nodded. "Of course, my lady. If you will follow me."

Sansa nodded, standing to her feet and following after the servant, feeling a worry over the harp that she did not know it was still in her to feel for inanimate objects when he accidentally scraped it against the door.

"My apologies, my lady," he said, glancing back at her, and Sansa simply nodded her head, hardly able to show more concern than that.

The servant led her out into a secluded part of the gardens, where she found herself surrounded by beautiful white roses, and Sansa sat down on a little bench that he acquired for her in front of her high harp, knowing that she could not send him away for propriety's sake, but wanting nothing more than to be alone in the gardens while she played.

She reached out, hands flittering over the strings, before glancing back at the servant. Pod, she thought his name. He'd been honored after the Battle of Blackwater, and still dutifully served her husband, and she still barely knew his name.

"Turn away," she ordered him, and he blinked at her, before doing as he was told.

Somehow, it helped.

She began to stroke the strings of the harp, her fingers idle, for they brought her back to a time when she was not the last surviving Stark despite herself, and, for a few moments, she was almost happy.

And then her finger stuck on a string that made a particularly bad sound, and that moment vanished.

She sighed, glancing up to see that Pod was still standing dutifully with his back to her; hand on the pommel of his sword as he guarded her.

She wondered if he thought that such theatrics would actually be useful, if one of the Kingsguard came and demanded that she be dragged before Joffrey and beaten again. If he thought that anyone in King's Landing could genuinely protect her.

And then she thought of a song that Lady Leonette had taught her, while she had remained in King's Landing, one of the first that she had taught Sansa, for it was simple enough in melody and sweet and short.

She began running her fingers over the strings of the harp again, idly attempting to pick up the tune.

After a while, she saw Pod straighten out of the corner of her eyes, but she ignored it; if Joffrey or anyone else wanted her presence, they would wait until she had finished this song or they would drag her away from the harp.

She had a sudden image in her mind of Joffrey stomping the harp into bits, and her fingers faltered.

"You're playing it wrong," a voice said behind her, making Sansa startle.

But she did not have the time to pull away before Margaery's soft, lily white hands were suddenly wrapping around her own, manipulating her fingers into the right positions, and Sansa swallowed as she felt the rest of Margaery's body slide onto the seat behind her, press up against her back, so close that she could feel the warm heat of Margaery beneath her gown.

"Your Grace-"

"Please, Sansa, how many times must I tell you to call me Margaery?" Margaery's voice whispered teasingly in her ear, and Sansa bit back a laugh, remembering Cersei's face throughout that entire ordeal.

"At least once more," she promised, and could feel Margaery's smile, even though she could not see it. "I'm playing it wrong?"

"Oh, yes," Margaery agreed, seemingly dragged back to the topic at hand. "You're far too stiff, Sansa. This song is meant to celebrate, not to cause illness."

Despite herself, Sansa giggled, attempting to loosen herself up for the sake of the song. "Is my playing causing illness to you, _Margaery_?"

Margaery didn't pause for a moment. "It will, if you continue in such a way. Your fingers are dancing, Sansa, not posturing."

"And you can tell the difference, in the sound?" Sansa asked, raising a brow and half-turning to face her. She stopped when she realized how close they were, blushing and turning around once more.

"Yes. It's a melody, Sansa, not a dirge. The sound must resonate, deep in your bones, must go on long after your fingers have stopped touching those strings. You must play the harp, Sansa, not allow it to play you."

Margaery's voice was melodious, but it seemed to Sansa that there was something more to her words then than just the explanation of how to play a song.

Her fingers began to stroke at the strings as Margaery had suggested, allowing them to ring out longer than she had before, as she asked, “Will it always be like this?"

Margaery seemed to be watching her performance with something bordering on fascination. "Much better. Like what?"

"Will you always be telling me one thing and meaning another?" Sansa blurted out, her words concealed, she hoped, from any listeners by the tinkling of the music.

Behind her, Margaery had gone rather stiff. "I have always attempted to be as honest with you as I can, Sansa. But we don't live in the world of this song, or any other, and so I cannot always be."

Sansa thought about that for a moment, head cocked, before she sighed. "I suppose that is all one can ask of another, in Westeros."

Margaery gave her a half-smile. "You've stopped playing with your left hand."

Sansa jumped, glancing down at her hands, her right still playing out a melody while her left rested stiffly against the strings, forcing away any sound that her right might have accomplished.

"So I have," she whispered thickly. "Forgive me, Margaery, I am not very good."

Margaery sent her a long look. "That is not what my goodsister Leonette told me, before she left for Highgarden."

Sansa flushed. "An exaggeration born of courtesy, no doubt."

Margaery lifted a brow. "Are you implying that my goodsister is a liar?" she asked, and Sansa could not tell if she was teasing, or not.

"No," she denied hurriedly, just in case, "I would never-"

But that was just the problem, wasn't it? The Tyrells had promised their friendship, had promised to make her part of their family and send her away to Highgarden, far away from these wicked Lannisters.

And, when the time came for them to stand by her, they had not.

"I think you are as good as my goodsister said you were," Margaery went on, when Sansa had not gone on for some time. "You are just distracted today." She smiled brightly. "Perhaps you should continue another time. Would you care to have tea in the gardens with myself and my lady grandmother? I was just headed there when I saw you."

Sansa swallowed. "I wouldn't wish to intrude-"

"Nonsense," Margaery brushed this aside. "My grandmother despairs of entertaining the same company over and over, I am sure." She paused. "I would...greatly like to spend some more time with you. To make up for the time that I have not."

Sansa stood, brushing down her skirts. "Well, I suppose my lord husband will not need me for the rest of the afternoon."

Margaery clapped her hands together. "Perfect," she said, gesturing for a servant to take away Sansa's harp, and Sansa hoped that the serving boy would know to deliver it to her chambers once more.

"Do you play?" Sansa asked as they walked, and then flushed when she realized what a foolish question it was. Of course Margaery played, or she would not have been able to say the instructions she had.

Margaery, however, simply gave her an indulgent smile. "We at Highgarden all learned the high harp when we were quite young," she said smoothly. "My brother Garlan and I had a knack for it, but I confess that it isn't quite interesting enough of a pass time, for me. My mind wanders, as yours did today."

Sansa nodded. "It is quite a lovely instrument though, and sometimes, it's nice to have one's mind on other thoughts."

Margaery lifted a brow at her, but, when she spoke again, it was no longer of harps. "I confess I had an ulterior motive for wishing to speak with you, Sansa." Sansa could not find it within her to be surprised by this. "Joffrey is looking for you, I understand, and I wished to spare you that. I hope that it was not too untoward, my doing so."

Sansa blinked, feeling foolish for her uncharitable thoughts. "I...Thank you," she whispered out, and Margaery grinned at her.

"And, besides, my grandmother has remarked that she grows bored of me. Apparently," Margaery's voice dropped into the perfect imitation of the old woman, "One grows boring after they've been married, and all through it."

Sansa smiled. "She certainly has a way of letting everyone know her thoughts and getting away with it."

That elicited a laugh from her companion. "Indeed, she does. A special talent for it, I understand, bourn of respect and old age. I don't think any of us could claim the same."

Had it always been this easy to talk to Margaery? Sansa couldn't tell.

"Perhaps we will, when we have reached her age," Sansa suggested, and Margaery gave her a long look that she could not quite decipher, before smiling grandly.

"I certainly hope so. I look up to my grandmother in all things, and above all, aspire to be most like her," she confided, and Sansa could not say that she was surprised by the admission.

They reached the pavilion where Lady Olenna seemed to spend most of her time, when she was not abed as Margaery had suggested she often was.

The old woman was sitting with several of the Tyrell ladies, who were intently sewing and looking as though they would do anything to escape drawing the old woman's notice.

A bard was standing in the corner, singing a melancholy dirge that reminded Sansa of the song she had been attempting today, before Margaery had reconciled her with it.

"Lady Sansa," The Queen of Thorns greeted when Sansa arrived, and Sansa dipped into a curtsey. "Go on, girls, I've had quite enough of sewing for one week," she snapped at her relatives, who jumped to their feet and looked only too happy to flee the gardens.

Olenna sent them a rather amused glance that Margaery seemed to share, before turning her attentions on Sansa once more.

"Forgive an old lady her intrusive questions on the other day- one must play a part even when they are old enough to not know whether their farts smell of roses or not. Sit, and have tea with me now."

"Grandmother!" Margaery scolded, sounding scandalized, and something about that made Sansa crack a smile as she sat and reached for one of the tea cups, remembering the last time she had been here, speaking of Joffrey and his vileness.

Her hands began to shake, and Margaery handed her a small cloth from where she had perched on one of the empty seats beside her. "For the heat," she said, when Sansa raised a brow at her.

She was grateful for it, nonetheless, and wrapped the cloth around the tiny neck of the cup as the bard continued his singing

"Oh, she knows perfectly well what I am now, and I am not going to hide it for her delicate sensibilities when there is no one else to overhear," Olenna said dismissively, taking a sip of her tea and grimacing. "Disgusting stuff. Do the Lannisters know what passes for tea in the rest of Westeros, or do they just assume that their massive egos make up for the taste of horseshit?"

Sansa, who had been about to take a sip, snorted and nearly spilled the stuff all over herself.

Margaery leaned forward, holding out a cloth from the table as though she intended to wipe it up herself.

"For Gods' sake, Margaery, let a servant do it," Olenna muttered, gesturing one over with a wave of her wrinkly hand, "Isn't that one of the demands of a queen? To let others do anything that might get them dirty?"

Margaery lifted a brow, handing the servant the cloth and allowing her to do the embarrassing job of wiping at the small spill in Sansa's lap.

"I haven't found that being a queen has been very different at all from being Lady Margaery," Margaery confessed, with a put-upon sigh.

Olenna's tea cup rattled loudly as she slammed it back down onto it's small plate, and Sansa jumped a little.

"That is because you are not the queen," she corrected her granddaughter. "That designation belongs to the shrew, Cersei."

Sansa's eyes widened, and she glanced around in horror, saw that none of the servants attending them looked at all surprised by the Queen of Thorns' words.

Margaery's lower lip jutted out in what could almost be considered a pout, if Sansa didn't know any better. "I am married to the King; she is the Queen Mother."

Olenna raised a hand, as though this argument was inconsequential. "You are not a queen while she still pretends herself to be a queen," she muttered, clearly not convinced. "But, enough of that." She turned in her seat to give Sansa a long look, and Sansa, despite the scrutiny, was rather relieved to be changing the subject.

She understood what Margaery had said, that they must all do what they could simply to survive, and that, for the Tyrells, that was a very different sort of plotting than it was for Sansa, but it still unnerved her, to hear of their plotting now, after knowing that they had plotted about her.

Their conversation had turned into one like the mummers’ shows that had gone on before she and Margaery had reconciled, and Sansa did not care to remember those.

"Margaery tells me that the Lannisters have been giving you no end of grief since the Old Lion told your lord husband there must be an heir."

Sansa looked at Margaery in alarm, before remembering that Margaery had been there, when Joffrey had threatened to rape her, had laughed about Tyrion doing so, and a dwarven babe.

"I...yes," she whispered, her tea cup rattling so loudly she feared that she would break it.

Olenna clucked her tongue. "Disgraceful, the lot of them. Any true nobility would know better."

"Grandmother, we speak of our own matters within our house in much the same free manner," Margaery reproached.

Olenna raised a brow at her. "Not at all the same, nor do we pressure young girls to give birth before they've been married yet long. Speaking of which, your brother Garlan's wife, who is hardly young, is pregnant yet again. At this rate we'll have no need of either you or your brother Willas to have children at all."

Sansa choked, for the teasing reminded her, even if it was hardly of the same subject, of that lighthearted teasing between her siblings, back in Winterfell, before all of this.

She frowned, for most such teasing took place between Jon and Robb and Theon.

Margaery half-smirked; apparently this was an argument that she could afford to let go. "She has a name, Grandmother."

Olenna waved a hand. "She's altogether too boring to bother remembering it," she muttered. "If my son weren't a fool, he would have at least married Garlan to a woman capable of more than siring sons, and with a bit of wit between her ears. Anyway, by the time we're celebrating another Summer Feast, I'm sure there'll be another on the way."

"Grandmother! They are your great-grandchildren," Margaery admonished softly. "You ought to get to know them."

"I only bothered to get to know you and your brothers when you were of an age not to be annoying, mindless little creatures," Olenna said dismissively. "I shall do the same with these, if I live that long."

Sansa coughed, and the two glanced at her.

"Forgive us, Sansa," Margaery said with a warm smile, "Sometimes we forget that we are not commoners, to gossip away so."

Sansa shook her head. "I don't...I don't mind," she said finally, and, in truth, she did not. She could remember a time when harmless gossip had been fun, when it hadn't ruined lives, and this was not about her.

Lady Olenna's assessment of Lady Leonette had not been wrong, after all. While she had been grateful to the woman for teaching her to play the harp, she had wondered at the woman's constant ability to speak of nothing but music and children, wondered if she even realized the dangers of life in Westeros.

Lady Olenna and Margaery exchanged a look, and then Lady Olenna shouted, "Boy! Bring some more of those lemon cakes."

And then, to the singer in the corner whom Sansa had barely even realized was there, his melancholic tune was so soft, "Can't you sing something else? If I have to hear another rendition of something that sounds like _The Rains of Castamere_ , I shall throw myself off of this cliff."

"Grandmother!"

Sansa rather agreed with the sentiment, she thought, as she watched the singer fumble for a moment, looking shocked, before bursting into a song about birds and flowers and beauty.

Olenna waited for a moment, before nodding. "Much better," she muttered under her breath, causing Sansa to smile slightly.

She had missed this, she thought. She knew that the Tyrells had had plots within plots for including her in any of their conversations, and a part of her was still worried that Margaery's intentions toward her were more than they seemed, but the Queen of Thorns' ability to say anything she pleased always got a small smile out of Sansa, even if she was also secretly terrified out of her wits about whom might overhear.

"There," Olenna said, when the serving boy had brought those desired lemon cakes. "Eat up, Sansa, before you waste away entirely."

Sansa blushed, reaching out and picking up a lemon cake to nibble on.

She hardly noticed the way that Margaery watched her bring the cake to her lips, eating scarcely a few crumbs before setting it down once more, nor the way that Margaery's lips pinched as she did so.


	20. SANSA XVII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, check out TangerineDuMal's (polarbiscuit on tumblr) fanart for the last chapter! It's awesome. (I'm shit at links, so hopefully this one works.) http://ouatlovr.tumblr.com/post/149164469120/polar-biscuit-youre-playing-it-wrong

"Little dove," Cersei said, with that charming smile that never failed to strike terror in Sansa, from the moment she had learned what Cersei and her son really were. The smile meant she wanted something, something that only Sansa could give her. “Come and sit with me."

And Sansa had precious little left over to give.

"Your Grace," she said warily, stepping forward because it was expected of her and sitting on the ledge the Queen Mother had taken up position at beside her, as the woman gestured for her to do.

Two of Cersei's Kingsguard were standing at the end of the hall, their backs to Cersei and Sansa, and Sansa swallowed a bit, wondering why the Queen Mother had taken up her own guard in the balcony before the throne room.

She looked ever so much like a lion, laying in wait for her next victim.

"I have news from the Vale that you should hear, Lady Sansa," Cersei said coolly, and Sansa's heart stuttered in her chest. Her aunt Lysa was dead, her cousin, Lord Baelish, her only supporter here in King's Landing.

Well, perhaps not her only supporter.

"Sansa?" a voice said, and Sansa forced herself to look up.

"Yes, Your Grace?" she whispered hoarsely.

Cersei arched a brow. "You don't wish to hear my news?"

Sansa gulped. "I...Of course."

"Your aunt Lysa has finally agreed to the terms Lord Baelish put to her, on behalf of himself and the Crown. She has sworn her allegiance to House Baelish," she looked annoyed as she said those words, for some reason, "As well as to Joffrey, and they've haggled out the difference between themselves. Your aunt and Lord Baelish have no doubt had a happy wedding ceremony, by now, content in their abilities to haggle like fishwives at market."

Sansa wondered, idly, if she was going to be sick.

She wondered if it would have been better to learn that her last living relatives in the Vale were dead, that Lord Baelish was dead.

Instead, they had sworn allegiance to the Lannisters, the very people responsible for killing her mother, her father, Robb.

"I..."

"Aren't you happy for your aunt, sweet dove?" Cersei asked, the parody of a curious look on her face, and Sansa remembered who she was with.

Remembered that she was playing a part, to survive in this horrid place.

"Yes, Your Grace," she said softly. "Very happy. I hope that she and Lord Baelish will be good for one another."

Cersei laughed, low and cold, and took a long gulp from the glass of wine in her other hand. "I sometimes forget, Lady Sansa, that you are of the North. You have acclimated yourself so well to things here in the South. But," and here she reached out, taking Sansa's cheek in her hand. Sansa forced herself not to stiffen at the touch. "You are so innocent still, in some ways, despite what I have attempted to teach you of our lives here."

Sansa could not help but bristle at those words, though she did so underneath her skin, where Cersei could not see and punish her for it, or tell Joffrey of it.

"You have been most generous to me, Your Grace, despite my un-deservedness," she said instead, lowering her eyes.

Cersei gave her a long look, and then let go of her, smoothing out her Dornish red gown idly. "I noticed you the other day walking the Keep with Queen Margaery and several of her ladies. I see that you've found a new friend and counselor in her, now."

Sansa froze, and, had her Septa not taught her to keep courtesy even in her own mind, might have cursed at the foolishness in doing so, for no doubt Cersei had seen, if the way she was looking at her now was any indication.

It occurred to her then, that she was playing the game, just as everyone else in King's Landing did so. Hers was a different game; her survival was more questionable, and so she must smile and keep her own counsel, but it was no different than the games the others played, only with higher stakes and less care.

She hadn't wanted to marry the cripple of Highgarden because she cared for him, having never met him, but because she wanted to use the Tyrells to leave King's Landing. Anywhere was better than here.

She remembered what Margaery had once told her. _Women in our position must make the best of our circumstances._

She froze, and wondered if the Tyrells had frozen, when they'd allowed Lord Tywin to marry her to Lord Tyrion instead of taking her for Willas Tyrell, when they'd had the chance.

It had been a misstep, on their part.

Just as allowing Cersei to think anything of her friendship with Margaery was a misstep of her own.

Margaery had not yet miss stepped with Joffrey, but Sansa knew that it was only a matter of time. Perhaps she would not, though that was unlikely, for she had not made the mistakes that Sansa, had while she had once thought to be his queen.

But Sansa was just as far in the game as Margaery, now, and she shouldn't begrudge the other woman for _surviving_ , as Margaery had referred to it. Not when Sansa was doing just the same, and far more poorly.

"The Queen has been most kind to me since she arrived in King's Landing," Sansa said neutrally.

Cersei raised a brow. "I asked you once before what you thought of her," she said. "Whether there was anything within her brain. I am still uncertain on the matter. Perhaps you might enlighten me now?"

Sansa licked her lips. "The Queen is...very kind," she said finally, and thought of how Margaery had been the one to approach her, when the Tyrells hoped to marry her to Willas. How she had spoken of treason and wanting Joffrey dead as badly Sansa did without batting an eyelash. "But I think that she would not be queen now, were it not for her grandmother and father."

Cersei stared at her for a long moment, and then laughed. "Perhaps you have learned something during your time in King's Landing, Lady Sansa. Thank you, my dear one."

She stood then, and the smile froze on her face as she walked away from Sansa with two Kingsguard behind her, as if she had completely forgotten Sansa's presence there at the moment of her standing.

Sansa hoped that she had helped Margaery, in causing the Queen Mother to underestimate her, rather than harmed her.

She may be still uncertain in her feelings for Margaery, but she did not want to see the other girl die at Cersei's hands, she knew that much.


	21. SANSA XVIII

Margaery had told her that it was dangerous for them to spend too much time together, for, although Margaery was the Queen and could protect her from most of that danger, if Cersei became suspicious of their friendship, she would most certainly find a means to end it.

Sansa had not quite worked out what she had meant by 'suspicious' save for perhaps that Cersei would think their friendship was part of some elaborate plot, but she understood well enough that Cersei would do anything to destroy her own happiness, as would Joffrey, and that she still held quite a lot of power as the Queen Mother.

Still, she thought that it was worth risking, telling Margaery that the Queen Mother was asking Sansa about her, at every opportunity. If Cersei was plotting something, then Margaery needed to know.

She made her way to Margaery's chambers, the ones in the Maidenvault, for she did not wish to run the risk of finding Joffrey within, and knocked on the door.

There was no answer for some time, and so Sansa knocked again, a bit more insistently this time, with her mind made up that if no one answered she would simply return to her chambers before she brought attention to herself.

The door swung open, and Lady Reanna's startled face met her own.

"Lady Sansa," she said, blinking at her. Sansa noticed her tuck something in the pocket of her lime green gown. "What are you doing here?"

Sansa raised a brow. "I was coming to see Margaery," she said, a tad defensive, mostly due to the other girl's defensiveness.

"Queen Margaery is in the Sept of Baelor, praying that the gods will bless her with a child, and for her husband the King," Lady Reanna told her, rather primly. "She has been there for the better part of the morning. I could tell her that you called?"

Sansa blinked at her, and then shook her head. "That is all right," she said. "I was just on my way to the Sept."

A lie, of course, but she did not want Margaery to think that something was wrong.

Lady Reanna raised a brow. "The Queen requested that she not be disturbed."

Sansa considered asking which Queen, but decided that it was not worth the headache the thought of even a hint of her disloyalty might cause. She simply nodded. "Of course. Then I shall not disturb her."

Lady Reanna cast her a dubious look, and then walked out of Margaery's bedchambers, shutting the door rather pointedly behind her.

Sansa remembered then, the strange conversation she had caught between Cersei and Lady Reanna, and wondered at the girl's strange behavior now.

Something about it did not sit right with her.

She left Lady Reanna at the staircase leading out of the Maidenvault, and made her way to the Sept of Baelor, hoping against hope that no one else would be within the Sept alongside Margaery.

She had no wish to dip her head and smile to Joffrey's words today, not after having been forced to do so already for Cersei.

She was fortunate then, to find that there were precious few within the Sept, beyond the priests there and Margaery and her retinue, which included the Lady Elinor whom Sansa had met the other day.

Had she not already been told by Lady Reanna however, the smallfolk standing in droves outside the Sept, waving their hands and shouting out to their beloved queen would have informed her of Margaery's presence within.

Margaery always seemed to be drawing such crowds, whether she walked among the smallfolk or not. And it was a good attention, not the attention that Sansa was used to hearing about from the smallfolk.

Everyone loved Margaery. Even Joffrey.

"Lady Sansa!" Margaery's melodious voice broke her out of these musings, the other girl turning from where she had been kneeling to give Sansa a small smile. "How lovely to see you here," she said loudly. "Come and pray with me."

The High Septon, where he stood almost leering at Margaery, nodded his head in approval at these words, and Sansa wondered if he had even noticed her recent absence from the Sept.

She moved to stand next to Margaery, smiling nervously. "I actually came to speak with you. Lady Reanna told me that you were here."

Margaery's features darkened at the mention of the girl's name, and Sansa wondered if she too had noticed Reannas's behaviors. Her next words, however, killed that possibility. "Ah yes. I left Lady Reanna to attend to my chambers. She has been late every day this week to her duties, and I like to think myself a lenient mistress, but certain things must be punished, don't you agree?"

Sansa thought of Joffrey, thought of the words that Margaery had spoken to her about surviving him, and wondered if Margaery was thinking of them, too. "Yes," she said, voice rather small.

Margaery smiled. "I'm glad; I don't want to seem cruel to anyone, but especially not to you."

Sansa shook her head. "I don't think anyone could ever think that about you," she said softly.

"You did."

Sansa's head snapped up, and Margaery sent her a pained smile.

"I know that you did, when I first married Joffrey, before I could explain myself to you. I saw the way you would look at me sometimes, when you thought I wasn't looking at you."

Sansa ducked her head. "I thought he'd corrupted you, somehow."

Margaery reached out, lifting her chin and staring into her eyes. "Joffrey may be the King, and capable of many things, but I have never yet met someone powerful enough to change another's base nature, Sansa."

Sansa flushed, pulling away, unused to the close contact and yet yearning it all the same. Still, she did not like that Margaery was touching her so in front of so many people, although she could not explain why.

And then she remembered why she had come to the Sept in the first place.

"Cersei has been asking questions about you," she blurted out.

Margaery nodded, not looking at all surprised. "My ladies have reported the same. What did you tell her?"

Sansa flushed. "I told her that you were very pretty, and that was all."

Margaery barked out a laugh, earning only a partially stern look from the High Septon before he returned to his prayers.

Sansa blushed further. "I'm sorry, I just...I didn't want her to think you were plotting against her, and become wary of you."

Margaery shook her head. "No, don't apologize. I think that was a good idea." She reached out, as if to touch Sansa's chin again, before her hand fell loosely to her side once more. "Thank you, Sansa."

Sansa nodded. "Of course. Have I interrupted your prayers?"

"Yes," Margaery said, flashing her a grin, "But I don't mind, and I am sure that the gods will forgive us, this once."

"I didn't know that you..." Sansa did not quite know how to finish that sentence without sounding insulting. It reminded her of the time she had spoken to Loras here, had learned of his very real worries for his sister.

Margaery smiled, taking the words gracefully, to her credit. "The gods are always with us," she told Sansa. "And I have always felt a connection to the Mother. My mother often told me the story of how she prayed for a girl for many years, and the Mother finally answered her prayer with me." She noticed the surprised look on Sansa's face. "Not very pragmatic of course, to wish for a daughter instead of sons, but then, my mother hardly ever is that."

That surprised a laugh out of Sansa. "And what do you pray for now?" she asked quietly.

Margaery thought for a moment before answering. "For a son," she said finally. "I suppose it is not the most original prayer, nor am I as silly as my mother, to pray for a girl child, much as I might prefer one."

"You are the Queen," Sansa said, with a little nod.

Margaery gave her a long look. "I have always found boys to be...how shall I say it? Not as pragmatic as us females. As long as you have one, the line will continue, but they are not much use beyond that. I would prefer a girl child, even if it would disappoint the realm, because then I would know that...well, I would know that she would live."

"You could teach your son to live," Sansa said quietly.

Margaery nodded carefully. "Yes, but even if my son learns everything I can teach him, I do not know that he would take it to hear forever."

"I would like for us to be friends again," Sansa said, and Margaery's eyes widened in surprise. "Real friends, like we were before...all this."

Sansa did not think that she had ever seen Margaery surprised by anything; her eyes widened, and her face slackened a bit, as though she was half-stepping out from behind a mask which she quickly hid behind once more, and her mouth puckered.

Sansa thought that she looked strangely beautiful, in the way the ladies of the North did. Free.

"I would like that very much," she told Sansa, once she had recovered herself, reaching out and squeezing Sansa's hands. "Although I did not know that we weren't," she admitted.

Sansa swallowed. "Something has been holding me back, and...I would like to apologize. It was naive of me to think that a wedding to Willas should only benefit myself, or that anyone in King's Landing would survive a day without doing as they must, as I myself have done every day that I've faced Cersei and Joffrey with a smile. I understand."

Margaery's eyes widened. "Sansa-"

"People die all of the time, and if you aren't careful, anyone could be next. And you, Margaery...you are the closest thing to a friend I've had in King's Landing, even if I failed to understand you before. You...shouldn't die, just because of Joffrey. So, I understand, and let us speak no more of it," Sansa went on quietly, giving Margaery's hands a little squeeze in return. "For...I don't think I can."

Margaery hesitated, looking torn, and then nodded. "All right," she murmured, with a quirking smile. "Then we shan't."


	22. SANSA XIX

In the days to follow, Sansa found herself spending most of her time in Margaery's presence, despite the other girl's warnings about safety.

Safety be damned. She had not been safe since she arrived in King's Landing.

Her lord husband seemed pleased with the arrangement, even if he had not outright said so. He seemed to be walking on needles about her, ever since his mentioning that he thought it would be best if they had a child, for which she was rather relieved, but when every morning at the break of fast she mentioned that she would be spending some of her day with Margaery, he would smile a little and tell her that he was glad to hear it.

She did not know if this was because he was glad to know she would not be getting into trouble with Cersei or Joffrey, or because he was relieved to hear that she had some friend with her now.

Of course, this did not mean that she was free of Joffrey or Cersei. In fact, she found herself even more burdened by Joffrey's presence than usual, though at least Margaery's influence meant that the burden was not so taxing as before.

And Cersei seemed to take every opportunity to avoid Margaery that she could. It was not hard to imagine why.

"What are we doing today?" Sansa asked after being let into Margaery's chambers by a rather sourfaced Reanna, smiling shyly when Margaery turned and grinned at her, unashamedly still dressing despite having called out to Reanna to allow Sansa into the room anyway.

Sansa saw a swathe of skin more than she was used to seeing from Margaery before she averted her eyes, blushing.

Despite having grown up with a younger sister who didn't understand the meaning of the word propriety and a slew of brothers, Sansa was still unused to seeing anyone without their clothing, man or woman, and Margaery's comfortableness with her own body was almost disturbing.

Lady Elinor and another Tyrell lady whose name Sansa did not know helped Margaery slip into a light pink, sleeveless gown as she answered.

"I thought we might go down into the city today," she said, with rather too much excitement in her voice for Sansa's comfort.

Sansa remembered the last time she had been down into the city, remembered the riots and how she had nearly been raped by men who did not care whether her last name was Stark or Lannister.

But Margaery had been down into the city almost every week since her arrival in King's Landing, and had emerged the better for it, beloved by the smallfolk and the nobles and guards alike.

She gave Margaery a tremulous smile when Margaery turned and looked at her, after too long a silence. "That sounds...lovely."

There was a knock on the door, and Margaery let out a little sigh, turning to Reanna with a raised brow.

The girl moved over to the door, opening it and then taking an actual step back, face etched in surprise which she quickly hid.

Ser Osmund Kettleblack was standing in the doorway, dressed in his Kingsguard uniform and staring over Reanna's shoulder at Margaery, almost ignoring the girl altogether. "Queen Margaery. I am to report here as your personal guard for the day."

"Ser Osmund," Margaery said, coming to an abrupt halt where before she had been moving toward Sansa. "I did not expect to see you among my honorguard today. Where is my brother Loras?"

Ser Osmund glanced down at the Queen. "Ser Loras has been assigned to King Joffrey this morn, Your Grace. He wishes someone to spar with."

Margaery paled, but quickly hid it behind a smile. "Of course. Well then, Ser Osmund, I suppose you've gotten rather a boring duty. My ladies and the Lady Sansa and I were just about to play come-into-my-castle. You may play it with us, if you like."

Ser Osmund blinked at her. "I will stand guard, Your Grace."

Margaery bit her lip. "Of course."

Sansa wrinkled her brows at Margaery in confusion, but Margaery shook her head minutely, and Sansa did not ask. Perhaps Margaery did not feel as safe in the city alone as she let on, and would not go without her brother by her side, to protect her.

"We will play it in the courtyard near the Maidenvault, I think," Margaery said to her ladies with a clap of her hands, and then, without even a moment's hesitation, reached out to grab Sansa's hand and yanked her out into the hall.

Sansa blanched, and quickly hid it when Margaery glanced her way, allowing the other girl to drag her along without protest, as Margaery's ladies followed behind them.

Sansa had not played come-into-my-castle since she was a young girl, acquiescing to play with Arya but mostly with Jeyne. She found that playing it with Margaery and her ladies reminded her ever so much of being young again, when she'd had nothing to worry over in regards to her future because she could trust her father and mother to take care of it, and, despite the thought that this should bother her, it didn't.

In fact, she rather enjoyed playing the game, right up until the moment when Margaery tripped over Lady Reanna's foot and sprawled forward into the dirt.

Margaery fell with a small, startled cry, twisting her body in a vain attempt to avoid falling as her left arm slammed against a stone pillar while the rest of her body hit the dirt. She gasped, and her ladies appeared to forget the game entirely, rushing forward to see that their queen was well.

After a moment in which Sansa saw genuine pain on the other woman's face, Margaery stood up, giving her ladies a reassuring smile even as she rubbed at her arm.

"I am quite well," she told her ladies. "It is my own fault, I suppose; I am rather old for such games. But we ought to continue, I think."

She looked shamefacedly toward the ground beneath her.

Sansa worried at her lower lip, wondering how much pain Margaery was in, even if it had only been a small fall.

"Perhaps Ser Osmund ought to save Your Grace," Lady Reanna spoke up then, and Sansa blinked at the other girl, who was standing just beside her. "He is a most gallant member of the Kingsguard, after all, and most well suited toward saving damsels. Then you might bow out of the game gracefully, Your Grace."

Margaery blinked toward Ser Osmund, still standing against the far wall but looking rather worried at Margaery's injured arm, which she clutched close to her chest. "If you wouldn't mind, Ser Osmund," she said, sounding rather breathless, though Sansa could not imagine why, for her fall had not seemed to overly tax her beyond the arm.

She supposed that, in some ways, Ser Osmund was an attractive man, and anyone must have been better than Joffrey, but she looked at him and saw only the back of his hand, colliding with her cheek.

Ser Osmund stepped forward, looking a little wrong footed as he glanced at the Lady Reanna before reaching up and placing an arm around Margaery's shoulder, for her to lean on.

Margaery smiled up at him, still rubbing at her arm. "My thanks, Ser Osmund, my gentle hero. It appears I've now won the game, I would say."

Ser Osmund stared down at her for a moment longer than Sansa deemed appropriate, and then murmured that she ought to send for a healer to look at her arm.

Margaery nodded. "Of course. You are most wise, Ser Osmund; I shall do so at once. Lady Sansa, perhaps you could accompany me?"

Sansa blinked, and then stepped forward. "Of course, Your Grace," she said, giving Margaery a little curtsey and trading places with Ser Osmund, who, for the first time that day, looked rather annoyed.

"I am supposed to stay with you at all times, Your Grace," he said then, and Margaery blinked innocently at him, leaning rather heavily on Sansa. "I am your Kingsguard."

Margaery brushed the hair from her eyes. "Of course," she said, in that placating tone that Sansa had sometimes heard her use with Joffrey. "You must accompany us then. Lady Sansa will act as my rock whilst your hands are free in the event that you will need to protect us. I hope that will be sufficient?"

Ser Osmund glanced at Sansa, and then ground out, "Of course, Your Grace."

A Tyrell healer was not far from the courtyard, for it seemed that the Tyrells existed to be of help to one another, regardless of where any one of them was at any particular time, and Margaery and Sansa were ushered into a healing chamber while Ser Osmund was directed, rather firmly, to wait outside.

Margaery's arm, just above the elbow where she had slammed it into the pillar, had bruised, flowering out in blue and purple splotches that made Sansa wince it sympathy, impressed with how Margaery had managed to hide her pain so far, when such bruises must have stung horribly.

She wondered, for an instant, if that was less to do with Margaery's ability to hide her true feelings and more to do with a recently built up tolerance for pain, thanks to Joffrey.

She thought of her own scars, the ones that she did not allow anyone to see, and felt a pang of sympathy for the other girl.


	23. SANSA XX

The gown Margaery wore was a dark purple, sleeveless and yet warm at the same time, solid underneath a sheer covering that rose almost to her throat, though the dress revealed a swathe of porcelain skin where the bodice met her waistline, her hips as lithe and beautiful as always.

Proof, again, that Joffrey was not harming her, not even where he thought it could not be seen.

In fact, Sansa's own gown offered less proof of her own treatment by her husband, covering her from the throat down almost completely.

Still, she was not comforted. The bruise that was already beginning to fade on Margaery's arm stared back at her like a spectre, haunting her.

"Are you unwell, Sansa?" Margaery asked suddenly, stopping in the middle of her walk through the garden path.

Sansa swallowed, shook her head. "I think I ate something bad for the break of fast this morning, that is all."

Margaery sent her a concerned look. "Perhaps we should sit down, rather than walk," she suggested pensively, but Sansa shook her head.

"I think that walking will not harm me further, Your Grace, if that is all right with you," she said quietly, staring down at her hands.

A moment later, Margaery was taking her hands in her own, and Sansa glanced up, startled. "It is not all right with me," she said, voice too gentle, and Sansa wanted to pull away, but did not. "You look like you can barely stand, and I would not mind sitting, myself."

Sansa did not protest further, for she sensed it would be for naught, and she was feeling rather weak, even if she would not admit it to Margaery.

There was a bench, just a few paces further, and Margaery sat down, pulling Sansa beside her.

Margaery's Kingsguard, ever present even when Margaery's ladies were not, took up his guard at the edge of the small alcove where the bench sat, silent with his hands on the pommel of his sword.

Sansa did not feel comforted by that, either.

Ser Osmund was not Margaery’s guard today, and Sansa was rather glad of that, for he'd had a strange look in his eyes as he guarded Margaery that she had never noticed even when he hit her, and she liked it far worse, but it was not Loras either, and so the trip into the city seemed to be permanently placed on hold.

Sansa could not say that she was sorry that it had not been mentioned again.

"Sansa," Margaery said quietly, drawing her attention back to the young queen. "Are you sure that you are well?"

Sansa nodded. "Of course. I...suppose that my mind merely needs for a distraction."

Margaery nodded, folding her hands in her lap. "I too yearn for distractions lately," she said, in a smaller voice than Sansa had ever heard from her.

Sansa swallowed. "I pray that your own prayers to the Seven have been successful," she said, the words tasting bitter in her mouth, for more reasons than one.

Margaery shrugged, plucking a rose from the garden beside their bench and handing it to her. "It is of little matter at this stage," she said serenly. "Joffrey and I have only just recently married, after all, and a child so early would be a strange occurence, though a welcome one, indeed."

Sansa tried to imagine a child of Joffrey's and Margaery's. Her mind's eye would only supply a beautiful blond creature with Margaery's doe eyes and Joffrey's leering smile. She shivered.

"Cold?" Margaery asked, quirking a brow at her.

Sansa shook her head. "I felt a chill on the air, but it is gone now," she answered, hoping that Margaery would not investigate further.

To Sansa's relief, she did not.

Instead, they walked for some time in silence, gowns swishing through the rose gardens, Sansa's occasionally catching on the thorns, until Sansa could bear it no loger and the words came spilling out of her before she could stop them.

"Are you all right?" she asked, and was hard-pressed not to throw her hands over her mouth, blushing furiously. "I'm...I'm sorry," she stammered out. "I didn't mean to..."

Margaery smiled gently at her, squeezing the arm she currently had trapped in her own. "It's all right, my bird. I...am quite well."

Sansa thought of the many threats that Joffrey had thrown her way, while they were engaged and even afterwards, of the many horrible things he planned to do with her once he'd had his wicked way with her, barely suppressing a flinch.

She could not imagine how Margaery could be all right, if she had been subjected to any of those things.

"Oh, my sweet girl," Margaery said suddenly, glancing at Sansa in understanding, "Have you been so worried for me all this time?"

Sansa looked away.

Margaery sighed. "That explains rather much. I am quite well, my dear. You may rest assured that Joffrey has never done anything to me that I have not wanted him to. He is a most considerate husband."

Sansa wondered if she looked green, by the way Margaery's eyes widened and she quickly went on, "Perhaps 'wanted' is too strong a word, but I have not been hurt by him, Sansa. He has done his duty by me as my husband and king, and I have done my duty as his wife and queen. Nothing more, nothing less. There. Does that sate you?"

Sansa stared at her for a moment, wondered if she would ever be sated until she had seen Margaery lain bare and knew that there was not a bruise on her, and then blushed, at such a thought.

Margaery started walking again, and Sansa hurried to keep up with her, still blushing and finding herself unable to meet Margaery's eyes.

"You're blushing," Margaery commented then, taking in Sansa's sorry state, and only causing her to blush more deeply. She smiled gently. "I only wished to console you, not embarrass you. Perhaps we ought to speak of something else, then."

"Yes," Sansa echoed, glad for the excuse, "Perhaps we ought."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a commenter in the last chapter complain about my tagging a character that has not yet occurred in the story. I make those tags more for me than for the readers, and there are a lot of characters tagged right now that have yet to make an appearance but will play important roles in the story later, but if they are annoying everyone I can take some of them down.


	24. SANSA XXI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right guys, I'm reaching the end of my knowledge of roman numerals, lol. Hopefully that's right?

"We've received another message that the Boltons are helping the Freys to defeat the Blackfish," Joffrey said with a grin, linking his arm with Sansa's and practically dragging her along beside him.

Sansa bit her tongue so hard that she tasted blood. She should not have attempted to go alone to the library again, but Margaery had sent her a regretful message that her grandmother wished to speak with her alone.

"That is good, Your Grace."

He smirked. "You must be so sad," he said, reaching out and flicking at the hair by her ears, "To know that bastard Snow will inherit Winterfell, instead of you and the little brat Lannister you'll give my uncle. Did you know they'd taken Winterfell, after your stupid brother met his end?"

Sansa swallowed hard, for Joffrey only informed her of it twice a day, when she was unfortunate enough to have gained his notice. "Yes, Your Grace."

The King had only tormented her with the news since, after all.

"They say that the Bolton bastard is insane," Joffrey said with a grin, and Sansa wondered at this, for she knew no one more insane than Joffrey himself. "And that he sleeps in your bitch mother's chambers, in her bed." He giggled. "Did you know?"

Sansa felt her face heat with an anger she was not sure she could control, if Joffrey kept on like this. "No, Your Grace."

She had thought that anyone else living in Winterfell besides the Lannisters would be a welcome thing, but the thought of anyone as insane as Joffrey soiling her mother's bed every night...she shivered.

Joffrey laughed.

"Perhaps, when you give my uncle a little lordling, we'll take Winterfell back from those stupid Boltons and give it to your brat," Joffrey said, with a menacing grin. "Would you like that, Sansa?"

Sansa bit her lip hard enough to draw blood, pretended not to notice when Joffrey's eyes seemed drawn to it, though inside she had gone quite cold at the sight. "Yes, Your Grace."

His grin widened, and his eyes went back to her own. "I'm glad," he said. "I'd like to visit you soon and give you the little lordling before my uncle does. We don't want you dying before you see a Lannister in Winterfell, after all. It just wouldn't be fair."

Sansa was quite sure that she had gone pale at those words, considering Joffrey's laugh, but she didn't get the chance to think up a suitable response. Nor did she think that she would have been able to, had she had the chance.

She likely would have told Joffrey that she would very much rather be dead, and he would have obliged her, perhaps.

Prince Oberyn appeared behind her, dipping into a bow for Joffrey before reaching out and taking hold of Sansa's arm. She might have shook him off in any other instance, for it was quite improper of him to do so, but she was far too shaken herself to attempt such a thing.

"Your Grace, I wonder if I might steal the Lady Sansa away from you for a time?" he asked, sending Joffrey a winning smile. "My lady Ellaria has something that she wishes to discuss with her. Lady Sansa?" he held his arm out to her, and, for a moment, Sansa stopped breathing.

Joffrey stared, open-mouthed. "But...but...I am in the middle of punishing her," he said, finally, looking irritated but not angry, not yet.

Prince Oberyn dipped his head. "Of course, and I would not have interrupted had my lady not intimated to me that the matter was one of importance. The demands on a woman's mind are far beyond me, but I do believe it had to do with a Dornish gown for the Lady in question. Lady Sansa."

His voice was more insistent this time; it was not a request, and, after another tentative look at Joffrey, Sansa took Prince Oberyn's arm, allowed him to bow her to their king and then lead her away, leaving Joffrey gaping after them.

She did not dare to speak until they had rounded the corner and left Joffrey behind for good.

"Prince Oberyn," Sansa breathed, "That was quite inappropriate."

Oberyn grinned at her slyly. "Was it? My lady Ellaria truly does wish to speak with you, at some point while she is in King's Landing."

"Lady Ellaria is not above the King," Sansa bit out, glancing worriedly behind her, oddly unnerved when she found that no one was following them.

Oberyn still looked amused. "I happen to think she is."

"Regardless," Sansa said, trying not to sound amused herself, "A married woman being escorted by a man such as yourself is hardly appropriate."

Oberyn stopped then, in the middle of the hall, sending her a concerned look and forcing Sansa to come to a stop as well. "Do I scare you so, Lady Sansa?" he asked, voice too gentle, and Sansa almost felt tears pricking at her eyes.

She started walking once more, hesitant until she heard his steps behind her. "You are a man, and much larger than I," she answered, and hoped that it was answer enough.

Oberyn's hands clenched into fists, and Sansa, still smarting from the blow that Ser Meryn had dealt her, flinched. He noticed at once, and lowered his hands, palms flat. "I did not mean to startle you, my lady."

Sansa shrugged eloquently. "I do not like surprises, of any kind. They tend to make me...jumpy, I suppose." She gave a nervous little laugh, for the benefit of the courtier walking past them.

Oberyn followed her gaze. "I can well imagine why. My apologies again, my lady."

Sansa shook her head. "It was not your doing."

"Nor for any fault of your own," Oberyn said, voice back to that gentle tone that both soothed and bothered her.

She thought wildly for a way to change the subject. Fortunately, her thoughts from before Joffrey's unwelcome interruption were quick to the surface.

For a moment, she let the fear creep up in her that Oberyn did not intend to take her from here at all, that he was merely a Lannister plant to trick her into speaking against the King, so that they could finally kill her.

But then she remembered that the Lannisters wanted a baby of her, not treason, and she remembered the look in Oberyn's eyes when he had spoken with Joffrey, just now, as though Joffrey were not a king, but a pest and a naughty child, and she asked the question she had wanted to for some time, now.

"How?"

Oberyn patted Sansa's arm, nodding to the nobles they passed as they walked. "How, what?"

Sansa sent him a look of annoyance. "How will you take me from King's Landing, as you promised? The Lannisters will never let me go, they will never let you take me."

Oberyn grinned. "You don't trust me yet?"

"I told you, I don't like surprises," Sansa said coldly. "And you have given me no reason to so far."

"Does he do that often?" Oberyn asked, and Sansa blinked up at him in confusion.

"Often?" she repeated dumbly.

Oberyn gestured to her cheek, and Sansa reached up, brushing at it absently, relieved to find that the area was not even swelling. Perhaps it would not even bruise.

"His Grace...does as he sees fit," Sansa answered, which was not entirely an answer at all, but Oberyn seemed to draw his own conclusions from it.

His eyes darkened.

Oberyn swallowed. "The Lannisters are cowards and fiends, and their boy king is worse than all of them, preying on a young girl without ever being told not to."

Sansa laughed falsely. "That is treason, Prince Oberyn. I would never wish harm to come to my beloved. He is still my one true love, despite setting me aside, and rightly so."

"You _can_ lie," Oberyn said, staring at her appreciatively.

Sansa tossed her hair. "What of my Dornish dress? Joffrey will...no doubt wish to see it. I am given to understand that Dornish attire is somewhat more...revealing than what is normally worn in King's Landing."

Oberyn's face fell. "I did not think of that when I suggested it, only-"

"I know," she said, patting his hand. "It was a good lie. For a man who knows nothing of the demands of a woman's mind."

Oberyn stared at her for a full minute, before his lips twitched. "You are teasing me," he said finally, and Sansa resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

"Yes, Prince Oberyn, I am. Now, I must be going, before someone sees us together and my honor is compromised."

Oberyn smiled. "Of course."

She went back to her chambers with rather renewed spirits, relieved to have avoided a full beating on Joffrey's orders, and rather relieved to know that her friendship with Prince Oberyn was indeed that.

She knew that they could not keep meeting as they did, just the two of them, but perhaps he could arrange for Lady Ellaria to meet with her instead, in the future, for surely the woman must be in on this plan, as well?

It was not until she returned to their chambers that she realized that Prince Oberyn had never answered her question.


	25. SANSA XXII

The Dornish gown, when it came, delivered in a little box by one of the retinue of the Dornish, made Sansa blush for the thought of wearing it.

It was tan, as were most of the clothes the Dornish wore, she had observed, and had no sleeves, ending scandalously soon after her waistline, and dipping rather far down her chest. It was not transparent, but skin tight in a way that made it appear so.

It was not the sort of thing she would have chosen to wear on her own, though it was beautiful, in its own way. It was the sort of gown that she could imagine Margaery wearing, though, and wearing well.

She tried to imagine herself wearing it, when Prince Oberyn took her to Dorne, and could not quite manage it.

She heard a sharp intake of breath from behind her, and closed her eyes tightly before turning around.

"Lady Sansa," her lord husband said with a slight tremor in his voice, turning away in the next moment.

Sansa was sure that she blushed fiercely as she reached for her nearest shawl, wrapping it around her shoulders before answering her lord husband. "It...it was a gift. I had no intention of wearing it..."

"A...beautiful gift," Tyrion said quietly, not meeting her eyes.

"I will change out of it now, if that is all right with my lord," Sansa said, hurrying from the room to do just that before her husband could respond.

She did not emerge from the little room where she went to change her clothing until she could hear the voice of Tyrion's servant, Pod, setting the table in the outer chamber once more.

When she did, Tyrion took one look at her bloodshot eyes and sent Pod away, after the boy refilled his wine.

"I've heard from my brother Jaime that you spent some time in Prince Oberyn's presence, today," her lord husband said, as she picked at her dinner and he ate rather ravenously at his. "And that it was not the first time."

Sansa did not look at him, forking some meat and staring at it for a moment before letting it fall back down onto her plate.

Her husband liked his meats cooked almost to the point of being burnt, and she wondered if they had burned her brother's body like that, once they were done defiling it. Her goodsister's and mother's as well, perhaps.

"Yes, my lord," she told Tyrion, voice absent and very small. She hoped that he did not notice, but then, what concern was it of his that she spent time with Prince Oberyn, save that she might dishonor her husband by sleeping with the widely known fiend in the bed.

She blushed at the thought.

She may hate Lord Tyrion, but she would not dishonor him in such a way, as her lady mother and her septa had always taught her not to. Surely, he must know that.

"Be careful in whom you place your affections, Lady Sansa," her lord husband told her gently. "Or your trust."

"Is there something about my conduct that you have issue with, my lord?" Sansa asked stiffly, still rather annoyed with him, even now.

Her husband sighed. "The Red Viper did not get that name merely because he loved to play with snakes as a child, Lady Sansa. The Red Viper does not want your friendship, Sansa," Tyrion explained gently. "You are the last heir to Winterfell, to the North. The Lannisters will not be the last to attempt to claim you. You would do well to keep on your guard about him."

Sansa lifted her chin. "I am always on my guard, my lord."

Her husband dipped his head. "I have no doubt of that, my lady."

Sansa's brow furrowed at those words, but she did not have time to respond before the door opened and Shae stepped inside.

"Lady Sansa, Lord Tyrion," she greeted them both, her eyes somewhat softer this time as she looked at Tyrion, and Sansa bit her lip to see it.

"Shae," Tyrion said, his voice oddly soft as he said her name, and Sansa turned away, folding the Dornish gown quickly before Shae saw it.

"Are you ready for bed, Lady Sansa?" Shae asked, seeming to notice the tension in the room for the first time. Sansa doubted that this was the truth.

"Yes, that sounds wonderful," Tyrion murmured, sounding far more relieved than Sansa privately thought the question warranted.

She sighed. "Of course, Shae. I fear my day has been rather long."


	26. SANSA XXIII

"Those fucking Tullys," Joffrey snapped, and, down the table, Tommen flinched at the harsh words. Sansa was rather surprised that he was not used to such language from Joffrey by now. She had certainly grown immune to hearing it, but perhaps there was something innocent left of Tommen Baratheon, after all.

“They ought to have all been slaughtered with the rest of the Starks. If those Freys had done as they were supposed to..."

Cersei half-turned toward her oldest son, lips drawn down into a disapproving frown. "Joffrey, my dear, don't say such things at the table."

Sansa wondered if she was reprimanding him for the language, or for what he'd said of the Tullys. She had never taken issue with his language before.

Joffrey glared at her. "I'll say whatever in the Seven hells I like, Mother," he snapped at her, and Cersei's spine stiffened.

She reached out and took a long gulp from her wine goblet, expression pinched.

Sansa picked at her food.

Margaery smiled brightly, turning to her husband and laying a hand on his arm. "Perhaps we could go hunting soon, Your Grace? You did promise to take me, after we were wed, and I so would love to go."

Joffrey's eyes widened and all thoughts of the Tullys were seemingly forgotten. "Of course," he told her, sounding very much like a little boy trying to impress a woman he did not quite know how to. "We should go to my shooting range, and I'll teach you better how to use a crossbow."

Margaery smiled as if the idea of doing such a thing was more exciting to her than anything else he might have said. "I would enjoy that very much, Your Grace. And...I suppose...I ought to have some practice first, shouldn't I? Before we go hunting?"

"Joffrey," Cersei said then, with a patient smile, eyes flitting between the King and Queen, and Sansa had no doubt that, if she thought she would get away with it, she would not move to sit directly between them in order to redirect her son's attention. "I am sure that your lady wife does not wish to hunt as though she were a man. Surely you can think of a more...civilized activity, to participate in with her."

Joffrey sneered at his mother, hand reaching out to snake over Margaery's wrist in a grip that almost looked painful, and was certainly possessive. But before he could speak, Margaery did.

"I don't mind at all, Your Grace," she told the Queen Mother, with a dazzling smile that fooled no one at the table, save perhaps Joffrey. Lord Tywin, from where he sat at the head of the table, was squinting at Margaery the day he had when she had intervened for his sake about the Freys, as though she were a particularly interesting puzzle that he was attempting to figure out.

"I have told His Grace before that I would very much love to go hunting with him, and the very idea excites me, so long as I have his blessing to do so." She glanced at her husband. "I wish to offend no one, however."

Cersei's smile was brittle. "I'm afraid that, once you have spent any amount of time in King's Landing, my dear, you will learn that such a thing is impossible. There is always someone who will take offense, from some minor lordling to the common people themselves."

"Enough," Joffrey snapped at his mother. "If I say that my lady wife is going hunting with me, then she is, and that's an end to it, _Mother_."

"Her Grace is most wise," Margaery deferred then. "She has been most helpful to me, since my wedding day. I do not know how I could have survived in my new station without her. If she thinks that it would be...unwise, in the view of the people-"

Cersei shot Margaery a look, as though she did not at all appreciate the help from the other woman, pursing her lips.

Joffrey waved a hand in dismissal; strange, for Sansa had seen him cave to Margaery's whims for smaller things since their marriage. "My mother is wise in matters that are important to women," he said coolly, "And to Queens. But I am the King, and she knows naught of running a kingdom. You belong to me, not to the people."

Sansa thought of how Cersei was rumored to be running the kingdom on her own before Lord Tyrion and then Lord Tywin took over, of how her lord husband told her Joffrey had very little actual power at all, and privately agreed with him in this one, small thing.

Margaery dipped her head. "Of course, my love. I didn't mean to presume-"

Joffrey took her chin, tilting it upward. " _You_ presumed nothing, my queen," he said, and, though his words were hard and not directed toward her, Sansa could see that his touch was almost gentle.

She could hardly remember a time when Joffrey had been gentle with her, and feared how long it would last for Margaery.

"Joffrey..." Cersei began again, leaning forward as if to lecture her son. Sansa was surprised; she did not think Cersei had ever persisted in something so much as she was tonight, and wondered if it was simply because she was deep in her cups, or could not bear the thought of Margaery winning this round.

She certainly had not fought half so hard for Sansa's father.

"Enough, Cersei," Lord Tywin said then, still staring with his steely gaze lingering on Margaery as she smiled and spoon fed her husband a bit of soup.

Funny, how Joffrey did not seem to mind that treatment in the least, despite that it made him look like a child, to need spoon feeding.

Cersei pouted, like a child told that she could not have what she wanted, or like Joffrey, and took another long gulp of wine.

When the supper was over, Tyrion was one of the first to go, belching loudly until his lord father dismissed him, and thus Sansa, in disgust.

There were times when Sansa did not understand her lord husband at all, for she had seen the way that Joffrey had taken to leering at her not long before his belching had begun.

Ser Jaime was not long after them, and met them in the hall, calling out loudly for Tyrion as he traced his sword with his one remaining hand.

"I suppose we could not have hoped for tonight to have gone much better," Ser Jaime said quietly as he approached, and her husband snorted.

"It was certainly entertaining, watching our two queens quarrel over Joffrey like two bitches with a bone," he said with a smirk, and Ser Jaime's lips seemed to twitch, in spite of himself.

"Jaime!" Cersei called out, emerging from the dining hall then, and the Kingslayer bit his lip.

"I suppose that's my cue to return," Jaime said, with a rather long-suffering sigh, before turning back to Cersei like a dog to his master.


	27. MARGAERY IV

There were days when Margaery Tyrell was not perfect.

There were days when she went a little too far in her insults to Cersei, and caused the other woman to rise in vengeance and destroy everything Margaery had worked for. There were days when her temper got the better of her, and she made enemies with her servants. There were days when she slipped up in front of her psychopathic husband and aroused his suspicions of her true nature.

Today was not one of those days.

"It's just here," Joffrey was saying, practically bouncing on his feet as he led his wife to the training grounds just before the King's Wood. "The soldiers use them to practice, but they won't be today."

Margaery beamed at him, adjusting the slip of her sleeveless white gown almost unconsciously. Or, at least, she hoped that Joffrey would see it as unconscious.

She was not above using her womanly wiles on her husband, after all.

She was not above anything when it came to Joffrey Baratheon.

"I'm glad, Your Grace. I wouldn't wish anyone to see me if I am too horrible at this," she confessed, and Joffrey stopped, giving her an appraising look.

"You won't be horrible," he said decisively. "And if anyone ever laughs at you," here he sent a disapproving look at their Kingsguard, Ser Meryn and Loras, "I will have their heads immediately."

Margaery smiled, reaching out to take his hand in her own. "That is most kind of you, my love," she said smoothly, ignoring the way that she could see Loras rolling his eyes from the corner of her own. She would have to have a talk with him about that, and soon.

Joffrey pulled away from her. She wondered at that; he was almost as touch shy as Sansa, when she would have thought that the two of them had nothing in common.

Joffrey was the scalding, ever-present sun while Sansa was the cool moon.

"Yes, well..." Joffrey cleared his throat a little, and then he spun away, bouncing with pent up energy as he led her the rest of the way to the training grounds that he had promised her.

Margaery could not quite withhold her intake of breath when she arrived, and she reached out, squeezing her husband's hand in what she hoped would be mistaken as excitement.

The archery grounds were vast, a large field before the Kingswood filled with ringed targets on posts, their red bull's-eyes all staring directly at her.

"Do you come here often, Your Grace?" Margaery asked, sending her husband an inquisitive look.

He puffed out his chest, smirking at her. "As often as a King can be spared for such things, though I like the hunting far more now."

Margaery nodded. "Of course you do. May we..." She had noticed that neither of them had a weapon.

"Oh! I...made you something," Joffrey said, fumbling with his pockets before calling out to Ser Meryn. "My lady's present, Ser Meryn."

Ser Meryn stepped forward, handed him a wooden box which Joffrey than held out to Margaery.

Margaery eyed it as he thrust it out to her, taking the little box gingerly in her hands and opening it.

The box contained a crossbow, similar to the one that Joffrey had once shown her in his chambers, but more improved, she could see, and smaller, almost dainty, adjusted to her own lithe form rather than Joffrey's, with a gold and green rim. Like the other, there was a lever to release the arrows within, and this too was smaller, easier for her to manage.

Margaery stared at it for an appropriate amount of time with an inappropriate amount of awe on her face before looking up.

"It's...It's beautiful," she said, running her fingers slowly along the bow. "Thank you, my love. I shall treasure it every time I use it."

Joffrey waved his hand dismissively. "It will do the job well enough, once you've learned to use it."

Margaery smiled warmly. "I cannot wait to use it, my love. Would you teach me now, Your Grace?"

Joffrey blinked at her, and then grinned. "Yes. Yes. Let's start with that one," he pointed to a target about ten paces from where they stood, before moving to stand behind Margaery.

Margaery relaxed her body as she felt him come up behind her, just barely pressing against her before his hands guided her to the right positions on the crossbow.

"You have to know exactly where you want the arrow to release," Joffrey told her, his breaths catching against her hair as he pressed his cheek to the back of her head. "You have to see the target, think of only the best spots to hit it. The head, the stomach."

Margaery nodded enthusiastically, acutely aware of how far away her brother was from the two of them. "The heart."

Joffrey nodded; she felt it against her hair, pulling at it a little. "Yes," he whispered, and she wondered what he would do if she kissed him, right here, in the middle of the archery grounds.

She wondered if he would enjoy it more than the things they did in the bedchamber.

"And then," he whispered, breathless, "You just release this catch, and it'll hit the target. These crossbows are much more accurate than just a bow and arrow, too, so it should be easier to start with."

Margaery nodded, pulling on her lower lip a little with her teeth before lifting her hand to release the lever.

"Not too fast," Joffrey warned her, "Or you'll catch your fingers."

Margaery nodded, heart pounding a little in her ears as she narrowed her eyes on the target, leaning back against Joffrey as she released the lever of the crossbow her husband had given her.

The arrow sang as it soared through the air and embedded itself in the bull's-eye with a dull thud.

"Like that, Your Grace?" she whispered, glancing back at him innocently.

Joffrey shuddered, looking up to meet her eyes. "We shall go hunting very soon, my lady," he whispered, lips brushing against her ear, and Margaery smiled widely.

"I cannot wait, Your Grace," she confessed. And then, carefully, "Although, I admit, it is not so fascinating as I once thought it would be." She glanced from under her lashes at Joffrey as she said those words, heard his intake of breath.

"It is more fun to kill a living target," Joffrey admitted, "But my lady will have every chance for that, soon enough."

Margaery smiled. "I cannot wait, Your Grace."

Joffrey licked his lips. "N-Neither can I, my lady." His hand ghosted along the underside of her arm, where the bruise lay, and inwardly, Margaery sighed, for she recognized the lust in his eyes well enough, by now.

"Your Grace," a messenger appeared suddenly at the edge of the clearing, and Joffrey's eyes darkened with another emotion altogether as he turned to the man whom Ser Meryn was attempting to force back.

"What is it?" he snapped, Margaery and her shooting forgotten, for now.

The messenger swallowed audibly as he got to his knees. "The Queen sends for you, Your Grace."

Margaery tried not to roll her eyes, and was not entirely sure that she had succeeded. Cersei knew that she and Joffrey were out here on the training yards, after all, and had made clear her view of this; if she did not have her spies watching Margaery at all times, then Margaery had underestimated the woman.

Which was a very difficult thing to do.

If possible, Joffrey's expression darkened even further, and he turned back, grabbing Margaery's arm and pulling her forward.

Loras advanced a step, hand going to the pommel of his sword, but Margaery shook her head at her brother subtly.

"The Queen," Joffrey repeated, saying the words slowly. "The Queen is right here, you fool."

The messenger glanced from Margaery to Joffrey. "The Queen Mother, Your Grace."

Joffrey's lips thinned. "My mother sends for me? Like I'm a servant, at her beck and call?"

The messenger gulped. "Your Grace-"

"I. Am. The. King!" Joffrey screeched, facing turning purple with exertion. "The Queen Mother does not send for me!"

"My love..." Margaery started, but Joffrey ignored her.

"You may go and tell my _mother_ ," Joffrey sneered, "That she may request an audience with me, like any other of my subjects. She knows where I am, obviously."

The messenger wavered even as he stood. "Your Grace-"

"Or I can cut out your tongue, and send it to her," Joffrey snapped. "I'm sure she'll understand the message the same."

The messenger had likely never moved so fast in his life.

"I am sure that she meant no harm, my love," Margaery placated the moment he was gone, effecting a soothing expression as she reached out to touch him once more. He shook her hand off, glaring after the messenger. "She is your mother. It has likely not occurred to her-"

"If the fact that I am King has not occurred to her yet, then I've nothing more to say to her at all!" Joffrey snapped, and then, seeing the shocked look on Margaery's face at his harsh words to her, his expression softened. "I am sorry, my lady. I merely wish that she hadn't ruined our day."

Margaery smiled gently. "Not ruined yet, my love. We've still some time before you must be called away to the important matters of the State, yes?"

Joffrey grinned. "Yes, we do, don't we?"

Margaery smiled. "Could we try a further target this time, my love?" she asked, pulling him back toward the training fields.

And, when he did finally have to return to matters of state, which, as far as she understood it, involved approving all of Lord Tywin's plans without paying much attention to their content, her lord husband was in a far better mood. She could almost have been persuaded that he had forgotten about his mother's summons, if she did not know him so well.

No doubt he was thinking of ways to enact revenge, after watching Margaery hit all but one of the targets he had Ser Meryn and Loras set for her for the better part of the morning.

Margaery allowed Ser Meryn to escort her back inside, and found Lady Reanna waiting on the dais before the Keep, smiling widely at her. Joffrey was long gone, having dragged Loras into some discussion of weapons that had superseded even Margaery's influence.

"That was well done, my lady," Lady Reanna told her. And, at her look, elaborated, "I was watching from here for some time. You seem to have a talent for the sport, and so quickly you took to it. His Grace seemed impressed."

Ahead of them, Ser Meryn turned to one of his fellow Kingsguard and began speaking to him in low tones. Margaery eyed him as she answered her lady.

Margaery sniffed derisively. "My brother Willas ensured that I was taught the art of the bow from the moment I became a woman, Lady Reanna. _That_ ," she nodded behind her, to where she had been with Joffrey moments earlier, "was sporting of another kind. But I will accept the compliment, all the same, for one is not more difficult than the other."


	28. SANSA XXIV

"Sewing, again," Sansa said, dubiously.

Margaery grinned at her. "I promise that this time, it will not be in the Queen Mother's chambers, nor will she be in attendance. She has urgent business with the Small Council, and anyway, she's been rather...distant, lately."

Sansa blinked, at that. "What sort of business?" she asked, and wondered if Stannis Baratheon was setting up for another siege of King's Landing. Wondered secondly what Cersei was planning, if she was no longer attempting to befriend Margaery. She was not a most patient woman, and Sansa doubted that she would remain with a plan she thought was failing so spectacularly, especially after the way that Joffrey had humiliated her at the dinner table.

Margaery gave her a considering look, and then shrugged. "Something to do with the finances of the Crown, I suspect. No doubt the Tyrells will be asked for more...assistance. So. Sewing?"

Sansa sighed. "I do not think that my stitches can do any better with practice, Lady Margaery, if you are trying to tell me something."

Margaery's eyes twinkled with mirth. "Then perhaps you will agree to another activity with me. I have been meaning to do it for some time, but have not found the right...partner, for such an activity."

Sansa raised a brow. "What is it?"

Margaery smiled. "I have always enjoyed swimming. There were these pools, in Highgarden, and I...Anyway, I would like to go swimming here, in King's Landing. The water in the harbor always looks so calm, and I think it would be a wonderful activity. Perhaps a picnic, as well. I will invite some of my other ladies to come along, if they so wish it, and of course we will be escorted by the Kingsuard."

Sansa chewed on her lower lip. "I don't...I don't really know how to swim."

Margaery shook her head dismissively. "That doesn't matter. Most of my ladies cannot swim, either. I thought that we could merely wade, and pick up seashells, if we can find them. Only, how I would love to be in the water again." She batted her eyes at Sansa, who laughed a little to see it.

"That sounds lovely," Sansa admitted, and it did, but... "The Queen Mother would never let me go with you."

Margaery shook her head. "Let me deal with Cersei, if you would really like to go, Sansa. I don't want her inhibiting you in even this small thing."

Sansa hesitated. "But the Queen-"

"Sansa," she said gently, taking both of Sansa's hands in her own and squeezing them. " _I_ am the Queen now."

Sansa swallowed. "Then...I would like that, very much."

Margaery grinned, pulling back and clapping her hands together. "Wonderful. I shall tell Elinor and Megga."

Sansa wrinkled her nose at the mention of Elinor, despite that she knew she had no real reason to dislike the girl, not like she did the Lady Reanna.

"We'll meet in my chambers in one hour?" Margaery asked with a smile, and Sansa nodded.

"I'll be ready," she said, and it was only after she had uttered the words that she realized she had absolutely no idea what one wore to swim.

There hadn't been much opportunity for swimming in Winterfell, after all, despite her Tully heritage. Her lady mother had always bemoaned that fact, had always said that the thing she missed the most about her home was swimming in the river, and that it was such a shame that her sons would not have the opportunity.

It was not difficult to elicit the assistance of Shae for this, though. The other woman was more than pleased, Sansa knew, with her renewed friendship with Margaery, even if she had left off saying anything about it since the incident with Tyrion.

Shae managed to find her a gown that was simple and would not be destroyed with the water, and helped Sansa into it.

"Perhaps I should go with you," she suggested, as she tied Sansa's hair back into an elaborate braid. "So that the King does not think that you are attempting an escape."

Sansa swallowed. "I don't think that's necessary," she said kindly, laying a hand on Shae's arm. Shae stared down at it for a moment, and then back up at Sansa, her eyes narrowing. "Margaery's ladies will be there, and members of the Kingsguard. The King will be able to see that I am not going anywhere."

Shae hesitated, and then nodded. "The Queen will keep you safe."

"Yes," Sansa told her, with a smile. "She is my friend."

Shae sighed. "You have more friends in King's Landing than you think, Lady Sansa." And then, before Sansa could make sense of those words, "Go. Have fun."

Margaery and her two ladies and several Kingsguard, Ser Loras among them, were waiting for Sansa in the Maidenvault when she arrived, and she blushed and apologized and ignored the look in Margaery's eyes when she told her that everything was fine.

Margaery led the way out of the Red Keep, and Sansa found herself wishing that the stronger, self-assured woman would lead Sansa farther than that, even as she sighed to breathe the fresh air outside of the Keep.

They took litters to the beach, took the short way so that they did encounter many of the smallfolk, though those they did shouted love to their beautiful and kind queen. Margaery and Sansa shared one, and spent their time giggling behind the screen, and Elinor and Megga shared the other. The Kingsguard marched alongside them to the beach and then Ser Loras was there to help his sister out of the litter first, and then Sansa. He did not meet her eyes as he did so.

The beach that the Kingsguard had brought them to was just outside the city walls, and Sansa wondered for a moment how Margaery had managed to convince her husband to allow her outside of the city walls, before she remembered that this was Margaery, capable of all manner of miracles.

Sansa had smiled more in her presence than she could remember doing so since arriving in King's Landing.

The water was lovely today, glassy and perfect and a little warm, and the girls spent the remainder of the afternoon wading and gossiping and attempting to skip smooth stones and making sandcastles, and it reminded Sansa of the times that she had gone out into the godswood with Jeyne, to get away from everyone for a little, and how lovely and peaceful she had always found it.

It was beautiful here. The open skies, not hidden, if she stared only to the East and pretended that the Keep did not loom behind her, seemed bluer here than they had in the royal gardens, though she knew that was likely only her imagination. The air was pleasantly warm, and she found herself glad that she had not worn other clothes and had allowed Shae to help her choose them, or she might have been stuck on the beach in such weather.

The Kingsguard took up their position at the edge of the beach, close enough to defend while still allowing the girls their privacy.

None of them ever actually did any swimming, though Margaery lamented that Megga could not actually do more than tread water, which Megga seemed rather surprised to hear.

Little fish, freer than Sansa, swam around her legs, and she dug her toes into the sand with a little sound that she was relieved she did not comment on, and pretended to be listening to the other girls' words.

She wondered if this was what it was like in Dorne, all the time.

And then Sansa saw the little row boat, tethered to a dock not far from where they were swimming.

She froze, stared at it, saw the little oars tied to the sides of it.

She knew that it was foolish. That Prince Oberyn had promised to take her from this place, regardless that the leaving itself was taking far too long for her, and that she would be visible to the entire harbor, rowing away. That she barely even knew how to row on her own.

But still, the temptation was there, and she couldn't help but walk toward the little boat.

"Sansa," Margaery said quietly, laying a soothing hand on her clothed arm. She had not even noticed the other girl walking up behind her. "Don't."

Sansa sucked in a breath, flitting her eyes away from the boat and giving Margaery a tremulous smile. "I don't know what you're-"

"I know you want to leave this place," Margaery interrupted her gently. "Believe me, I _know_. But there are half a dozen Kingsguard here, and both of my ladies are witnesses. Even if I ordered them to lie on your behalf, do you think anyone would believe that you managed to slip away?"

Sansa gulped. "I...I shouldn't have come here," she gasped out, attempting to pull her sleeve free of Margaery, but the other girl wasn't letting her go. "It's different, with the ships. I could escape, here. I could take that little boat and you'd never see me again."

"You wouldn't make it into the sea before Joffrey ordered your ship destroyed, regardless of whether or not you were in it," Margaery told her. "Sansa, come and sit with us on the beach."

Sansa took a deep breath, and then nodded. "Yes. All right."

She allowed Margaery to lead her back to the beach, where Elinor and Megga were already waiting, allowed Margaery to pull her down into a sitting position in the white sand beside her, allowed Margaery to lull her into conversation.

She did not know when she forgot about the little boat, instead talking animatedly about the gowns of King's Landing and how she used to enjoy sewing, once, how, if she must sew in King's Landing, she would rather it be with gowns that she might wear, than pillow cases.

Margaery had leaned forward, Sansa noticed the next moment that she focused on the young queen, resting her chin on her hand as her lips parted a little.

Sansa paused in her speaking, blinking self-consciously at Margaery. "What is it?" she asked, running a hand through her hair.

Margaery shook herself, as if she was coming out of a dream. "Nothing," she said finally, smiling faintly. Then, "You just...looked so happy."

Sansa flushed. "I..."

"You needn't apologize for it, Sansa," Margaery said quietly, her gaze suddenly far more intense than it had been a moment before.

"I wasn't...apologizing, I just..."

Margaery reached out, taking Sansa's hands in her own. "You deserve to be happy, Sansa," she said fiercely. "And you needn't apologize to yourself, every time that you are."

Sansa pulled away from her, swallowing hard. "I think perhaps I should return to the Keep now. My husband will be looking for me."

Margaery sighed, but then nodded. "I will escort you, of course. You shouldn't go back into that city alone."

"Oh no, you needn't-"

"It is no imposition," Margaery promised her. "Elinor! Megga! Back to the castle with us."


	29. MARGAERY V

She was due to meet Sansa in some time for another stroll around the gardens, despite her grandmother’s comment that if she saw another Lannister garden she would throw herself from a cliff to avoid sitting in it again.

She had been doing that often lately, and Margaery had a terrible feeling that it was a not so subtle warning; that soon enough, Olenna Tyrell would not be around to help her here, in King’s Landing.

What she had not worked out was whether this meant what she feared it meant, or that Olenna would be returning to Highgarden soon.

In retrospect, she was not sure which was worse.

There came a knock on the door just as Alla was helping her into a crimson gown with little golden lions stitched into it, and Margaery smiled, thinking that perhaps it was Sansa come early, or Loras come to complain about something or other.

It had been some time since Loras had opened up enough to do that, however.

"Just a moment, Sansa!" Margaery called, and then smiled warmly at Alla. "That will be all, dear. Thank you."

Alla smiled back at her. "Do you think that I could come with you to the royal gardens? Elinor'll have me doing chores all day, otherwise."

Margaery chuckled. "I suppose it could be arranged, but you mustn't tell anyone I let you," she whispered conspiratorially.

Alla grinned. "I'll just go and get my shawl."

Margaery nodded. "I'll wait for you in here."

She had noticed that Sansa was far more willing to be open around her when they were alone, or in Margaery's chambers, and she rather liked Sansa better that way.

Uninhibited.

She swallowed, and ushered Alla through the side door that would lead to the chambers she shared with Megga, before going to her own door and opening it with a bright smile.

Sansa was not on the other side of the door.

"Ser Osmund," Margaery said, smiling prettily at him to hide her surprise. "I did not expect you today."

Ser Osmund gave her a per functionary bow from the doorway of her bedchambers. "His Grace required your brother Ser Loras for a sparring session. I hope that I am not too disappointing?"

Margaery blinked at him. "Of course not, good Ser. Only a surprise, that is all."

"A good one, I hope?"

Margaery cocked her head. "I hardly know you, Ser. 'Tis not a bad one. Only...there was something that I wished to speak with him about, is all."

Ser Osmund was stepping through the door already as she spoke, his great shoulders barely fitting through the entrance, and at her words he bit back a smile. "I do not think that our king will occupy much of your brother's time, my lady. He has not done so in past spars."

Margaery's eyes narrowed. "That was hardly appropriate for you to say, Ser Osmund." She brushed past him, into the hall, rather regretting now that she had sent Alla away. "I will hear no insults against my husband, His Grace. Do you understand me?"

Ser Osmund ducked his head, shamefaced, but followed her nonetheless. "Of course, Your Grace. I meant no offense, only harmless japes."

She hesitated. "Then all is forgiven. My ladies and I wish to play come-into-my-castle again today, Ser Osmund, in another of the covered gardens. I hope that you will be the gallant knight you were when we played the other day."

Ser Osmund reached out, hand snaking around her wrist, and Margaery stiffened, instinctively attempting to pull away.

"Unhand me at once, Ser Osmund," she ground out, when his gloved hand did not retreat as she had no doubt been expecting it to.

"Do you and your ladies really find such enjoyment out of children's games still?" he asked her, eyes roving her form in a way that might have made a lesser woman shudder. Margaery did not flinch. "You are a woman grown now. Surely you have interest in...more grown games."

Margaery pursed her lips. "Many of my ladies are not women grown, Ser Osmund," she told him, voice cold. "And I myself have always found enjoyment in this very game. Are you coming, then?"

Ser Osmund sighed. "If my queen insists."

She lifted her chin. "Do not touch me again, Ser Osmund."

He nodded, though she could detect amusement in the quirk of his brow. "As my queen demands."

When Margaery knocked on the door to her ladies' shared chambers moments later, and asked how many of them would wish to accompany her in a game of come-into-my-castle in the courtyard, Alla groaned.

Margaery did her best to conceal her shaking as she led her ladies to the courtyard, Ser Osmund following behind, a silent specter.


	30. SANSA XXV

"Ellaria Sand wishes to speak with me?" Sansa repeated, rather dreading the thought as she remembered their last meeting. While she had found the woman kind and friendly, the meeting dredged up rather unpleasant memories still.

Shae nodded. "I can tell her that you are busy, if you like," she said, folding her hands in front of herself.

Sansa shook her head. "Queen Margaery sent a servant to inform me that she and her ladies were playing come-into-my-castle again, instead of walking in the gardens. I've no wish for more games today, I'm afraid."

Shae gave her a long look. "Are you certain? They might do you good."

Sansa sighed. "At any rate, I shouldn't keep Lady Ellaria waiting."

Shae ground her teeth a little, but then smiled. "I'll walk you there, then."

Sansa lifted a brow, suspicious. "Why?"

Her servant, Tyrion's lady, whatever she was now, was unimpressed as she ushered Sansa out into the hall. "I want to make sure you get there safely, and send a servant to come and find me to walk you back?"

Sansa rolled her eyes. "I don't think that would be necessary. I know the way."

"Please."

It was the please that got to her, and Sansa glanced at her as they walked. "What has you so bothered? I thought you told me that I ought to recognize my friends, in King's Landing."

"I am not convinced that Prince Oberyn Martell and his lady are your friends," Shae said, through clenched teeth as they passed several nobles. "Nor am I convinced that you have entirely thought this through."

Sansa blinked at her. "How do you mean? One innocent meeting with Ellaria Sand will not harm me," she said, and tried to sound more sure than she felt about it.

Shae sighed. "I am your maidservant, Sansa. Do you think I haven't noticed the bundle of clothing and the hairbrush and the extra boots that you keep hidden in the back of your wardrobe?"

Sansa froze. "Shae..."

"I haven't told anyone," Shae said, her voice shaking, and Sansa did not think it was from fear. "Not even Tyrion. But Sansa...What do you think the Martells will do with you, if you go to Dorne with them? Do you even know?"

Sansa bit her lip. "It must be better than what the Lannisters have planned for me."

"Tyrion cares about you," Shae said quietly. "I know you don't like to think so, but it is the truth. He cares about you, and he will do his best to shield you from the rest of his horrid family that he can. Do you think the Martells really care about you, or your Stark name and what stealing you away from the Crown will do to the Lannisters? What do you think will happen to you once they've gotten their vengeance? You'll be married off to someone, to secure their claim to your home."

"I don't want to talk about this," Sansa snapped at her, as they came to the corridor where she knew the Martell host to be staying.

Shae nodded. "I know, because you don't want to think about it. But you should. Or, at the very least, you should ask."

Sansa spun on her. "Do you think I haven't? I'm scared about what might happen to me once I leave King's Landing, Shae, but I'm terrified of what will happen to me if I stay here. Don't you understand?"

"Yes," Shae said, without a moment's hesitation. "Yes, I do, Sansa. I just...Just remember that you have friends here, and the Martells may be offering you something good, but they may not be your friends, either. Prince Oberyn's anger over his sister's death is legendary, and that will always come first for him."

Sansa lifted her chin as they came to a stop outside Ellaria's door. "I'll keep it in mind," she said, in a rather harsh voice.

Shae smiled sadly. "You won't. Send for me if you need me, Lady Sansa."

And then she turned on her heel, and was gone.

Sansa stared after her for a moment, filled with an irritation she knew to be irrational; even if Shae had confessed herself jealous of Sansa, she did have Sansa's best interests in mind with her words, she knew.

She knocked on the door as Shae's figure retreated into the shadows of the hall, and told the answering servant that she was there to see Lady Ellaria. The serving girl laughed, but let her in anyway.

Despite all of her protestations that she was not a lady, Ellaria looked like a queen, where she was draped across the divan in her elaborate outer chamber, far nicer than the rooms Sansa and Tyrion occupied, sucking on a grape and flipping through a golden rimmed tome that Sansa thought looked somewhat familiar.

The room had a very Dornish look to it, despite the fact that they were in King's Landing, tan and gold with the Martell flags on the walls and what she assumed to be Dornish paintings beside them, with a lovely view of the ocean beyond where Ellaria sat, and it was beautiful, Sansa couldn't help but think, taking in the general splendor as she took a step forward.

"Lady Sansa," she greeted, but did not stand up, and Sansa smiled in turn.

"What did you think of the dress I had sent to you? I hope it fit well?" Ellaria asked as Sansa stepped into her chambers, and the other girl blushed.

"I...It was very lovely, and a good fit," Sansa said, pretending that she had done more than looked at it and tried it on once before shoving it to the back of her wardrobe guiltily.

Ellaria smiled. "I am relieved. Come, sit with me, child. I suppose my Oberyn told you I'd like to speak with you?"

Sansa swallowed, moving to the divan and sitting beside the Prince's paramour. "Yes."

Ellaria nodded. "I thought that it would likely be better this way, for seeing you in the company of an unmarried Prince known for his...indiscretions might make some suspicious of our intentions toward you, and we needn't have that."

Sansa came forward, sitting down on one of the cushions beside Ellaria. "My lord husband did...express some discontent," she admitted, and Ellaria nodded.

"Just as I thought. I will ensure that Oberyn understands the stakes, then, Lady Sansa." She reached out, brushing a bit of hair behind Sansa's ear. "Now, what has my Oberyn told you of his plans?" Ellaria asked, and Sansa blinked.

"Close to nothing," she admitted, for it was true, and she could not stand this not knowing. She never knew, and, in the end, it always harmed, rather than helped her.

Ellaria frowned, glancing at the door out of which her lover had just gone. "Well," she said finally, taking Sansa's hands in hers, "We must remedy that."

Sansa felt a wave of relief wash through her. "What will happen to me, once we are in Dorne? And when are we leaving? What of Myrcella Baratheon, and how will you sneak me past the Lannisters?"

Ellaria raised a hand, laughing. "One at time, my dear." She hesitated, looking Sansa over. "Oberyn and I have been making plans since the moment he first laid eyes on you, you know. You remind him ever so much of his sister, Elia, stuck here as a prisoner amongst the Lions."

Sansa flushed. "I did not mean to dredge up painful memories..."

"Oh no," Ellaria assured her. "You are not to blame, little wolf. My lover has had such painful memories dredged up since the moment he arrived in King's Landing. He would not have thought it so of you were he not already thinking of her near constantly." She gave Sansa a long look. "You do not look over much like her, after all."

Sansa did not truly know how to respond to that. "Ellaria..."

Ellaria pulled her close, into a warm embrace that Sansa wanted both to pull away from and press into. She did not remember the last time anyone had hugged her.

And then, in her ear, Ellaria whispered, "My husband has still some business in King's Landing to take care of, before he can take us back to Dorne, but worry not, for he hates it here as much as you. You must be absolutely ready at any time to leave however, little wolf. Can you do that for us?"

Sansa thought of her friendship with Margaery, but then, if it came down to a choice of staying in King's Landing where Margaery could barely shield her from Joffrey and Cersei and leaving this horrible place forever, she knew what she would always choose.

And there was little that she would wish to take from this place, anyway.

"Yes," she whispered, and Ellaria pulled back, smiling at her.

"Good," she told the other girl. "I think you will like it very much in Dorne, Lady Sansa."

Sansa smiled. "I hope so. I cannot wait to see it."

"Nor can I, my dear," Ellaria told her, with a distant look in her eyes. "Nor can I."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone for all of the support last chapter. You guys are great.


	31. MARGAERY VI

Margaery had been looking forward to a calm, quiet supper with her husband before they both retired to their separate chambers for the night. To that end, she'd had her servants prepare a nice roast and stew, and gotten out the finest of wines from the royal cellar, and waited for her husband to leave his meeting with the Small Council.

She had even been planning to bring up the subject of Ser Osmund, in only the vaguest of terms, of course; she knew how jealous her husband could become. Perhaps ask if he might not be assigned to her alone again, not when her brother or any of the other Kingsguard was available.

He had been assigned to her only once since the day she had spurned him, and had made no overtures toward her, but she had been distinctly uncomfortable in his presence nonetheless, and made a point of remaining out in public in front of as many people as she could throughout his duty.

She would come up with some excuse about his interest in Lady Reanna as a reason for this, and her husband would easily be swayed to agree to her demands without her alerting his suspicions of anything truly wrong.

Joffrey had gone to the Small Council maybe a handful of times since Margaery had arrived in King's Landing, she knew, content to make decisions without any information on them and torture those still in his court.

Margaery had been encouraging him to attend more meetings since their marriage, for, while she understood the advantage the realm had when Joffrey was distracted enough with her not to deal with any matters of state, she knew that it would be better for both of them if she knew what was going on in the Small Council, if Joffrey could keep a curb on Cersei and the rest of the Lannisters.

She should have known better than to think the words 'calm' and 'quiet' in conjunction with Joffrey Baratheon.

He swept into their chambers, his face a storm cloud, about half an hour later than they had agreed upon, and she almost saw the tears filling his eyes before he turned away and plopped himself down into the seat at the table across from her own, glaring down at his roast as though it had personally offended him.

Two high red spots had appeared on his cheeks, and a vein had popped out on his neck.

Margaery grimaced and pretended it was a smile. "Is something wrong, my love?"

Joffrey glanced up at her, his expression softening only minutely. "My fucking grandfather, that's what's wrong. He thinks he's King now that I've made him the Hand."

Margaery arranged her face into a mask of sympathy. "Surely he doesn't contradict the King's wishes?"

Joffrey grabbed at his knife and fork, ripping apart his roast. Margaery winced as he shoved a large piece into his mouth and chewed on it violently. "He undermines me every chance he gets. Makes me feel like a child even when he knows I am the king."

Margaery's lips pursed in disapproval. "Then he ought to be taught a lesson, Your Grace. You cannot allow him to treat you in such a fashion just because he is your grandfather."

Joffrey pointed his fork at her, and Margaery forced herself to retain her sympathetic smile. "Exactly. You understand. I ought to do away with the whole Small Council altogether and rely only on your own council. Or, better, name your father Hand of the King. He knows his place."

Margaery dipped her head. "If that is what you wish, I am sure that my father would be honored, Your Grace, but Lord Tywin-"

"I. Am. The. King!" Joffrey shrieked, standing to his feet so suddenly he nearly knocked over the table. "I don't have to answer to Tywin Lannister, or any of the rest of them!"

Margaery nodded, opened her mouth to cool the storm, but Joffrey spoke before she could, voice raising with his anger.

"All these...people...judging me, I can see them, every one of the fucking courtiers, even my own mother, now!" Joffrey snapped, and with a sweep of his hand the contents of their supper fell to the ground.

Margaery bit back a sigh. "I'm sure that they don't mean to, my love-"

"Oh, they do!" Joffrey shouted, his face turning a hideous shade of purple. "Thinking they know better than me, not liking it when I make my own decisions. Yesterday, Grandfather told me to sit down, in my own Small Council meeting. I've been going, since you urged me to, but apparently my being there doesn't even matter!"

He kicked his chair and it went flying across the room. Margaery barely managed not to jump in surprise.

Instead, she stood to her feet, coming to stand behind her husband and hesitantly placing her hands on his shoulders. When he didn't shrug her off, she leaned forward, pressing her nose into the soft part of his neck.

"They don't understand the burdens that a king lives under, my love," she murmured, and Joffrey nodded. "How could they? They play at the game of thrones, but you are the king. They all think that, were they king, they would do things their own way, but you must persevere. You must show them how wrong they are."

Joffrey nodded. "I am the King. Not them."

Margaery ducked her head a little, turning to smile up at him. "Yes, you are, my love. And everyone of them knows it. It's why they judge you, why they crave the power you have." She leaned forward, pressing their noses together. "Don't let them take it from you."

"I won't," Joffrey vowed, and then his hands were moving down her body, pulling her in front of him and cupping at her breasts. Margaery leaned into the touch, looking over his shoulder at the picture mounted on the wall behind him and moaning when she felt it appropriate.

After what the smallfolk were beginning to call the Red Wedding, Joffrey had commissioned an oil painting of the Stark downfall, and it hung in their chambers everyday; Robb Stark, with the head of a wolf and the body of a dead man, his wife, with her child still inside her bloated belly, Catelyn Stark, a red streak across her throat, and a dozen dead Stark soldiers about them.

Joffrey stood triumphant in the middle of the painting, holding a bloodied Widow's Wail and grinning like a madman.

Margaery found her eyes often drawn to that painting when they made love. She knew that Joffrey noticed sometimes, and made sure, when he did, to act appropriately aroused by it, when inside she felt nothing but disgust.

"Perhaps we could go to the archery range again soon, my love," Margaery offered, and Joffrey smirked at her, glancing up from his attentions to her breasts, where he had removed the top half of her gown, which conveniently opened on its own.

"Would you like that?" he asked, kneading her left breast with both hands, and Margaery moaned again.

"Oh, I would, my love. But only if you think I am not wasted on the sport. I am sure that I am not very good."

His eyes grew dark then, and he forced her chin up, studying her with an adoring expression that she always found disturbing, even if she knew how hard she had worked to receive it from her husband.

"You're wonderful," he told her, "Better than any of my foolish excuses for guards."

"Really?" she asked, breathily, and Joffrey blinked at her, lust in his eyes now, as one hand trailed down the front of her gown.

"I expect we'll have you hunting the living soon enough," he continued, and Margaery beamed at him.

"I cannot wait for that, my love. Do you have a Small Council meeting tomorrow, by any chance?"

He waved a hand dismissively, and she let out a small whimper at the removal of his hand from her person, noticed how he seemed to stand a little taller for it. "Nothing I can't miss."

She grinned, suppressing a sigh, leaning forward and taking his index finger into her mouth, giving it a little suck that had Joffrey gasping.

"I'm so glad."

And then he reached down and started undoing the ties of his trousers, and Margaery took him by the shoulders, leading him back to their bed in the other room of his ornate chambers, her plans for a quiet night in her own room long gone from her mind.


	32. SANSA XXVI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two in one today guys, I'm on a roll.

"My father is unsure what he should do," Margaery confessed. "Alla and Elinor are both promised to a suitor, once their service to me is rendered complete, but the man fought valiantly during the Battle of Blackwater, and his family, despite not being noble, is wealthy enough that securing their loyalty could certainly help our cause, and at the very least not hurt."

"It doesn't sound as if your father is unsure what to do," Sansa pointed out timidly, but Margaery only smiled at her.

"You are right; my father prefers to spend his time planning more important battles or at the dining table," she said with a shrug. "I suppose then, that I am unsure what to do."

"What about Lady Megga?" Sansa asked curiously, attempting to think of any other of Margaery's ladies whom she could name.

Still, it made her uncomfortable even to speak of planning another woman's betrothal, after hers with Joffrey had ended so badly.

"I'm sure that Megga's betrothed would have something to say about that," Margaery said with a little chuckle.

"Megga has been betrothed? But then...why is she still your lady?" Sansa asked incredulously, for it was not the custom for married women to remain on as ladies, even to their queens. While Elinor and Alla were too young to be forced off into marriage and away from their liege lady, Megga was older even then Margaery.

Margaery laughed. "Her betrothed has sailed off to Pentos, or Lorath, or one of those Free Cities," she informed Sansa. "I expect he won't be back for some years, if at all. He promised Megga an unknown gift of great beauty for their wedding, and said he would not return without it. I personally think that he will get her a Valyrian jewel, if he can find it."

Sansa blinked at her. "But...Megga is just a lowly member of your House," she said incredulously. "Why would he agree to such a thing for her?"

"Megga told him that she would give him virginity if he could promise her something better than a knighted husband and a gaggle of little Tyrells," Margaery said with a half-smirk, "And then she danced with Tommen on my wedding night. I suppose he rather took the hint."

Sansa flushed at Margaery's words. "Did she really..."

"Oh, of course she didn't mean it," Margaery said, grinning now. "She gave up her womanhood long ago, to some backwoods laborer in the stables, the little liar." She glanced down at Sansa, and smirked again. "You blush so prettily, like a maiden," Margaery said, giggling at the blush of crimson running over Sansa's face at her words.

"I...I...is it so obvious?" Sansa finally burst out, and Margaery blinked at her in surprise.

"Truly?" Margaery asked, lifting her brows in surprise.

Sansa blushed. "Is it really so strange? I am a maiden, and my maidenhood belongs to my husband, should he wish to take it." She shifted uncomfortably. "That is how it works."

Margaery laughed. "Well, of course it is, but you are perhaps the first maiden I have met wholly unspoiled. Most ladies find a way to circumvent such traditions. And why should we not be? It is not for men to have all of the fun before their wedding night. Women ought to have the opportunity to practice, as well."

Sansa was left reeling, at the revelation that the Queen had not been a virgin on the night of her wedding to Joffrey, though a part of her was rather relieved by that news, for Margaery's sake.

"Cersei once told me that a woman's most powerful weapon is between her legs," Sansa said shyly.

Margaery laughed. "That sounds like her."

Sansa tilted her head. "You don't agree."

Margaery smiled. "Little bird, a woman's most powerful weapon is her mouth. Once a man's had a taste of one cunt, he's tasted them all. It's the teasing that he loves."

Sansa blushed scarlet. "Does...does Joffrey..."

Margaery smiled again, but this time, her eyes were not dancing with the amusement they'd had before. This time, the smile was fake. "Joffrey is just like any other man, but the teasing is different, with him."

"Because he's insane," Sansa said, and it felt liberating to say so, even if it was only between the two of them. Even still, her eyes widened and she glanced around, in the old fear that someone was watching them from the shadows of Margaery's bedchambers.

Margaery's lips twitched, as if she was having trouble holding back a smile. "Yes, that does seem to have an effect."

Sansa's head whipped around. "He is your husband," she stammered out.

Margaery shrugged. "I told you, Sansa, that I wanted you to feel safe to confide in me anything you like, here. No one will overhear us; the walls of my bedchamber are the thickest in the castle. If I could not say and do as I pleased here, I would not have given you that false hope."

"You said that you were a maiden when you and Lord Tyrion were wed," Margaery said quietly, taking a sip of her wine. "And now...Do you mean that Lord Tyrion has never..."

Sansa blushed. "No, not once."

Margaery sat up then. "Sansa, if he never consummated the marriage, then you could have it annulled by the High Septon," she told her seriously. "You wouldn't have to be married to him. I...I see the way you look at him, sometimes, and I do know what you confided in me, that you don't care for your husband at all."

Sansa laughed hollowly. "The Lannisters will never allow that. They want me married off to a Lannister, so that no one else can claim Winterfell. If I make any sort of claim, Joffrey will force Lord Tyrion to fuck me in front of witnesses, if necessary, to get the job done."

Margaery's lips twisted. "But-"

"You know that; it's why your family wanted me to marry Willas, so badly," Sansa said, with just a touch of bitterness in her voice.

Margaery threaded her fingers through Sansa's hair. "It may have been my family's wish, but Sansa, I thought that we had agreed not to speak of that...unpleasantness, again."

Sansa eyed her for a moment, and then reached for another piece of cheese. "Of course. I...Why would you want me to get an annulment, anyway?"

The other girl was silent for a long moment, and then said brightly, "You still could be. Safe, in Highgarden. You would just have to make sure the Lannisters don't know what you're planning, go to the High Septon first thing in the morning."

"Margaery."

She glanced at her. "Must you see a plot in everything, Sansa? I would like to see you smile again. There, now you know." She shrugged. "And, I know how the prospect of having the Imp's child frightens you. I find it distasteful, myself. But I suppose it doesn't matter, if seeking an annulment on the grounds of no consummation would only endanger you." She shook her head.

Sansa nodded. "I would like that, more than anything, but it is impossible," she told Margaery. "They'd never allow it."

"Then I am sorry for bringing it up," Margaery apologized sweetly. Sansa nodded, and they spoke no more of it.

She felt almost guilty, for not telling Margaery that there was no reason to attempt such comforting words, for she would not be long for King's Landing, but she knew that such was a secret between herself and the Martells, and to speak of it, even here, where she trusted Margaery not to tell a soul, would be betraying her confidence to them.

Margaery must never know, even if it pained Sansa to lie by omission to her friend. It would be easier, this way.

Sansa was no fool. She suspected that, whatever business Prince Oberyn still had here, it must be ominous, for Ellaria to instruct her to be ready to leave at any moment, and it was best not to get Margaery involved in such a thing, for her own sake.


	33. MARGAERY VII

"Your Grace," Margaery said, blinking in surprise when she found Cersei standing on the other side of her door, wearing a pinched expression that was more reminiscent of a grimace than a smile. "I did not expect you. Do come in, I was just changing my gown."

Cersei dipped her head, leaving Jaime Lannister outside to step into Margaery's chambers primly, the door swinging shut behind her.

For a moment, though she knew it would certainly be foolish of the other woman, Margaery feared that Cersei would attempt to kill her, now that they were alone.

She almost wished that Jaime Lannister had come into the room with them, though it would hardly be appropriate and she doubted he was any more trustworthy.

Cersei half-turned away to give Margaery some privacy as she stripped off her gown, letting it fall to the floor where she knew her ladies would pick it up, later.

"I would like to apologize for the words I said at the dining table," Margaery said, effecting her sweetest tones. "I did not think that His Grace-"

Cersei cleared her throat. "You need not apologize, my dear gooddaughter. His Grace and I have been...growing distant, since the marriage, and I have been struggling to connect with him. Through no fault of your own." Her words softened to almost a whisper, so that Margaery had to strain to hear her. "I suppose everyone will be noticing it now, however."

As she slipped into a golden dress that had been a gift on her wedding day from her grandmother, she cleared her throat to let Cersei know that it was all right to look again, pulling her hair out of the collar and letting it fall loosely around her shoulders.

Cersei was staring at her discarded gown when Margaery looked up. Margaery followed the other woman's gaze, paling when she saw the spots of blood clearly visible on it.

Her ladies could like be rid of the stain, but, seeing the almost gleeful expression on Cersei's face, she found herself rather wishing they would burn it for her, instead.

Cersei examined the cup, she knew, in lieu of Margaery herself. "Do you have your moon's blood, this month?"

Margaery swallowed, feeling oddly uncomfortable in front of her goodmother, as though she were naked. Not that she had ever been uncomfortable in only her skin before. "Yes, Mother," she said, merely because she knew it would annoy the other woman.

Cersei's lips twitched in obvious irritation at the title, but she didn't protest it. Margaery did not believe it was because she had learned not to fight certain battles. "I do not need to inform you of the importance of an heir, I hope? The people must be assured that the Crown is strong, especially with Stannis Baratheon contesting us."

"Of course," Margaery said quietly. "We...are trying. We are most eager for a child."

Cersei snorted. "There is no need for trying on the man's part, my dear. Only for us females. That was the design of the gods when they created us to bleed monthly. We must bleed and bite our tongues and dry our eyes, but they find only pleasure in the bedchamber."

Margaery bit her lip. "Of course, Mother. I defer to your experience."

Cersei's eyes flashed. "I suggest you try faster, my dear girl. My son is...not known for his patience. There are...certain remedies that one might take, to quicken the womb and raise the chances for a child."

Margaery did not trust any advice Cersei gave her not to close her womb completely. "Please, Mother," she said sweetly, sitting on her divan and gesturing for Cersei to do the same, "Tell me more. I wish only to please my husband and the realm."

Cersei smiled coolly. "I shall have Grandmaester Pycelle make some of these herbs for you, my dear. They greatly helped me during my marriage to King Robert, may he rest in peace."

Margaery smiled widely. "Well, and I see the proof of their work every day," she said. "I find myself having no more doubts on the subject. But shouldn't I speak to the Grandmaester myself?"

Cersei reached out then, taking Margaery's hands in her own and looking at her with serious eyes. "Such things are better handled...discreetly, my dear. Should anyone in the Red Keep learn of your desire to have such potions made, they may fear for the potency of both yourself and the King. No; I shall see to these matters for you, as any goodmother might."

Margaery dipped her head in acceptance. "I am most grateful for your help in this matter," she told Cersei. "I want for nothing more than to please my king and the realm, and you seem to have more of a head for it than I."

Cersei lifted a brow; perhaps Margaery had gone too far in her wording. "You seem to be making progress with the King," she said, voice rather dry, and Margaery flushed.

"You are his mother," she told the older woman, "And I am sure that, once his infatuation with me due to our very recent wedding has begun to wear, as the duties of his kingship return to him, he will look again for his mother's expertise, as I do."

Cersei looked almost relieved at the words; Margaery was far more adept at hiding hers. "Do you think so?" she asked, playing with the cuff of Margaery's sleeve.

Margaery nodded. "Of course, goodmother. The bond between a mother and her child...it is so powerful, I have been told. I only hope to experience it soon, myself."

Cersei sent her a shark's smile. "I pray to the Mother that you do, everyday," she said soothingly. "For the good of the realm."


	34. SANSA XXVII

“I had a visit from Cersei yesterday,” Margaery said with a sigh as she sank down into the seat beside Sansa in the gardens, under the little gazebo.

Sansa glanced up at her, face quickly morphing from one of happiness to see her, which always caused a pleasant sensation in Sansa's stomach to see returned, to one of alarm st the subject matter. “Was it about our time at the beach? I knew that I shouldn’t have...”

Margaery waved a hand dismissively. “Cersei’s been a right thorn in my side ever since I arrived in King’s Landing. I hope she hasn’t given you any trouble over our going swimming?” Margaery asked gently.

Sansa flushed, which was answer enough.

“Cersei ought to do us all a goodly favor and throw herself off the nearest cliff,” Margaery said indifferently, and Sansa gasped in surprise.

“Margaery! She is still the Queen Mother. She-”

“What, we’ve all been thinking it for a long time now,” Margaery pointed out indifferently, twirling her finger in her wine. “I shall speak to her about allowing you to go into the city without difficulty. She will listen to me, now that she thinks she has made herself a friend to me.”

The wine that Lady Reanna was pouring spilled over the goblet and onto Sansa’s sleeve and arm. She cried out in surprise, glanced down at the liquid.

It looked like blood.

“Reanna!” Margaery snapped, reaching out with a spare bit of cloth and wiping at Sansa’s ruined sleeve. “Honestly.”

“Apologies, Your Grace, my lady. I-”

“Be gone from my sight,” Margaery snapped at her, even as Reanna moved forward to wipe up the spill herself. “I think you’ve done enough damage this afternoon, don’t you?”

Reanna swallowed audibly, and then dipped her head. “Apologies, Your Grace. I will leave you then. Would you like me to send another of my ladies to replace me?”

Margaery waved a hand, and Reanna took the hint, departing with another curtsey.

Sansa forced her eyes away from the bit of skin that Reanna’s loose sleeve had revealed when she’d poured Sansa’s drink, and glanced back at Margaery as the lady left the room. “I don’t mind. I’m sure it was an honest mistake. My serving woman Shae will get rid of the stain,” she said, glancing down at her own sleeve and the red stain that Shae would most likely not be able to be rid of.

“Ah, the girl is becoming a menace,” Margaery said quietly, setting the cloth on the edge of the table. “My father should never have elevated her to become one of my ladies if she did not understand the honor of it. I dare say she wouldn’t have the interests of men like Ser Osmund back in the Reach.”

"I have noticed Lady Reanna acting strangely," Sansa agreed carefully, ignoring the mention of Ser Osmund, for she did not know why any girl would want his attentions. He was, after all, incapable of marrying her. "I, just the other day, noticed her speaking with Cersei." She spun back to Margaery. "What reason could she have for that?"

Margaery waved a hand dismissively. "Cersei has been attempting to recruit my ladies against me, as her spies," she said, pawing through the dresses as though they held far greater importance. "She has, as of yet, not succeeded."

Sansa felt a cold chill run through her, though it was hardly cold in this room, nor in all of King's Landing, compared to the North. "And if she does?"

Margaery glanced up at her, and, seeing the serious look on Sansa's face, walked closer and pulled her into her arms. "My ladies are all of House Tyrell and House Redwyne, loyal to me. They would not betray me to Cersei, and besides, I have nothing to hide."

Sansa blinked at her, thinking of the scars she had seen on Lady Reanna's arm, when she had moved to pour Sansa's drink, of the way her face had become gaunt and pale in recent weeks, her skittish eyes every time Cersei entered a room.

She was not certain that she was as sure of the girl's loyalty as Margaery. After all, pain, or even the threat of it, could make a person do anything.

Sansa, of all people, knew that.

“I think it far more likely that my lady Reanna is afflicted with a different malady,” Margaery went on. “She has spent rather too many mornings in her chambers, neglecting her duties because of tiredness or sickness, after late night meetings with Ser Osmund Kettleblack for me to think differently.”

Sansa blinked at her in surprise. “You think that she-“

Margaery sighed. “I suppose that answers the question of what I must do with her, and also whom that knight might be able to marry, out of my ladies. She will make him a fine wife and be far from here.”

She sounded almost worried as she said the words, and Sansa wondered why, if Margaery thought that was all there was to this situation.


	35. MARGAERY VIII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have a porn chapter! And a Margaery POV! And still no Sansa! *Sighs*

When Elinor Tyrell first arrived in Highgarden as a member of a lower branch of House Tyrell to be Margaery's pillow friend at the age of twelve, they had bonded from almost that moment onward. They both enjoyed similar things, both had similar attitudes about the ways of the world, and both had similar taste in bed partners.

To that end, they had bonded even more closely, and continued to do so since, regardless of whatever their current situation was.

It was not a romantic partnership; they knew each other too well for that, but one which suited and sated them both well enough.

And it was certainly suiting at least one of them now.

Elinor arched up from the bed, wrapping one arm around Margaery's back and splaying her fingers out over Margaery's arse, several fingers and a thumb dipping teasingly between her cheeks as her mouth claimed Margaery's own, wide and unyielding.

Margaery gasped a little at the sensation, pressing her chest into Elinor and pushing the other girl gently down into their shared bed, half-smirking as Elinor gasped and her legs fell open invitingly for her.

Elinor had always been so enthusiastic, in such matters, so very willing to have anything and everything Margaery or anyone else could give her.

Almost instinctively, for Margaery found that her mind was elsewhere, she reached between Elinor's legs, wondered if Ser Alyn had done this deed yet for his betrothed, and rubbed against the small nub she found there, barely listening as Elinor gasped and writhed beneath her, shoving hard against Margaery as her fingers clawed into Margaery's arse.

She hated to think that what she was doing today seemed almost like a duty, almost like what she did in the bedchamber with Joffrey at times, for she had always found this activity with Elinor to be far more fun than it seemed today.

When Elinor came, spurting onto the bed with a small cry, Margaery sighed, for she normally felt such excitement at being able to bring her pillow friend off so well, and she felt nothing, today.

Elinor, undeterred, reached up and began rubbing at Margaery's nipples until they hardened under her touch, digging a small digit into Margaery's arse until Margaery's body jerked and she gasped, pulling away from the younger girl.

"Margaery?" Elinor asked, still panting, her features twisting into concern rather than the ecstasy that she had been feeling before, and Margaery leaned down, giving her a guilty kiss.

"I'm sorry," Margaery said, pulling back and pushing her hair behind one ear as she collapsed onto the bed beside Elinor with a small sigh. Her hair fell in soft ripples over her breasts, the blanket that had been previously only covering Elinor falling around her waist. "I don't know what's gotten into me, lately."

Being on her moon's blood did not normally affect her in such a way, and, in any case, she had finished with it the other day.

Elinor was not like Joffrey. With Joffrey, she could easily fake such things in the bedroom, and not feel guilty for it after, for much of their relationship was more of the same, while Elinor saw her all the more easily, during such intimate things, and could not be fooled.

She should have known better than to try.

Elinor grinned up at her, eyes dancing impishly. "I do," she said, not bothering to sit up as she lay splayed out over Margaery's bed, reaching out and rubbing her fingers against Margaery's side playfully.

Margaery raised a brow. "Oh?" she asked, coquettishly. "Do you?" She ran a finger down Elinor's stomach, smirking when the other girl arched into the touch with a wanton moan, even so soon after coming in Margaery's hands.

"Oh, yes," Elinor grinned wickedly. "Sansa Stark."

Margaery's hand, kneading into the soft muscles of Elinor's stomach, pulled away at that. "Whatever are you talking about, dear Elinor?"

Elinor's smirk matched Margaery's own. "I've seen the way you look at her, cousin. As if she is the very reason you draw breath, and you wish to consume her. The same way Ser Alyn looks at me."

Margaery's lips twisted into a pout. "I would have thought that I was not so obvious in my desires, nor that you had found them out so quickly."

Elinor bit her lip. "Well, you needn't worry about the Stark girl figuring you out, nor about Joffrey. You have both of them easily fooled. But I have been your pillow friend since we were small, and I know you better than anyone, Margy. So? Out with it. When did you realize you felt that way about her?"

Margaery swallowed, biting her lip. "I'm not entirely sure when I started feeling that she was...more than a friend, to me," she said softly, and then, "No, that's not entirely true. I was in love with her from the moment I saw her in the rose gardens, so sad and serene and beautiful. I wanted nothing more than to see her smile, and when I did, I knew that I was lost, for I could not live without such a smile again."

Elinor giggled. "She must be very pretty when she smiles. Your poetry is far better than the shit that Ser Alyn sends me. You ought to give him pointers, that not everything can be compared to my cunt," she told the other girl, and Margaery laughed hollowly.

"It doesn't matter," she said finally, "For she will certainly never feel the same way about me. Sansa is...she's lovely, and such a good friend, but there are certain things that she is unmoving about, and her...Northern honor is one of them. We are both wed. To men. That is the end of it, to her mind."

Elinor pouted, at those words. "Well," she said finally, hands dipping between Margaery's thighs once more, causing the other girl to sigh as Elinor climbed atop her with the ease of one who had done this one hundred times, for she certainly had, and far many more than that. "She certainly doesn't know what she's missing, there. Perhaps you'll corrupt her, one day."

Margaery fell back against the pillows, spreading her legs in invitation. Her eyelids fluttered as she felt Elinor's fingers prod against the inside of her. "Perhaps..."

And, as Elinor’s fingers pushed inside of her, Margaery moaned and pretended that it was Sansa Stark, bringing her off instead, wondered how the thought sat so well in her mind.


	36. SANSA XXVIII

Sansa did not know how, but Margaery had somehow convinced Joffrey to allow her and Sansa to have their supper alone together, in Margaery's chambers, and he was not there to torment either one of them.

In fact, only Loras and another Kingsguard were there at all, standing in their customary position outside of the door, and of course one of Margaery's ladies, Lady Elinor, was serving their drinks, a secret smile on her face whenever she poured for Sansa.

The supper was one of the most enjoyable that Sansa had since arriving in King's Landing, and she had almost managed to forget that her friend had to get Joffrey's permission to have it alone with Sansa at all, considering that she was a prisoner here and that such formals things as dinners should be had with one's husband.

It made Sansa feel a secret thrill, nonetheless.

The food they ate was largely cakes and sweet wines and soup, and Sansa rather wondered at that, but Margaery did not seem to think that there was anything strange about the dinner, and so she did not protest.

They made it through most of the supper on small talk, which mostly meant that Margaery did the talking and Sansa listened, for Margaery ever so liked to talk about nothing for long periods of time on end, and Sansa never grew tired of hearing her voice, the kindest voice in King's Landing.

"Would you like one?" Margaery suddenly asked, gesturing to a bag of red candies sitting in a bag at the end of the table, by the other desserts, and Sansa realized that she had been staring at them, unfocused, for some time.

Sansa blinked down at the red candies rather dubiously. "What are they?"

She had never seen their like before, for they were dark and red with a white frost over them, small enough to fit more than one in her hand, and looked like blown glass.

"Candied roses," Margaery explained, picking one up and setting it on her tongue with a wide smile. "They're made almost purely of sugar, chocolate, and something that makes them so red. They've come from Highgarden," Margaery told her, holding one out, "My mother sent them."

Sansa reached out to pluck it from her fingers, but Margaery simply giggled, evading her fingers and placing the candied flower on her tongue, instead.

Sansa blushed, but didn't quite have time to think about that as the sugared treat melted in her mouth, delicious and sweet and reminding her strangely of Winterfell. She let out a little moan at the taste, as she felt the chocolate fill over her teeth and the warm red explode behind her tongue, and then blushed, glancing at Margaery.

Margaery was staring at her in rapt attention, no doubt wishing to know what she thought of the candy, and Sansa was sitting their moaning over it like...like...

"Do you like it?" Margaery asked finally, when Sansa had swallowed.

Sansa gulped the rest of it down, reaching for her wine as the taste lingered in her mouth. "It's delicious," she said, but her words were flat.

Margaery blinked at her. "Is something wrong?"

Now that the sweet taste was gone from her mouth, she missed it, as she missed the snow of Winterfell and the lemon cakes her septa would see made for her even though they were far more of a delicacy in Winterfell than in King's Landing.

She swallowed hard, and resisted the urge to reach for another one.

"Do you miss your mother?" Sansa asked, and Margaery glanced at her in surprise at the sudden change in topic. "I mean...only that you never see her. She seems to stay in Highgarden, all of the time. You must miss her."

Sansa missed her mother every second of every day.

When Joffrey had told her how her traitor mother and traitor brother had died, Sansa had wanted nothing more than to run from his presence, to be sick as he explained in graphic detail how they had cut her mother's throat open and watched her bleed, how her brother Robb had crawled across the floor to the body of his bride, only to die beside her and have his head cut from his body to be replaced with his direwolf’s head, paraded about the Freys' home for days.

Joffrey had been all too delighted to tell Sansa of how her family had spent their last few moments, and Sansa had had to smile and say that of course they had deserved them, because she knew what would happen if she said anything else.

She could not imagine, however, still being parted from her mother, had her mother still been living. She could not imagine willingly parting herself from her, as Margaery and her mother had done ever since the wedding.

Margaery shrugged elegantly. "She prefers the climate of the Reach, the...friendly air, there. And...She sends me letters, often, along with my brother Willas." She sent Sansa a long, knowing look. "Do you miss yours?"

Sansa stiffened. "I...I..."

Margaery leaned across the table and took both of Sansa’s hands in her own. "It's all right, Sansa, to miss them," she said, forcing Sansa to meet her eyes. "I know that Joffrey wants you to be perfect for him, as does the Queen Mother, but I don't ever want you to be perfect for me."

Sansa's lower lip wobbled. "I...I know that they were traitors and the worst sort of people, but..."

"They were still your family," Margaery finished, knowingly.

Sansa looked away. "I...I can't talk about this anymore."

Margaery smiled reassuringly. "Of course not. Would you like another candied rose?"

Sansa hesitated. "No, I don't think so."

Margaery nodded, but ate another herself.


	37. MARGAERY IX

Loras walked into Margaery's chambers, fully clothed in his Kingsguard uniform, and collapsed onto the divan beside her without speaking a word, his face falling into one of her crocheted pillows as he let out a groan of frustration, his feet hanging over the side.

"I've heard that you've been sparring with Joffrey," Margaery said, not without sympathy, setting aside her book to reach out and brush at the hair on his nape.

Loras groaned again, half-turning to face her. "Your little shit of a husband is a horrible sport, at everything, Marg."

She smirked. "So I've been told. He has always been gallant and honorable when teaching me hunting, however."

Loras wrinkled his nose. "Because he's putting on airs in front of you. If you weren't there, don't think for a moment he wouldn't break his crossbow on the back of some servant the moment he missed a target."

Margaery cocked her head, lips pursed into a thin line. "I hope that he has not been doing that with you?" she asked gently, rubbing at his neck and pulling off the white cloak.

Loras groaned into the touch, rolling his neck. "No. Doesn't want to make himself look bad in front of the brother of his queen, though. I've had to let myself lose every day that we've sparred since he started it. I no doubt look like a joke in front of the rest of the Kingsguard, by now."

Margaery tsked. "I'm sure that's not true, Loras. They've seen you fight in tourneys and other battles long before this. They know what you're doing now. You're not the only Kingsguard to make himself appear a fool in front of his king."

Loras snorted, sitting up then. "You're rather too good at that," he said, pulling his hair out from under her fingers. "I can see how you've managed to keep Joffrey under wraps these past few months a bit more easily, now."

Margaery shrugged. "Have some crackers, Brother, they'll do you good." She handed him the small tin sitting on the table in front of their sofa, and Loras dutifully took a bite, and then, glancing at her, another.

"What's in these?" he asked.

Margaery shrugged one shoulder, going back to her book and opening it up to the place where she had left off. "Grandmother had them made for me. Some sort of concoction with strawberry cake mixed into them. I haven't decided if I like them or not."

"Grandmother, eh?" Loras asked, but took another one in spite of this.

Margaery flipped to the next page of her book. "Why does Ser Osmund never spar with His Grace?"

Loras glanced up at her. "Ser Osmund? You're on first name basis with them now?"

"He's one of the many Kingsguard who watches out for me throughout the days, Brother dear, but I've noticed that he has never been asked to do so with the King when he wishes to spar."

Loras shrugged. "He's more fit for fists and fisticuffs, and the little shit may be stupid about some things, but he knows he wouldn't last for more than three seconds in such a fight."

Margaery nodded. "You shouldn't call him that." Loras muttered something unpleasant under his breath, but Margaery ploughed on. "So you admit that my lord husband has some skill at swords?"

Loras snorted. "I could admit that a pig had some skill with a blade if it were true in some extent, dear sister. In any event, if your husband wasn't such a bloody coward, he might, yes."

Margaery clucked her tongue. "My husband is the King, Loras. Be careful."

Loras stood to his feet, groaning a little as he did so. "I've been careful," he muttered, sounding almost petulant now. "I'm growing tired of it."

"What's our family's motto, Loras?" Margaery asked, sounding bored as her fingers reached for another cracker and her eyes skimmed the page of her book.

Loras grimaced. "Patience is a very good way of filling one's pockets," he offered helpfully, and Margaery glanced up at him, frowning and looking less than impressed.

He reached out and snatched the book from her fingers, tossing it onto the table and yanking Margaery to her feet. She yelped playfully, smacking at his arm.

"You have such an influence over your husband," he said suddenly, pulling her against him, "You could probably talk him into doing whatever you wanted."

Margaery tilted her head. "Probably," she murmured under her breath, and then giggled.

"Talk him into letting us go home to Highgarden for a little," Loras suggested, facial expression turning suddenly serious. "I could go as your honor guard and we could visit Garlan and Leonette. You could even bring Sansa."

Margaery raised an eyebrow. "What's brought this on?"

He groaned. "I think I shall die if I have to stay here another day, Sister."

She grabbed him suddenly, expression fierce. "Don't say things like that, Loras. They aren't funny. And, in any case, Joffrey would never agree to such a thing."

Loras pouted. "I thought you said that he would do anything you wanted."

"Within reasonable limits," Margaery said, leaning forward. "I have to be here to want them."

Loras sighed. "Don't you miss it?"

"You think I don't?" she asked, quietly. "I miss Highgarden so much. Everything about this place is just so...wrong. But my hold over Joffrey only exists for as long as I am here to keep it. If I mention leaving he will think that I am fleeing, and he will lose interest in me, or...he will change it to the interest he feels for Sansa Stark."

Loras grimaced. "Growing strong," he muttered rather resentfully, and Margaery nodded, fixing his hair.

"Growing strong," she repeated. "But you don't have to remain here forever. I'm sure that I could think of some way to get you to Highgarden for a little, if you so wanted."

"Are you japing, sister?" Loras demanded, turning on her, and Margaery bit back a smile. "I'd never leave you here. I suppose we will just have to brave King's Landing forever."

"Not forever," Margaery told him gently. "Some day, we won't have to brave it."


	38. MARGAERY X

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right, guys. Warnings for the chapter contain spoilers and so are at the bottom of the page, for those with triggers. Read at your own risk.

"You've a visitor, Your Grace," Elinor told her, and Margaery glanced up from where Alla and Megga were helping her apply her morning jewels, red, just like Joffrey enjoyed them. Like blood.

"Sansa?"

Elinor smirked. "No, Your Grace. Ser Osmund Kettleblack."

Margaery's brow furrowed, remembering the last time that she had encountered him. "That's strange. Isn't Loras already supposedly guarding me?" She knew her brother to be down the hall, engaged in carnal relations with that blonde whore who had so turned his head since arriving in King's Landing, but she had not thought that the Lord Commander would send her another guard, for surely he did not know of it.

Her brother was, after all, usually more discreet than that. The whore was very persistent.

"He said it was a private matter, Your Grace," Elinor said, with a little shrug. "I can send him away, if you like."

Margaery lifted a brow, intrigued. "No, no, send him in. Alla, Megga, perhaps some time alone? I do not know what this private matter is of, but I can guess."

The girls exchanged glances; Lady Reanna had not arrived to help her lady dress this morning, once again. One of the ladies had reported to Margaery that she had seemed ill this morning, unable to keep anything down.

"Of course, Your Grace," her ladies told her, though Elinor gave her a rather concerned look, before they turned and exited, and, moments later, Ser Osmund Kettleblack took their place.

"Your Grace," Ser Osmund dipped his head as Elinor shut the door behind him, "I would like to apologize for my unforgivable behavior the other day. I was wrong...to express such things toward you, for you are not a woman, but a queen."

Margaery stared at him in surprise. She had not expected an apology, after all. Much the opposite; she could sense Cersei's frustrations every time she rejected her knight, and she knew that Cersei's patience would not last much longer. She intended to be prepared for the event, as well.

"I confess, Ser Osmund, the matter had been almost entirely forgotten," she said gently. "But it is certainly forgiven, so long as it does not occur again."

He dipped his head. "Of course, Your Grace."

She turned away from him and back to her jewels, picking out another silver broach to go along with the red jewels, and that was when he struck.

A strong arm latched around her wrist, the other on her shoulder, spinning Margaery around and knocking the breath out of her. Her broach fell to the ground with a soft thud.

And then Ser Osmund kissed her, a hard, unyielding kiss that stank of alcohol and resolve and bitterness, and Margaery flailed against it, finally succeeding in pushing the man off of her. Her lips felt bruised from the contact, and she wiped his spit from her mouth with a grimace.

"Ser Osmund," Margaery said quietly, reaching up and taking hold of the hand sitting on her shoulder. "You are a fine knight and a good man, but I am beloved of my husband."

Ser Osmund sucked in a breath. "Your Grace-"

She attempted to pull away, but his hold on her did not loosen, not even with her words. His grip on her shoulder tightened minutely, instead. "Ser Osmund, please-"

"Surely you cannot love such a creature," he said quietly, staring at her intently. "Your husband is a monster, Your Grace."

She lifted her chin defiantly. "He is my husband."

"Your Grace..." Ser Osmund's eyes looked her up and down. "I..."

"Unhand me, Ser Osmund," Margaery said, her voice steely, but Ser Osmund did not listen to the words, instead backed her against the wall of her bedchambers, across the room from her bed, arms on either side of her, effectively locking her in place. She swallowed, feeling suddenly claustrophobic as the walls of the room seemed to close in around her, as his great arms actually did so.

She thought of Elia Martell, facing down a creature even greater than this one in a room not very far away from this one, and struggled against the hold, attempted to slip out from underneath his bracing arms.

He grabbed her left arm, twisting it savagely to stop the attempt, and Margaery let out a whimper as she heard it pop ominously.

"Ser Osmund!"

His hands reached out then, one to wrap around her waist and pull against him, before pinning both of her hands together, the other to wrap around the back of her pale, thin neck. Margaery froze.

Ser Osmund peppered kisses along the nape of her neck, whispering all the while, "You are most beautiful, Your Grace, I could not resist myself. I have...dreamt of doing this to you, since the moment I first laid eyes on you in the audience chamber of the Red Keep, when you were promised to King Joffrey. I want..."

Margaery began to struggle against him then in earnest, for she knew what was to come, knew that a soiled wife of the King was worth nothing to anyone.

"If you do not unhand me, Ser Osmund..."

"I bet that I could make it better for you than that little fool Joffrey," Ser Osmund whispered against her skin, and the words sent shivers down her spine. His kisses felt like they were leaving stains on her skin. "I'll make it good for you, as well. Better than he does, no doubt."

She shook her head, struggled against his grip, to no avail. "Ser Osmund, let me go. Whatever she has promised you, whatever she has threatened you with – I can protect you. I am the Queen."

His hand around her neck squeezed lightly, and Margaery froze.

"I am sorry, Your Grace," she thought she heard him whisper against her vulnerable throat, but it might have just been a trick of the wind caused by Ser Osmund throwing her down onto her own bed with a loud thump, his hands roving her body as he began to strip himself of the heavy armor of the Kingsguard, his white cloak falling to the ground about his feet.

Oddly fitting, that.

Margaery attempted to scream once she recovered her breath from being thrown onto her back, the sound coming out a startled cry, and her throat had never failed her so badly in her life. She flailed, attempted to roll onto her side, to get her elbows under her, but he pushed her down, the palm of his hand splaying out over her chest and keeping her there, even as she fought against it.

"Ser-"

He slapped her, hard, and Margaery's head swung back against the sheets. She let out a strangled whimper as the knight climbed atop her, closed her eyes and turned her head away before he pulled it back and forced their lips together in a mockery of a kiss. The hand not on her chest reached out and grabbed her by the wrists, pulling them above her head and holding them there.

His breath tasted of garlic, and Margaery gagged.

While his mouth opened and his tongue forced its way between her teeth, she could hear him working at the drawstrings of his trousers, felt them fall around his knees and her waist.

She bit his tongue, and he groaned, pulling away from her, if only a little. But then she could feel his hand, the one not holding her wrists, pull her gown up around her waist and yank down her smallclothes, could hear the sound of them ripping a little with the movements.

Margaery bucked against him, whimpering, and Ser Osmund let his legs fall on either side of her petite waist, keeping her still as his fingers jammed inside of her mercilessly and worked her open like a whore after a bloody battle. Margaery gasped in pain, squeezed her eyes shut.

She was a Queen of Westeros, not a whore at the end of a battle. Ser Osmund had not seen a battle since Blackwater Bay. She may have been forced to allow him this chance to defile her, but she would not allow him to take her pride, as well. Would not allow him to take her crown.

And Margaery fought, thought of the crossbow standing on its end in the corner of her room, thought that if only she could grab it, she could...she could...

What, exactly? Margaery Tyrell had never killed someone before. She did not even know if, had she been holding the crossbow when Ser Osmund walked in, she would have been able to pull the release.

She had not reported him to her husband or her brother the first time Ser Osmund approached her, though she knew his intent. Had said nothing because, despite that he was an agent of Cersei's, she had not wanted him to be killed for that very reason.

And her kindness had fucked her. Was about to, just now.

"Please stop this..." she rasped, beginning to see stars at the corner of her vision. She wondered if his purpose was to rape her or strangle her to death.

"Be quiet, Your Grace," she heard Ser Osmund say above her, pressing his lips to her chin, her delicate throat. She wondered what Cersei had said to convince him to do this, if she had threatened him or he had relished the opportunity to see what his queen's cunt tasted like.

His hands moved down to her breasts, cupping them through her gown, and then he was ripping the front of her gown open. He took a dusky nipple into his lips, his ear scraping against her cheek as his hand continued to open her up for him, and she wondered that he even bothered to take the time to prepare her, but she was rather more horrified in the knowledge that her cunt was growing wet beneath his ministrations.

Perhaps he thought it would assuage his guilt, to trick himself into believing that she wanted this more than he did.

It was one thing for her to become wet for Joffrey. It was quite another for it to betray her to Cersei's puppet.

Margaery pressed herself firmly into the blankets of her bed, and wished for it to end soon. She did not trust her shaking hands enough to make another attempt to push him off her, knew that she would only be met with her own weakness, in the moment.

Her hands were shaking so badly that she wasn't sure if the tremors racking her were from herself or Ser Osmund, who, above her, looked just as discomfited as she felt.

And yet, she could not bring herself to pity him.

She knew that she had ruined herself, by not speaking earlier, when she'd had the chance. A ruined queen was no use at all, especially one who had failed even to give her husband a child first.

Cersei had, of course, known that.

Ser Osmund's hard length pressed into her thigh, then further, _gods_ , he was hard, and Margaery bit down on his ear as hard as she could manage, in their awkward position.

Ser Osmund let out a scream of pain and attempted to pull away, but Margaery did not dare open her mouth, did not dare let go as her teeth bit into the tender flesh of his ear, as his blood flooded into her mouth, thick and warm.

It tasted like copper, like her brother Loras had once told her when he downed a knight during a tourney by nearly biting off his finger.

"Your Grace!" a voice that sounded rather like Elinor's was screaming, and then someone was pulling Osmund off of her, and she barely recognized her brother's snarling face as he shoved the flat of his sword against Ser Osmund's chest, screaming at him as spittle flew from his mouth.

Margaery screamed as well, and then wilted in relief as she felt Ser Osmund’s body pulled away from her own.

Elinor was at her side a moment later, helping her to sit up and running her fingers nervously through Margaery's hair, asking over and over again in a whispered voice if she was well, and Margaery thought the other girl might be crying.

Ser Osmund's ear was sitting in a mess on the sheets in front of her, and Margaery stared at it, her eyes somewhat unfocused, and wondered if that was what he'd wanted, to not be able to hear her while he violated her.

That thought startled a laugh out of her, and she saw Loras and Elinor glance at her in concern. Margaery reached up, but her face was almost painfully dry.

Her hands were still shaking so badly that she almost poked her own eye out, and Elinor moved forward, took Margaery's hands in hers. Margaery took a shuddering breath.

"I'm all right," she assured them both, and then turned hard eyes on Ser Osmund. "He...He did not quite manage it."

If anything, the words only seemed to make her brother angrier, and he shoved Ser Osmund against the wall, yelling something at him that Margaery could not understand, despite that she was sitting right there, and should have been.

Elinor rubbed her back comfortingly.

Eventually, Loras' shouting words began to make sense to her, and she shivered, having never seen her brother so livid. Elinor wrapped her arms around Margaery comfortingly, and Margaery leaned into the touch, as much as she allowed herself to.

"How dare you lay hands on the Queen, you filthy excuse for a knight!" her brother was shouting at Ser Osmund. "It was your duty to protect her!"

Ser Osmund glanced from Loras to her, and then back again, licking his lips rather nervously.

Margaery saw that his trousers were no longer tented with the evidence of his arousal, and felt a small bit of relief at that, and then pity.

His ear was still gushing blood.

Margaery had done that. She paled, looked away. "Loras."

Her brother glanced back at her, and she didn't think she had ever seen such anger in his eyes, not when Renly had died, not when he had learned that their family planned to marry her to the little beast his lover had told him ample information about.

"He must face the King's Justice, not yours," she said, as gently as she could manage in the wake of that storm, and she could see the indecision in her brother's eyes. Could see how much he wished to kill his fellow Kingsguard.

But it was true. If Elinor had heard a scuffle, if Loras had in the middle of relations with his whore, then no doubt others had as well, and it would take only one testimony for Cersei to bring her down, to damn her with such evidence to her king, no matter how well she controlled Joffrey.

So Margaery had to act first.

"Are you all right?"

"Loras, I'm fine," she said gently, affecting a shaky smile even as she realized that it likely looked more like a grimace.

"He did not...?"

"No," Margaery assured her brother. "He did not."

Finally, Loras lowered his gaze, giving Ser Osmund a shove towards the door without another word.

As Loras dragged Ser Osmund away, Elinor turned to her. "Your Grace-"

"I'm fine," she said, gently pushing the other girl's hands away. She thought the lie might have been easier for them to swallow if her hands weren't still shaking, and clasped them together, shoving them into her lap.

"Margaery," Elinor said gently. "You've been through a horrible ordeal. It's all right to feel not in control, for once."

"Rip a part of my dress," Margaery said then, lifting her chin in defiance of the words, rather than her friend, and Elinor blinked at her.

"Margaery?"

"Do it, Elinor, please. Down the front."

The dress was already ripped somewhat, of course, and disheveled, but not enough. Not as much as Margaery would need it to be.

Her husband was hardly a man moved with sympathy, after all. No, the only thing that moved Joffrey was violence.

Elinor blinked at her once more, but she was used to the machinations of her lady by now, and Margaery could see her mind working even as she moved forward and ripped Margaery's gown down the front, leaving just enough to preserve her modesty and little else.

And, when it was done, Elinor sighed, pulling back.

"You should clean that," she said, gesturing to Margaery's chin, and Margaery reached up, surprised; her hand came away bloody. Elinor reached for it with the hem of her gown, intent on wiping it away.

"Leave it," Margaery told her, and Elinor blinked at her. "Joffrey will like it."

Elinor's eyes widened. "Margaery-"

"I should go to him now. If I leave open too much time, Cersei will..."

"Are you all right?" Elinor interrupted her patiently, eyes filled with concern. "Really."

Margaery lifted her chin. "I am a Tyrell, Elinor, as are you. We grow strong no matter our circumstances. Help me to the throne room, would you? I...I'm not sure that I will be able to walk the whole way, on my own."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Semi-Graphic Depiction of Rape, Violence


	39. MARGAERY XI

"My lady," Joffrey murmured as Margaery swept into the throne room, the purple bruises on her face and arm having already begun to bloom. She had told Loras that it would be better this way, to wait until there was evidence of Ser Osmund's mistreatment of her before going to Joffrey. "What has happened to you?"

He sounded almost concerned.

She had not known, not truly, how he was going to react. Had not known if Cersei had one anyway, and she ought to have let Ser Osmund finish the deed, if House Tyrell would find itself returning to Highgarden this night, until this very moment.

She knew now, though, that she could still spin this to her favor. Because her husband, horrific fiend though he was, seemed concerned for her.

Cersei, from where she sat next to her son, stood abruptly, eyes roving over Margaery's form with a look that could almost be alarm before she quickly schooled her expression.

Margaery allowed her lower lip to wobble and her hands to shake, as much weakness as she would allow herself to show before Joffrey, not meeting her husband's eyes as she twisted her fingers in the hem of her torn gown. "Your Grace..."

"What has happened?" Joffrey turned and demanded of Ser Loras, from where he stood seething beside his sister.

"This disgusting cur attempted to force himself on my sister," Loras cried out, for the whole of the court to hear as he pointed back toward Ser Osmund, held now between Ser Jaime Lannister and Ser Meryn. The side of his head was coated in blood from where Margaery had bitten him, so much blood, dripping down onto his white cloak and spilling onto the floor.

"He would have managed it as well, for he was set to guard her for the day, had she not managed to stop him."

"Loras," Margaery said quietly, subdued, her voice scratchy from where Ser Osmund had' had his hands around her throat, "I hardly managed that. I only screamed."

"She bit him, Your Grace," Loras went on, heedless of her words, and she wondered if anyone else noticed how rehearsed his words seemed. Cersei was too pale to have noticed. "I would not have found him in time, had she not managed to stop him herself."

Joffrey blinked in surprise, turning to his lady wife. "Is this true, Margaery? That you...bit Ser Osmund, and he did not succeed in his...attempt on you? He didn't...touch you?"

Margaery swallowed, lifted her chin. The blood that had gushed down her chin and throat when she had bitten his ear was still visible there, dried as it was. As were the bruises. "I would sooner have let him kill than touch me, my love."

"Bring him here!" Joffrey screeched the moment she had closed her mouth once more. "How dare a member of the Kingsguard, a position given to them of honor by their king, lay a hand on my wife? Presume to...to fuck the wife of the King, as if she were a common whore and not a queen? Bring him!"

Ser Jaime and Ser Meryn dragged ser Osmund forward, throwing him before the Iron Throne without pause.

Ser Osmund fell to his knees at once, staring up at Joffrey in supplication. "Your Grace..."

"Quiet, you," Joffrey snapped at him. "We're having a trial here."

There were titters of laughter from those assembled at the court, but they were more subdued than usual, eyes flitting from Joffrey to Ser Osmund to where Margaery still stood not far away from him, in her ripped and bloodied clothes.

Joffrey reached out a hand, and, after hesitating only a moment, Margaery stepped around Ser Osmund and walked to him, taking it. He brought her fingers to his lips and kissed them.

For a moment, she thought that he was going to suck on them, there in front of the whole court, but he merely asked, "How would you like him to die, my lady?"

Margaery forced her lips to quirk into that of a smile, even as she felt her insides roil. "I do understand that treason is usually punished in a specific manner." She paused, raised her eyes beneath her eyelashes to her husband. "Bring me his head, my love."

She understood that there were other, worse punishments for rapists that she could have chosen from, ones that her sick husband would have enjoyed far more, but even now, Margaery could not bring herself to suggest one of them.

It was different, when she was watching her husband carry out such sentences. It was different, watching rather than actively participating.

There was no reason to feel guilt, when one merely watched.

Joffrey grinned, turning to Ser Illyn Payne. "You heard my lady," he ordered the man. "I want it done here, in the throne room. My lady must be tired, after her ordeal. Make it quick, though the bastard hardly deserves that."

Ser Illyn Payne needed no more encouragement than that. He turned as if to leave the room, no doubt in search of his ax, when Jaime Lannister held out his sword, handle out, his expression grim. Ser Illyn stepped forward, grasping it in both hands.

Ser Osmund bowed his head toward the ground, not even struggling against the holds of the two Kingsguard grasping him.

Margaery wondered if he regretted what he had done. If he hadn't enjoyed it.

"Isn't there anything you'd like to say, _Ser_ Osmund, before you die?" Joffrey asked gleefully, Margaery momentarily forgotten in lieu of his lust for another's blood. He stepped forward, rubbing his hands together like an excited child.

Ser Osmund swallowed hard. "No, Your Grace."

Out of the corner of her eye, Margaery saw Cersei smile, before the expression vanished completely and she effected a frown.

Joffrey was frowning, as well, though his was far more heartfelt. "Well then, I suppose there's nothing else to be said." He glared at Ser Payne. "Take his balls, too. He won’t be needing them. Well?"

And, with two swings of Ser Jaime Lannister's Valyrian blade, Ser Osmund Kettleblack was dead. His head fell to the floor of the throne room with a dull thud, blood staining his Kingsguard cloak and the wooden tiles.

Joffrey had been right. His death was far too quick, even if, in her heart, Margaery knew that he was not the one she should seek justice from.

She swallowed hard, and rubbed at her throat, and wondered if it wouldn't have been better to wait, for her image in the eyes of the Court, of the people. For her own sanity.

"Bring it here," Joffrey ordered, and Margaery rubbed her lips together as the executioner brought Ser Osmund's dripping head, the man's eyes squeezed shut and face stuck in an expression of terror, to his king.

She grimaced at the smell, as it got closer.

"For you, my queen," Joffrey told Margaery, grinning. "Does it satisfy you?"

In answer, Margaery reached out with both hands and took the dripping head from Ser Illyn. Joffrey's grin faltered for only a moment, and then widened further still.

The gap on the side of Ser Osmund's head where his ear was missing stared back at her accusingly, as his eyes remained stubbornly shut.

"I shall treasure it more than I did Ser Osmund while he lived," she told Joffrey blithely, and Joffrey's loud laughter echoed through the hall for far too long. Some of the other courtiers began to laugh along with their king as well.

Margaery noticed that Cersei was not among them, not this time.

"Ahem," Grandmaester Pycelle coughed once the laughter had died down, and he had been given a particularly stern look from Cersei. He stepped forward, giving the king and queen a little bow.

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "What is it now, Grandmaester? Do you require the head to purify it before it can be staked on the city walls?"

"Unfortunately, I am afraid that now I must ask that the Queen be examined," the Grandmaester said in his halting, dottery tones. "It is the protocol, in such a situation."

"If my queen says that the fool did not succeed, then I believe her," Joffrey said coldly. "Are you questioning me?"

"Of...Of course not, Your Grace," the Grandmaester said with surprising smoothness, before glancing once more at Cersei. Her lips were pressed together into a thin line, and he continued, "Only-"

"Only what?" Joffrey interrupted him, sneering now. "Only my queen?"

Grandmaester Pycelle swallowed, glancing at Margaery. "Your Grace...Surely, you can understand the...unique position that this puts the Crown in, especially should the Queen have a child in recent months-"

"My. Queen. Has. Not. Been. Touched!" Joffrey screeched, reaching out and pulling Margaery against him. She stumbled forward, fell against his touch. "Any man who questions that can join Ser Osmund in his punishment for defiling her!"

Silence met his words.

And then Margaery stepped forward, placing a hand on his arm. "I don't mind, my love. I have nothing to hide. If the Grandmaester and the people would be contented only with such an examination, then I will gladly-"

"I said that you wouldn't, and you won't," Joffrey snapped at her, and Margaery bit her lip before nodding silently. "Unless the Grandmaester believes that he is above his king."

The Grandmaester simply scraped and bowed and murmured his excuses, and didn't once look at a now glowering Cersei.

"Now, m'lady," Joffrey made an about turn, grinning down at her, "I'm rather hungry. What about you?"

She smiled; it was more of a grimace, but she had noticed that Joffrey did not seem to understand the difference between the two. "I think that I should change first, my love."

He blinked at her for a moment, and then laughed. "Of course. I suppose you should go and clean yourself up."

Margaery smiled, despite the pain in her throat, and stepped on her tip toes, kissing his cheek.

"Thank you, my love."

He flushed a little. It was almost endearing. "Anything for my lady."


	40. SANSA XXIX

The news of what had happened in the throne room did not reach Sansa until late the next day, when she overheard two servants speaking about it in rather low, excited terms outside her door, having woken up, for once, long after her lord husband.

He had not approached the topic of their consummating their marriage since Shae had made it rather clear what she thought of such things, and Sansa could not be more happy to have the serving woman as her friend, even if Shae could be overbearing at times.

He had been rather kind to her last night, all things considered, almost too kind, and it had set Sansa on edge, worried that he knew something she did not.

He had been too kind to her when the news of her family's deaths had reached King's Landing.

But that did not mean that Sansa thought for a moment that her lord husband would wait forever, and if she had spent most of the night tossing and turning and thus caused herself to sleep far later than he, it hardly mattered.

"They say it happened in the Maidenvault, and that now the Queen will not go into her private chambers again," one of the servants outside Sansa's door was whispering to the other when she opened it. "The King is enraged."

Sansa paused, glancing at the servants, glad that they had not noticed her yet.

"They say the Queen ordered his death immediately because she didn't want the King to know that she had already been ruined," the other servant whispered loudly. "And now she is nervous that there will be a child."

"Nonsense," the other said. "Did you not see the blood on her? The Knight of Flowers said that she had bitten his ear off, and we could all see it. That woman may be a whore, but she would not allow her honor to be so obviously impugned where the King would have witness of it."

Sansa cleared her throat loudly, and the two servants fell silent, looking up with wide eyes.

"Back to work," she snapped at them, and was pleasantly surprised when they moved away and actually returned to their work, for precious few of the servants of King's Landing obeyed Sansa so easily.

Perhaps they had heard the fierceness in her voice, the slight growl that she had not actually tried for, the panic bubbling up somewhere deep inside of her as she put together the pieces of what the servants had been gossiping about.

Margaery had been attacked. Margaery had been raped by someone who's ear she had bitten off.

Sansa did not even realize she was running until she found herself almost in the Maidenvault, where dozens of servants were carrying Margaery's things out of her room, tables and chairs and the wardrobe she so adored and her vanity.

Sansa paused, brought up short with surprise, and then she saw Elinor Tyrell, carrying some of Margaery's favorite gowns draped over her arm.

"Lady Sansa," Elinor said, blinking in surprise. "Are you here to see Margaery?"

Sansa swallowed hard. "I heard...I heard what happened. How is she?"

Elinor shrugged, her eyes growing soft and sorrowful. "She is very strong, our queen. If you're looking for her, she should be almost done at the targeting range. His Grace took her there some hours ago."

Sansa nodded her thanks, suddenly worried. She wanted to know, of course, how Margaery was, wanted to see her with her own eyes after what she had heard, but she did not want to be forced to face Joffrey.

After a moment's indecision, Sansa found her way to the targeting range.

She was just in time, it seemed, for Margaery was handing off a bow that even Sansa could admit was beautiful to a squire, and kissing Joffrey's cheek, a dazzling smile on her face.

Sansa did not know how she could manage one.

"Sansa!" Joffrey called, seeing her suddenly, a wicked grin on his face. "My lady and I were just finishing shooting, but we could always go back to it. Would you like to be the new target for us?"

Sansa paled, glancing at Margaery in panic.

Margaery just smiled, slipping her hand into Joffrey's. "I am rather tired, my love. Perhaps another time. Though it was kind of you to teach me some more."

Joffrey glanced at her, and, to Sansa's surprise, his eyes seemed to soften. She wondered what her hold was on him that he would feel so greatly for her even after the scandal of her having been raped, would not set her aside when he had the right to, did not torment her for it.

Sansa knew that, had she been in Margaery's place, Joffrey would no doubt be taunting her about it, asking her why she was so weak, as, indeed, he already did, believing as he did that Tyrion raped her every night.

"Of course," he said, bobbing his head like a small child. Then, "I'll leave you then, my lady." He kissed her fingers, and then turned with his retinue of Kingsguard and servants and left the two of them alone on the archery field.

"Sansa," Margaery said with a smile. "I suppose you came looking for me in the Maidenvault. I'll be spending my nights more permanently in Joffrey's chambers now, I'm afraid, though I'm sure we can still find time to-"

"Are you all right?" Sansa blurted out, and Margaery blinked at her. "Only, I heard what happened yesterday, that someone-"

"I'll survive," Margaery said, and if her tone was rather short, Sansa certainly didn't blame her for it. "It was a horrible experience, but it's over now, and Joffrey is teaching me how to defend myself with a bow better in the future, should it happen again."

"Did you have time to grab a bow and set it before he attacked you?" Sansa blurted out, and then paled at the same time that Margaery's smile fell. "I'm sorry. I..."

The truth was, her mind had been rather too often on rape these days, what with the threat of her husband looming over her.

And she knew, from her deeply imagined fears, that she herself would likely not have time to reach for such a weapon, if Joffrey came for her in the night.

"It's all right," Margaery said gently, starting to walk back toward the Red Keep, and Sansa followed her dutifully, the two Kingsguard behind her. "My brother Loras has taught me such skills as would cause me better help in such a situation since I was a little girl."

Sansa blinked at that, somewhat surprised. Her mother had always forbade her learning such things from her brothers, and Sansa had never really had any interest in it at the time either, for it was certainly not a ladylike thing to learn.

Margaery smiled at the surprise on her face. "Not that it helped me overmuch, but he was always concerned."

"That's not what I heard," Sansa said quietly. "I heard that you managed to...mutilate him."

"Yes," Margaery agreed, somehow serene despite the subject matter. "I was rather desperate, at that time." And, at the bemused look on Sansa's face, "He did not succeed in...what he set out to do. I and Loras saw to that."

Sansa swallowed. "I...I'm glad," she whispered out hoarsely, and resisted her sudden urge to rush forward and throw her arms around the other girl. For some reason, she felt that it would not be appreciated. "But are you...?"

"Osmund Kettleblack is no longer considered a member of the Kingsguard," Margaery said calmly, and Sansa blanched at the knowledge that Margaery's attacker had been one of the Kingsguard, glancing behind her nervously. Ser Loras gave her a rather cool smile. "His name has been stripped from all works, and my husband had his body chopped into pieces and given them to the dogs to eat. He will be forgotten within the months to come, while my name will remain forever. I don't see why I should be upset. It is over now."

Sansa stared at her, wondered if those words belonged to Margaery Tyrell, or to the creature that she had to become to survive at Court.

It hurt, though she knew it shouldn't, to think that Margaery felt the need to don that creature for Sansa.

"Margaery..."

Margaery shook her head, giving Sansa a smile that she knew was fake. "I think it's better not to talk about it," she told the other girl. "I no longer sleep in the Maidenvault, and no one dares to say his name around me. Soon, it will pass from all memory."

Sansa nodded sympathetically. "Is there anything I can do for you?" she asked, hating the way that her voice cracked as she said the words, and, even as she said them, wondering what she could do. She was just Sansa Stark, incapable of even leaving the city without Margaery.

Margaery didn't meet her eyes. "Just...tell me about Winterfell," she said quietly, rubbing the pads of her fingers together in what Sansa guessed was a nervous gesture.

"About Winterfell?" Sansa asked, in some surprise.

Margaery nodded. "Only if it isn't too painful for you, of course." She shook her head. "Actually, you don't have to say anything, but..."

Sansa had the strange feeling that she would gladly jump from the parapets of the wall surrounding the city if Margaery had asked it of her, in that moment.

"I..." she swallowed. "It's funny, the sort of things you miss about some place you've not been to in a while. I...I think about the lemon cakes there. They were my favorite, you know." Margaery lifted a brow at that, though Sansa couldn't imagine why, but let her continue. "There's something about the ones in the South...they're sweeter, softer, while the ones in the North are tart. I didn't use to like them as much, but now..." she shrugged. "I miss them."

She didn't know if her words were even helping Margaery, why she was talking about lemon cakes, of all things, but Margaery nodded for her to continue.

Her voice a little shaky, Sansa did so.


	41. MARGAERY XII

"My dear," Cersei said, sweeping into Joffrey’s rooms as though she owned them, holding a cup that stank horribly, "I hope that you have recovered from your horrible ordeal? I had not thought that perhaps I should not give you the...remedy, until you are certain that any danger has passed? I have it here with me, of course, but..."

Margaery had moved into Joffrey’s chambers completely, after the Ordeal, as it was now being called by those who did not wish to incur Joffrey’s wrath. There would be no more privacy, and there was precious little time with Sansa now, for the girl found every excuse not to go to Joffrey’s chambers, and Margaery did not blame her, but she could not stand the sight of the Maidenvault any longer, and Joffrey certainly did not seem to mind the change.

For one who was infamous for his temper, her husband’s rage certainly ran out quickly, once it was incurred. Unless one had the name of Sansa Stark. She doubted he would understand why intimate relations were slightly less appealing to her now, even if Margaery had attempted to explain it, or hinted at such, at any point.

And so, she’d had to leave the room.

His chambers were no less opulent than her own, and the change had not been a difficult one, however.

Even if it meant that Cersei found even more chances to spend time near her, now.

Margaery bit her lip. "The...ordeal certainly shook me, but Ser Osmund did not...I mean, merely that there was no chance for him to..."

"Ah," Cersei said, and looked almost disappointed, and Margaery had her answer. "Then perhaps it is a good thing that I brought it." She opened the lid of the strange bottle in her hands, and held it out to Margaery.

Margaery took the cup from Cersei with a smile. "And...what did the Grandmaester say was in these remedies, Goodmother?"

Cersei appeared to be biting the inside of her cheek. "Herbs, my dear, and several potions. Truthfully, I didn't pay much attention at the time. I was rather desperate for a child."

Margaery nodded, tilting the cup that she might take a sip of the substance, before frowning and swirling at it with her fingers, instead. "It was most kind of you to go to the trouble, Goodmother. I do not know what I would have done without your advice and knowledge, these last few days. You must have learned so much during your time as queen."

Cersei's smile was brittle. "Indeed."

"And as a mother," Margaery went on, undeterred by the woman's stony answers and face. "I...confess, that I am rather worried, in that regard. My lady mother has only ever instructed me on the wonders of being a mother, and my grandmother hardly remembers such a time. I...I have heard," she went on, carefully, "That the birthing can be...painful."

She glanced up at Cersei with just the appropriate amount of worry in her eyes.

Cersei, to her surprise, gave her a smile that looked as though it was almost meant to be reassuring. "It can be," she admitted.

Margaery worried her lower lip. "I wish to please my husband, of course, but I confess that I am rather worried over the pain." She glanced down at the cup in her hands.

Cersei nodded. "I remember the day I gave birth to Joffrey. There was so much blood, everywhere, and I was sick at the sight of it. I had never really been taught of these things, you understand. They don't wish to let unwed ladies know of the trials of childbirth, lest they refuse their husbands when they are married."

Margaery's smile was slightly strained.

"And it was the worst pain that I had ever felt in my life," Cersei went on, a far off look in her eyes. "I felt as though my body was being ripped open with the blunt edge of a knife. I was terrified that I was going to die, and begged for my ladies to pray to the Seven. But then," and Margaery saw that the wistful smile on Cersei's face was perhaps the closest thing to a true smile she had ever seen on the woman. "Then I held my baby boy in my arms, so beautiful and perfect and covered in my blood, and it was worth it."

She glanced up at Margaery. "That will be you, one day, my dear. Children are a mother's only comfort, in this cruel world."

Margaery swallowed hard, opened her mouth to speak, but then Cersei cleared her throat.

"I shall leave you to it," she said, nodding to the cup. "Make sure to drink it all, or it will not have the desired effects."

A shade fell behind Margaery's eyes. "Of course, Goodmother. And again, it was so kind of you to help me in this. I only hope that my children will bring me half the joy yours bring you."

She wondered if Joffrey still brought Cersei any joy at all.

Cersei’s smile was brittle. “I am sure that they will, my dear. We mothers cannot help but love our children from the moment they come out of the womb no matter what they do. Enjoy the drink. I hope it brings you what we seek.”

The door swung quietly shut behind her.

Margaery turned, and poured the concoction into the plant at her window, turning back just in time when Lady Reanna entered the room behind her.

“Your Grace,” she curtseyed, eying the cup in Margaery’s hands.

Margaery sent her a dazzling smile. “Lady Reanna. You’re on time, today. Almost early, even.”

Lady Reanna dipped her head. “I would like to apologize for my actions lately, Your Grace. I have been...distracted by the pleasures of Court life. It will not happen again, I assure you.”

Margaery smiled at her. Ser Osmund was dead, of course, so there was no reason for it to happen again. “Wonderful. I’m glad. Come and help me with this broach my lord husband gave me, would you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter could jut as easily have been called, "Also Known As The Chapter Where I Sort of Kind Of Attempt to Humanize Cersei Lannister But Not Really" but I decided against it. You're welcome.


	42. LORAS I

There were things that Loras Tyrell did not need to know. He didn’t need to know, for example, in intimate detail, what his sister and her new husband did with their night hours, nor did he need to know what her husband thought of his sister in intimate detail.

There had been talk, Margaery had told him after the fact, of being rid of Joffrey before the conjugal act, though nothing had come of it when House Tyrell learned that doing so would mean aligning themselves with Littlefinger, and it had been apparently decided by his family that Loras did not need to know of this, either.

The only reason he did know was because Margaery worried that one day he might drive his sword through the little freak’s back and become another Kingslayer, and she wanted him to know that there were previsions in place.

Loras did not even know if that was the truth, or merely his sister attempting to placate him, every time he was forced to watch Joffrey squeeze her wrists a little too tightly or listen to the noises he elicited from her at night, standing as he did always by their door.

He understood why his family had chosen not to tell him about the thoughts of getting rid of Joffrey, knew that he was hotheaded, after the debacle with the Stark girl. That loose lips were dangerous things, and that Margaery’s safety came above his worry over her safety.

But he wished that he would tell her about how she was feeling, after what that cur had attempted to do to her. From what he could hear of their nights together, almost every night, he knew that Joffrey never forced her, that in fact, Margaery took the initiative most nights, much as it made him sick.

Margaery had nearly been raped, and while most of the kingdom was concerned about whether she might grow pregnant with a rapist's child rather than the King's, Loras was merely concerned with his sister.

She had grown even more standoffish lately, telling him nothing of her true feelings and treating him as he felt she treated everyone who wasn't their family, with a veneer of herself that he could not see past.

He had apologized to her, for not being there when she needed him most, and Margaery had brushed this off as an idle concern.

He hated it, even as he knew that she did not have the privilege of being able to speak freely about anything, and especially about what had happened to her, if she wanted everyone to forget about it quickly, as she seemed intent on.

The knowledge that he had been fucking Olyvar in another room when he should have been protecting her, as was his duty, while his sister had nearly been raped left a burden on Loras' shoulders that he was not sure he would ever fulfill.

Margaery had assured that it wasn't his fault, but she was hardly speaking to him now, spending most of her time with Elinor or the Stark girl, and he was afraid that he'd lost her.

She was with Joffrey now, Joffrey and several of her ladies and half a dozen Kingsguard, including Jaime Lannister who, even if Loras did not particularly like, was more than capable of protecting his sister’s honor and gaining his respect.

She was safe, for now.

He wondered if his life was doomed to be one of disappointment, for himself and for everyone around him.

The knowledge that his loose lips had sunken a marriage of considerable use to his family did not bother Loras as much as it should have, however. He had spent little enough time with the Stark girl, but he did not judge her as the sort who would be happy trading one prison for another.

And while her treatment would be kinder in Highgarden, and her husband kinder in Willas than the Imp, Loras did not think it would be a happy experience for the girl who looked at him and saw a knight out of a song. And he did not think his brother would enjoy attempting to make the girl happy for the rest of his life, and ultimately failing. Willas deserved better than that.

Knights out of songs did not return to that which had damned them, as Loras had, not long after the marriage arrangement had been foiled, and yet, here he was, because he was hardly the sort of knight worthy of the songs. Because even after what had happened to his sister, he couldn't get the blond whore out of his head.

“Ser Loras,” one of Littlefinger’s whores, whom he did not recognize, smirked at him in greeting after opening the door to one of Littlefinger’s most popular pleasure houses. “Something I could do for you?”

Luscious blonde hair fell around naked shoulders, and for once, Loras was relieved that Margaery had managed to sway her husband into making him one of the Kingsguard, lest he would have had to marry someone like the Stark girl for the good of his family name.

His sister knew him better than he knew himself, sometimes.

Loras shook his head. “The whore Olyvar. Is he here?”

The girl pouted, drawing away and tossing her hair over her shoulders. “He’s in the back, m’lord. Filling out papers for Littlefinger. He’ll likely be some time.”

Loras nodded. “I know the way.”

She smirked at him, and did not object as he swept past her and into the corridor.

Loras largely ignored the whores milling about the whorehouse, trying to get his attention; as far as he knew, Olyvar was one of the only male whores in King's Landing worthy of mentioning amongst those few lords who dared to use him; he was also the best, and Loras had no interest in any other.

Olyvar had blonde hair and blue eyes, was lithe and small and aggressive in his desires, and Loras wanted no other.

When he reached the office that he knew from experience Littlefinger usually occupied, Loras propped it open, glancing inside without announcing his presence.

Olyvar was sitting at the desk, calmly writing away, and did not glance up when Loras entered the room, did not even seem to notice his entrance, though Loras knew differently; whores always noticed everything around them. Observation might gain them extra payment, or their lives.

Whichever was more valuable to them.

Loras was not yet sure which was more valuable to Olyvar, though he had an idea.

"Are you going to stand there in the doorway all day, my lord?" Olyvar asked coyly from where he sat continuing to write, glancing up under his lashes at Loras.

Loras grinned, stepping inside and closing the door behind him. "That depends. Are you going to continue slaving away all day?"

Olyvar grinned, standing to his feet and setting aside the quill. "That depends, my lord, on what sort of slaving you have in mind."

Loras grinned, leaning forward and whispering something in Olyvar's ear that had the whore squirming under his touch when Loras went back to kissing him, licking the shell of his ear causing Olyvar to gasp in want.

“My lord,” Olyvar managed to murmur out, as Loras kissed his way down the other man’s neck. “What’s brought this on? I thought we’d agreed to meet in your chambers. You’d open a secret door for me? I love secret doors.”

Loras felt a pang of guilt as he remembered his promise to Margaery, to be more discreet, for her sake, for his sake. But he quickly the swept the feeling away, because he was here now, anyway, and he’d barely been able to constrain himself to his stockings up until this point, never mind up until the end of the week.

“Are you busy now?” Loras asked, sucking at Olyvar’s lithe neck.

Olyvar shuddered. “Not for the rest of the day, my lord, except these papers.”

“Come back to my rooms with me, in the Keep,” Loras said, pulling back a little. “I need you.”

Olyvar swallowed. “My lord-“

“Come with me,” Loras repeated.

Olyvar sighed, and Loras hid a grin as the younger man reached for his coat. “Very well, my lord, but I expect you to make it worth my while.”

This time, as he reached around and grabbed Olyvar by the waist with a smirk, he murmured, “Oh, I think I’ll manage that.”

Olyvar raised a brow. “I look forward to that, my lord.”

Loras was not quite sure how they had made it back to the Red Keep, nor how they had managed to do so without attracting the attention of his fellow Kingsguard or the City Watch. While his perversion was rather public in some circles, his family name kept it from being known by most, and he did know, despite Margaery's seeming to believe the opposite, if her constant warnings were anything to go by, that he had to be careful.

But there was something about the whore Olyvar that made him want to forget that, along with everything else he paid Olyvar to help him forget.

He sometimes wondered if Olyvar would continue to be with him if he did not pay the boy. When Olyvar had been posing as his squire to learn about Sansa Stark, he had not required payment, of course, but he was a busy man, now that Littlefinger had him back to his normal duties.

And Loras had known that he was a whore from the moment he first tumbled into bed with him. After all, ordinary squires were not so adept in the bedchamber, no matter whom they had served as squire previously.

"Gods be damned," Loras murmured, rubbing up against Olyvar in a random hallway that he was certain was close to his own chambers. "I need you."

He felt rather than heard Olyvar chuckling against him. "I do believe we're almost there, my lord."

"Damn," Loras glanced around, saw several of his fellow Kingsguard turning a corner and pulled Olyvar behind a nearby pillar. The Kingsguard passed them, unnoticing.

"You're fortunate to be a Kingsguard, my lord, and not a husband," Olyvar murmured throatily against his skin. "Believe me, I am very familiar with sneaking out of the bedroom after. I don't mind."

Loras shook his head, almost driven mad by the fact that Olyvar was even somewhat distracted as he dragged the whore the rest of the way to his chambers, and then shut the door swiftly behind them with his foot, tearing at Olyvar's clothes at the same time. "I'm off duty today. My sister and her husband the King are spending their day at the training ranges again."

Olyvar's face morphed into one of concern, but Loras knew that it was in fact, hunger for information. "I heard about the attack. How is she?"

Loras shrugged a little guiltily, pulling off Olyvar's doublet. He did not want to think about what had happened to his sister while he was bedding Olyvar. And while he allowed himself a little too much leeway in what he admitted to his whore, he would protect Margaery to the death, if he was able to, and that meant keeping back what he really thought about how she was feeling just now, he knew.

Even if a part of him wanted to tell Olyvar, wanted to confide it in someone so he didn't feel like he was the only one watching a ship sink, watching what was happening to his sister and knowing that he didn't know what to do about it.

"She's strong. A little shaken, but she's always been able to survive anything thrown at her. She'll survive this, too, and I'll never know how she's truly feeling about it all."

Olyvar clucked his tongue sympathetically, and then muttered under his breath, "Growing Strong."

Loras chuckled. "My sister takes the words to a new meaning altogether. Come now, Olyvar, out of these trousers."

Olyvar was quick to oblige him, and a moment later, Loras had him on the bed, fully naked, the sheets pooling about his legs as he spread them open in invitation.

Loras needed no further encouragement. He bent down, taking Olyvar's cock into his mouth and smirking up at the other boy before he wrapped his lips around it, enjoying the way he heard Olyvar moan and felt him writhe beneath him.

Renly had always been a quiet lover, afraid that they would be overheard, not willing to take the risk despite the fact that everyone who was important knew about them anyway.

When Olyvar shuddered, his body tightening, Loras pulled away, allowed Olyvar to come into his hand before turning Olyvar onto his back none too gently, not that Olyvar seemed to mind at all, if his moans of encouragement were anything to go by.

Olyvar let out an appreciative groan when Loras' first finger entered him, instinctively loosening his body as Loras reached behind him on the bed for the jug of oil he always kept nearby for such purposes, slicking his cock and entering Olyvar with little more preparation than that, not that Olyvar truly needed any.

"My lord," Olyvar grunted beneath him, fingers twisting in the blankets, "My lord, I'm going to-"

"Just a moment longer," Loras promised him, kissing the shell of Olyvar's ear and grunting as he felt himself come close. "Just a moment."

And then he was coming, and he was relieved when, along with all of the other times, Olyvar made no comment when he cried out Renly's name, before collapsing on the bed beside the blonde whore, vision going almost black with the strength of his orgasm.

When he was able to focus on his surroundings once more, he could feel Olyvar tracing the birthmark on his hip with his fingers.

"It looks like Dorne," Olyvar said, grinning up at him playfully.

Loras smirked. "It doesn't."

Olyvar shook his head stubbornly, chuckling under his breath. "It does. That's the...That's the Sunspear bay, right there, and that's where the mountains are, and over here is...Sun snake? Sun..."

"Sandstone," Loras said, lips pulling into a smile despite himself.

"Yes," Olyvar grinned impishly. "Sandstone. Just there." He kissed his fingers, and then pressed his fingers to the birthmark.

"Fine," Loras groaned, pulling Olyvar against him once more.

"We should go there. I think we would have a lovely time, judging by my experience."

"That would be wonderful," Loras said, kissing him again. "Dorne, Highgarden. Anywhere but here."

Margaery sighed, entering the room and glaring lightly at her brother. "We're late for dinner as it is," she said, picking up one of the cakes sitting on the table. She was growing fat lately, from all of this nibbling, she just knew it.

"You're very respectful," Loras barked out a laugh, as his whore moved to cover himself, blushing, though Margaery imagined he'd been seen by much more than she.

"I'm very hungry," she said primly, unapologetic, and Loras laughed again.

Margaery sighed, turning her attention on the whore. "What's your name?" she asked sweetly.

He hesitated, glanced at her brother before answering. "Olyvar, my lady."

Her smile turned cool. "I'm afraid my brother is keeping the king waiting, Olyvar."

He flushed, pushing off the blankets and getting to his feet, completely nude, and Margaery allowed herself to appreciate the sight of him as he marched across the room to grab up his clothes and then slipped away with a secret wink toward her brother, before turning to her. "My lady."

She wondered if he had seen her looking, or was merely saying goodbye as he ought to. Whatever the case, she dipped her head and watched him leave before turning back to Loras.

"Perhaps you might consider being a bit more discreet?"

Loras rolled his eyes, sitting up and throwing off the blankets as well. "Why? They all know about me anyway. Everybody knows everything about everyone. What's the point in trying to keep a secret in a place like this?"

Margaery sighed. "In any event, you shouldn't keep your brother's intended waiting."

"Willas' intended? Please. Not even Tywin Lannister can force Cersei to marry Willas. It'll never happen."

"Lucky him," Margaery muttered.

He smirked. "Unlucky you."

"You think I want that woman married to my brother?" Margaery asked incredulously, a little hurt.

"If she doesn't marry Willas, she doesn't go to Highgarden. Which means she stays in King's Landing. Which means you're trapped here with Cersei Lannister as your mother by law."

"Perhaps," Margaery agreed.

"Perhaps?"

"Perhaps." She paused, and her smile turned impish. "Perhaps I should ask Joffrey for her head," Margaery said sweetly, taking another bite of her sweet cake. "I think he might just give it to me."

Loras raised a brow. "Would he? He and his mother have always been disturbingly close."

Margaery shrugged, a small smirk on her features. "I do not think that even Joffrey's mother is worth more to him than the opportunity to see something hurt before him. And besides, he's been giving me so many, lately."

Loras grimaced, and wondered if his sister's marriage to Joffrey had left her slightly unbalanced. "What do you do with them?"

She shrugged. "It depends."

"On what?" he asked, lifting a brow incredulously.

"On what Joffrey wants me to do with them at the time that he gives them to me."

Loras sighed. "I don't know why you won't just let me kill him. The realm's already at war."

Margaery frowned at him. "Be careful with such talk, Loras. Nowhere is safe for it."

Loras rolled his eyes. "Yes, Your Grace. If you are not even safe in the capitol, how do you expect me to-"

"No one is safe in the capitol, Loras," she told her brother curtly. "Least of all the King and Queen."

He swallowed at her words, reminded of why she was saying them now. Of how insensitive he must have sounded, to say what he just had, when he sure as the seven hells hadn't meant it like _that_. "Margaery-"

“Hurry up,” she tossed some clothes at him, her manner brisk now, cooler, as it had been more and more recently. He wondered if his thoughtless words had just lost her for good. “We’ll be late for dinner.”

And then Margaery swept imperiously from the room.

"Shit," Loras blinked after her, and then sighed, reaching for a different pair of clothes, for Margaery, while certainly knowing how to dress in style, hardly knew how to dress a man. But he had rather lost his appetite, and he doubted that this supper would go over well even if he was wearing appropriate clothes.


	43. MARGAERY XIII

"The damned physicians say the fresh air of the rose gardens will help my constitution," Olenna Tyrell told her granddaughter as they sat under their signature gazebo late one afternoon, sipping teas and eating little cakes of meat and cheese. "While Lord Varys insists I try different potions of his. I think they're all liars, but they insist."

Margaery glanced up, meeting her eyes. "I'm glad to hear it, Grandmother. I've been worried about you, shut away in your chambers all of the time. Are you truly feeling better now?"

Olenna shook her head. "You needn't worry about an old woman long past her prime, my dear. Besides," her eyes darkened, "You have enough to worry about on your own."

Margaery lowered her head, staring down into her tea as she took another sip from it.

Olenna made an abortive motion toward reaching out to Margaery, toward the bruises on Margaery's face, still fading, before lowering her hand once more with a sigh. "How are you doing, my dear?"

Margaery sniffed. "I...I know it sounds wrong to say it, because it was such a horrible thing that could have happened but..." she glanced up, meeting her grandmother's eyes. "I feel fine. Completely fine. It didn't happen, and I felt sorry for Ser Osmund, while he was living, because I knew that he must be Cersei's puppet, but I don't feel anything for him now."

"Shameful," Olenna told her with a huff. "Absolutely shameful. They ought not to have forced you to look upon the man who had just-"

Margaery leaned forward, taking Olenna's wrinkled old hand in her own. "He didn't do anything, Grandmother. It didn't come to that."

"They ought to have drawn and quartered him, is what they ought to have done, and not made you decide his fate. It's absolutely disgusting that the Queen herself was attacked in such a way."

Margaery shrugged. "Cersei would have forced the situation into her favor if I gave her the time to think about it. Already, she's still trying to get me pregnant with a dead rapist's child. Or poisoned, before I can tell Joffrey of my suspicions." She cocked her head. "I'm not sure which it is yet."

Olenna's hand around her own tightened. "I won't let her," she vowed to her granddaughter, reaching out and cupping Margaery's cheek.

Margaery nodded. "I know, Grandmother."

"Ah," her grandmother's voice changed immediately, into an almost smile at the sight of Sansa, standing awkwardly at the edge of the garden clearing, hands fiddling adorably with her gown. "Lady Sansa. Do come and sit with us."

Sansa moved forward then, glancing at Margaery, who nodded gently at her, before sitting at the table with them, still looking rather nervous.

It was not the first time that she had encountered Sansa since the incident, and she knew that Sansa understood why she had done as she had when she confronted Joffrey about it, or, at least, she knew that Sansa said she knew she understood it.

Still, Sansa was acting rather nervous around her again, as she had before Margaery had cornered her in the library, what seemed an age ago, back when she had believed Margaery capable of violence.

She sighed, and stirred at her tea with her finger, wondered if her grandmother had noticed the gin she had slipped into it before partaking of it.

Then again, she had noticed the gin her grandmother had slipped into her own.

"Some tea for Lady Sansa," Olenna called to one of the servants, who swept forward and poured some into a fragile cup for Sansa before she could protest.

Sansa took a meek sip, and Margaery found herself feeling at least a little relieved to see it.

"Look at us, women," Olenna said suddenly, "The world may fail to turn when it should, but we are women, and we drink tea and endure."

Margaery set down her cup. "That's a poem, isn't it? I'm sure I've heard it before somewhere."

Olenna waved a hand dismissively. "If it is, I don't know whose, nor do I care. Ah! Lord Tywin."

Tywin Lannister was walking toward them, and the sight of him made Margaery nervous in spite of herself. She pulled her hands away from the tea cup and saucer, before anyone saw them shaking.

"Lady Olenna. Your Grace. Lady Sansa," Tywin said calmly, his face not changing expression throughout the greeting. He was holding a piece of parchment under his rail thin arms, and was staring openly at Margaery's grandmother, as if the other two ladies were not even present.

The Queen of Thorns glanced at the two of them and then at Lord Tywin. "Run along, girls. The adults need to speak now."

Sansa raised a brow, but Margaery simply laughed, linking her arm through Sansa's and pulling her away as Lord Tywin frowned after them disapprovingly before going to sit down with Olenna with that pinched expression still stuck on his face.

Sansa glanced at him nervously, but he did not seem to invest any more attention to her or to Margaery, getting into a rather heated conversation with the Lady Olenna before Margaery and she had even turned a corner in the gardens.

"What business does Lady Olenna have with Lord Tywin?" Sansa asked Margaery curiously.

Margaery smiled mysteriously. "I'm sure I have no idea."

Sansa raised an eyebrow at that, but Margaery seemed content not to elaborate at all. "Tell me, Sansa, have you ridden since arriving in King's Landing?"

Sansa blinked at her. "Ridden?"

"Horses," Margaery elaborated, with a small secret smirk.

Sansa stared at her for a beat longer before asking carefully, "Are you all right? After everything that's happened..."

"I wish people would stop asking me that," Margaery said gently, patting their entwined arms. "It happened, and it's over now. I will survive it. So. Riding?"

Sansa looked as though she might protest, before finally sighing and acquiescing. "That sounds lovely. In the Kingswood?"

Margaery understood her apprehension, then. "Joffrey will be caught up in matters of state all morning, from what I understand, and then sparring." She smiled. "We shall be all alone, there, save for, perhaps, a groom."


	44. SANSA XXX

Margaery Tyrell sat a horse as though she was born to it. As the stable boy handed her the reigns to her steed, a great hulking black creature with a closely shaved mane and white boots, Sansa climbed onto her own horse, a smaller grey who eyed her as though it thought her a nuisance.

Of course, they could not actually go alone, as Margaery had suggested the day before, and several of Margaery's ladies were accompanying them, but somehow they had managed to snatch Pod, Lord Tyrion's squire, and a Kingsguard who had not routinely abused Sansa into this venture, and no one had minded.

The courtiers and guards and Pod were riding well behind them, giving them enough room that their conversation would not be overheard, for which Sansa was rather relieved, for she knew, no matter who it was she spoke in front of, she could never quite be herself around Margaery if anyone was watching.

Suddenly, as they entered the well worn paths into the wood, Margaery threw her arms out and tilted her head back, laughing a little.

"Riding was my favorite pastime, back in Highgarden," she confided in Sansa, when Sansa mentioned it, and Sansa blushed a little, though she was not entirely sure why.

"I didn't appreciate it as much as I ought to have, in Winterfell," Sansa said quietly. Then, "I didn't appreciate many things as much as I ought to have."

"Hey," Margaery said, tone gentle, and that gave Sansa the courage to glance up. "We're not thinking, remember? The riding is supposed to help with that, not hinder it."

Sansa raised a brow, and then asked teasingly, "Do you not think often?"

Margaery stared at her in open surprise for a moment, before giggling. "As often as I can manage," she said, with a lilt in her voice that had Sansa giggling as well.

Like the day they had gone to the sea, Sansa managed to forget on this ride with Margaery, for a few hours, at the very least, that she was a prisoner of King's Landing, and wondered, this time, if that was why Margaery had suggested the riding as well.

She couldn't imagine going through what Margaery had gone through without breaking, couldn't quite understand how Margaery was managing to be as strong as she was, just now, and it confused her terribly.

She remembered the day that the Hound had saved her, before he had left her to fend for herself amongst the lions because she would not run away with him, remembered how terrified she had been, remembered how grateful she had been to the Hound for rescuing her from a fate worse than death.

Margaery had been rescued as well, but, from what Sansa had heard of it, she had largely rescued herself.

Sansa wondered what it had been like, biting a man's ear off out of sheer desperation.

Not thinking, yes, she'd forgotten.

They rode on in silence, Margaery throwing her head back to enjoy the riding with her eyes closed, and Sansa wondered if she was imagining herself back in the Reach, safe from Joffrey and potential rapists and the rest of King's Landing.

"That is the King's hunting lodge," Margaery told her at one point, breaking the silence to point out the wooden and stone building standing in the narrow grove of trees to their right. "Joffrey has told me about it, of course. He plans to take me there, when I'm good enough to hunt moving targets."

Sansa had a sudden worry. "Is he...do you think he will make you shoot...people, like he does with his crossbow, when you are good enough to hunt moving targets?"

Margaery flipped her hair, expression casual, but Sansa could see the tightness around her lips, the same fear reflected in her eyes. "I don't know. Would you like to turn back or keep going a while longer?"

And something wild in Sansa had her answering, "A while longer, if you don't mind, of course."

She didn't know when she had last been riding, didn't know when she would again have the opportunity to do so.

Margaery cast her a wry glance. "Not at all."

And so they rode on some more, until Sansa's eye was caught by a large, hulking tree, the area around it only grass, as though it had poisoned the ground to keep any other tree from planting itself nearby,

"What an odd tree," Margaery said, climbing down from her horse, and, with a sigh, feeling slightly compelled, Sansa climbed down as well, rubbing at the thin fabric covering her shoulders. She felt rather cold.

"It reminds me a bit..." Sansa swallowed. "There was a heart tree, back in Winterfell," she told Margaery. "It was where my family went to pray. There was something about it that was...comforting. A sanctuary, tucked away in a little spot in the godswood, far from anyone and anything."

"That's beautiful," Margaery said quietly, still staring up at the tree in lieu of Sansa. "Your people of the North pray to the old gods, don't they?" Margaery asked, and Sansa glanced at her. Margaery bit her lip. "Sorry, only, I thought that I had heard such things, but I have seen you in the Sept of Baelor many times."

Sansa shrugged. In truth, her family had never been overly religious, not in the way that the Lannisters played at here, making a spectacle of themselves when it suited their needs and appointing the High Septon. The Old Gods had been worshipped, by her mother and father, though she and her siblings had never been forced to worship themselves.

However, she could remember the first time that her mother had taken her to the old Heart Tree in the godswood, could remember how whimsical and wonderful the whole experience had been, could remember how easily she had listened to her Septa about how the Seven were the only true gods, how wonderful she had thought it when she had seen the Sept of Baelor for the first time, escorted by Joffrey and half a dozen knights, worshipping like a civilized lady.

"It is true that many in the North worship the old gods," she said softly. "My House was never very religious, though they did their duties. My mother found less comfort in the old gods than my father. She worshipped the Seven, as they do in the Eyrie." She shivered, glanced at Margaery. "What about you?"

Margaery glanced at her. "It is true that I spend many of my days in the Sept, praying to the Seven for a son for my king," she said quietly, "But I spend as many days imbibing strange mixtures and eating foods and rubbing oils on my skin and doing exercises that the physicians claim will help the process. I was never very religious, but I suppose it must be a great comfort, to be so."

Sansa glanced at the large almost heart tree, and shook her head. "It isn't," she told Margaery. "The gods, if they do exist, do so only to laugh at us."

Margaery linked arms with her suddenly, and Sansa turned to see her smiling sadly. "Then we should be our own gods," the other girl told her seriously. "Don't you think?"

And Sansa did not rightly know what caused her to commit heresy and nod pleasantly at the other girl.

Margaery seemed to simply have that effect on other people.


	45. SANSA XXXI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am back! And I bring you...plot! (Sadly not porn)

"I am his, and he is mine, from this day, until the end of my days."

Cersei was clenching her teeth so hard that Sansa was honestly surprised when her jaw did not crack while she gritted out those words, as Ser Loras, standing in for his brother who could not physically make the trip from Highgarden, especially so quickly, bent forward to kiss her.

Sansa had not even known that it was possible for someone to stand in for another at their own wedding, even if they were related, and she wondered if that meant Ser Loras would have to bed the Queen Mother as well, but apparently the Grandmaester had found some precedent for it, and though Cersei had objected strongly, Tywin had leapt at the opportunity this allowed him.

The announcement of the betrothal between Cersei Lannister and Willas Tyrell being returned to as a viable marriage between House Tyrell and House Lannister had come as a bit of a surprise to the Court, after Olenna Tyrell had fought tooth and nail to ensure that it did not come about the first time.

But, rumor had it, it had been Olenna Tyrell who had fought for the marriage, this time, and Tywin Lannister had been only too happy to ensure that it happened as quickly as possible, before Cersei could come up with some idea to thwart it. He wanted the alliance rather badly, of course, because it would mean that the Tyrells were no longer free to make another.

Or so Sansa's husband had told her, when she remarked on how strange it seemed that the Tyrells did not seem overly bothered by the prospect of a marriage with the Great Lioness.

She supposed that this was because they were happy enough to get Cersei away from Margaery before things escalated any more quickly, though Sansa could not imagine what they were thinking in inviting Cersei into their lives, into Highgarden.

Loras moved awkwardly to place a green and gold cloak over Cersei's shoulders, for she did not stoop to allow it, nor did she seem particularly pleased when the deed was done.

There was a dead coldness in her eyes that filled Sansa's insides with dread, even if she did not know what it signified.

There was only the most per functionary of cheering when Loras and Cersei turned about to face the crowd watching, House Tyrell some of the quietest, Sansa realized with some surprise.

Prince Oberyn looked rather amused by the proceedings, Sansa thought when she picked him out of the crowd, standing beside Ellaria, but the amusement was mostly shadowed by the concerned way he was watching the Tyrells, as if attempting to suss out what in the seven hells they were thinking.

Only one person seemed genuinely pleased with events besides Lord Tywin, though Sansa could hardly bring herself to be surprised.

Weddings always seemed to put Joffrey in a particular sort of mood.

He was grinning from where he stood before his mother, as a ceremony had been given for Loras, in Willas' place, to ask his king's permission to take Cersei to wife, and then Tywin had given her away.

It was not a ceremony that had been used at Sansa's wedding, for she'd had none to give her away anyway, and it was antiquated even then, but Joffrey had insisted, for "his mother's sake" he'd said, though no one really seemed to know what this meant, including Joffrey.

He’d wanted to give Cersei away himself, but Lord Tywin had insisted on it, as he was her father, and, if Joffrey was actually afraid of anyone, it was Tywin.

He leaned rather heavily on Margaery's arm through the whole thing, and, though Sansa wasn't close enough to smell it, she could tell by the wrinkling of Margaery's nose that his breath tasted of alcohol.

She knew that Margaery did not approve of drunkenness, anymore than Cersei had before Robert Baratheon's death. Wondered when that had changed for Cersei and if it would change for Margaery.

The thought, the comparison of Cersei to Margaery, repulsed her, however, and Sansa quickly put it from her mind.

"To the feast!" Joffrey shouted when it was all over, and dragged Margaery along beside him, Margaery affecting a pained smile as she followed him.

Cersei did not even affect that, disdaining Ser Loras' arm when he held it out to her and shrugging the Tyrell cloak from her shoulders.

Ser Loras reached back and snatched the cloak from the air before it fell to the ground, and glared at Cersei's back.

Beside Sansa, Lord Tyrion rolled his eyes, and then he was offering Sansa his arm, to lead her to the wedding feast.

Given what had just happened, Sansa figured that she had better take it.

The short trek from the Sept to the Red Keep seemed to last a lifetime, and, when it was completed and they had all taken their seats, Cersei and Loras first and Margaery and Joffrey next before anyone else, Sansa almost wilted into her chair out of sheer relief.

She didn't, though, because Joffrey was far too close for her comfort, and, if she had learned anything from his marriage to Margaery, from her own time with him, it was that she must never show him a weakness that he would be able to exploit.

The wedding feast was almost as awkward as she and Lord Tyrion's had been, though not nearly as awkward as the King's and Margaery's wedding.

Ser Loras drank with an enthusiasm that more suited Lord Tyrion, and Cersei, for once seeming sober, ate nothing and did not accept any congratulations, and looked as though she was planning ways to murder everyone in the room.

Sansa did not doubt that she was capable of it, and thus shrank back, where she hoped the woman did not see her, continuing to pick at her meal.

“I thought she’d get out of it right up until the moment they said their vows,” Tyrion whispered to her presently, and Sansa glanced at him. “When my lord father announced her upcoming nuptials to the family, she screamed herself hoarse with her threats."

Sansa realized that she must have been out riding that day, with Margaery, and flushed a little.

"Father wasn't fazed, of course," Tyrion went on, oblivious, "He usually isn't, but Jaime usually intercedes on her behalf. Didn't this time, though he's been sore about it since."

Sansa realized that, were she someone like Margaery, she would have learned to retain such information as Tyrion was so freely offering to her now to use at some point in the future, because surely that was significant, but she could think of no reason for it.

"The Tyrells don't seem pleased either," Tyrion said, glancing sideways at her, "Even though it was their idea."

Sansa well knew the reason for that; whatever their plot, Sansa wouldn't wish Cersei on anyone.

"My mother is going to be my goodsister now," Joffrey leaned over to shout rather loudly in Margaery's ear; Sansa could see that he'd spent rather too much time in the royal wine cellars lately, and wondered if this was Joffrey's influence; while she knew him to be a horrible beast in most ways, he had never been one much for drunkenness, before his wedding. It was not required to make him an uninhibited beast, after all.

Margaery patted her husband's arm lovingly. "Yes, and I suppose that makes her and I sisters now," she said, meeting Cersei's eyes as she said the words and giggling.

Cersei looked like she was contemplating putting her dinner knife through Margaery's eye, and was having a difficult time refraining.

Joffrey's face morphed, as though he were having trouble remembering how to laugh, before suddenly he shouted, "And you and I brother and sister. Just like Mother and Uncle Jaime. Isn't it strange?"

Tywin Lannister stood to his feet at those words, an expression not unlike a thundercloud filling his features, and then he was moving forward, no doubt to reprimand his grandson for such talk in front of so many.

Margaery smiled at him, her eyes narrowing playfully. "So strange, my love. I don't know how we shall manage it. Though I suppose we must pretend otherwise."

Sansa had a hard time keeping her mouth from falling open, and just barely managed it. Cersei's grip around the knife' hilt was causing her knuckles to go so white that Sansa could see the bone from where she sat.

"You're still my wife," Joffrey told her, rather imperiously, and Margaery nodded demurely.

"Of course, and I shall always be that," she said, and then leaned forward and whispered something in his ear that had Joffrey snickering.

It occurred to Sansa, then, that she would never have been able to do this. She would never have been able to sit by Joffrey's side as his wife for the rest of his life and appease him, even if her father hadn't become a traitor to the Crown. She would never have been able to laugh at his crude jokes and cause him to laugh in turn, to not wish to pull away every time he reached for her.

"Your Grace," Lord Tywin's calm voice broke through her musings, and Sansa glanced up to see him standing before the King and Queen with the reprimanding air of a grandfather. "Perhaps you've had enough to drink tonight. Queen Margaery shall escort you to your chambers."

Joffrey blinked up at his grandfather as though he were staring at a particularly fearsome animal, his mouth gaping open and then shutting like a fish for a few moments.

And then, from his side, "My love..."

"No!" Joffrey cried. "You can't make me. She's my mother; I ought to be here for her last day in King's Landing. I'm the King."

"Your Grace, perhaps this is a discussion you will like to forget come morning, when you have regained control of yourself. In the meantime..."

"No! I'm not going!" Joffrey shouted at him, and if he hadn't the attention of everyone at the wedding up until that point, he did now.

Cersei, from where she sat beside Loras, stood to her feet, looking rather pale. In truth, Sansa was beginning to wonder if she was not kicking up a fuss because her son was doing so just fine for the both of them, but surely that would mean nothing.

Surely Cersei knew that if her son realized she didn't want this, he would put a stop to it.

And yet, she was letting it happen, had let it happen. Sansa didn't understand why.

Tywin looked at Margaery as if he expected her to help him with this, but, at Joffrey's words, she seemed to undergo a different demeanor entirely, reaching forward to pour her own glass of wine and taking a long sip, her eyes cool as she laid her hand back on Joffrey's arm and told Lord Tywin, "The King has told you he doesn't wish to go. Who are you to tell him he must leave his own mother's wedding, Lord Tywin?"

Lord Tywin appeared to be grinding his teeth as badly as Cersei when he swept from the room.

Margaery smirked as she turned and kissed Joffrey full on the mouth.

Cersei's hand was digging so badly into the knife that Sansa was surprised it had not already cut her.


	46. MARGAERY XIV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wasn't sure if you guys would want me to update another chapter or for me to answer comments...lol

The long trek leading Joffrey back to his chambers took immeasurably longer with the realization that not a single one of the Kingsguard escorting them was going to assist Margaery in keeping him upright.

She supposed that, were she not his wife and thus obligated to touch him at some point, Margaery would not willingly touch Joffrey either, and so it was understandable.

Her husband babbled alongside her as they walked, and Margaery nodded and agreed with whatever it was he was saying, her attention on other things.

Jaime Lannister opened the door, a grim expression on his face as he watched Margaery, and she wondered if he would mourn his sister’s leaving.

Wondered if he would want revenge on those who had demanded it, or if he would understand why Margaery had.

She was rather surprised he was here; she wondered if that was at Cersei’s prerogative, that she wanted him to promise to take care of her son. He was not usually the man on guard outside their chambers, and she would have expected him to be drowning his sorrows in some way.

She gave him a grateful nod as he shut the door behind them, and then turned back to her husband, about to suggest that either they sleep or try again for an heir, but Joffrey’s attention had already been arrested.

“Some more wine!” Joffrey crowed, scuttling across the room to it with far more ease than he had made the journey back to their chambers and pouring himself a glass. Margaery sighed.

“I think perhaps you’ve had enough, my love.”

He glared at her over the rim of his glass. “I haven’t. My father could stomach three whole days with nothing but wine, and so can I.”

Margaery rolled her eyes. “I can see that.”

“I’m not happy with you either,” he snapped out suddenly, and Margaery blinked at him. “I’ve noticed how you’ve been so withdrawn since that Osmund fellow tried to fuck you and I killed him.” He leaned forward suddenly, grabbing her by the wrists and twisting them savagely. “Were you in love with him and got found out? Is that why you’re acting like this?”

Margaery blinked at her husband in honest surprise, more surprised that he had managed to articulate all of those words in his current state than by their content. “Was I...Of course not, my love. I have only ever loved you.”

And it was true, in a certain sense of the word.

Joffrey’s features twisted. “You lying shrew!” he snapped, slapping her. And then he bent forward to kiss her mouth. Margaery turned, smelling the stench on his breath, and offered him her cheek, instead.

Joffrey grunted. “You see? Like that. My wife should be as happy to have her king bed her as any other woman, and yet you shrink away from me now. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Margaery raised a brow. “Maybe I simply need more time, my love, after that ordeal.”

He grunted again. “Why? It’s not as though you were actually raped, is it, _Lady_ Margaery?”

He was squeezing her wrists again.

Margaery forced a smile. “Of course not, my love, but I confess that I get as little enjoyment out of bedding you as I did Ser Osmund, and I suppose the difference is a difficult one to decipher.”

Joffrey blinked stupidly at her. “W-What?”

Margaery’s smile became a little more genuine, then. “To bed, I think, my love. You’re very tired, and you’ll feel better about your mother in the morning.” She ignored his feeble protests as she dragged him to the bed and deposited him into it, half-smirking as she worked on stripping him down to his smallclothes.

“You…You can’t just put me to bed,” he protested, but Margaery ignored the words, pulling him onto the bed and pressing him under the covers. “I’m not a child.”

Margaery leaned forward, kissing him on the forehead. “Of course not, my love.”

He struggled against her for a few moments longer before sagging against the sheets.

Normally, she would lean forward and put her arms around him, would comfort and console him and tell him that he was a strong king and it would be all right, all the while thinking about what it would be like to smother him with a pillow, whether she would enjoy it or not.

But not tonight.

“She’ll be happy in Highgarden, won’t she?” he asked Margaery suddenly, and Margaery blinked at him.

It had never really occurred to her that her husband cared about anyone other than himself, though she knew that he had a close bond with his mother before she had arrived in King’s Landing. It would almost have been touching, if the object of his affection was anyone but Cersei Lannister.

“I very much doubt it, Your Grace,” she said quietly, “I very much doubt that she would be happy at all, separated from her darling child, and she will hate being at the tender mercies of my House.”

“Not a child,” Joffrey muttered petulantly, and Margaery rolled her eyes once again.

“Of course not, my love.”

“I could order her to stay here!” Joffrey shouted, with a sudden clarity. “She and Loras, and then she wouldn’t have to leave me at all.”

Margaery lifted a brow, unimpressed. “I’m afraid my brother Willas is her husband now, Your Grace, not Loras.”

Joffrey frowned, brows furrowing together in concentration. “Then…I could order him here!”

Margaery chewed on a nail. “And the wedding took place with Loras standing in because my brother would not make such a trip. Did you understand that at all, or did it go completely over your head?”

Joffrey blinked at her, no doubt certain that she had insulted him somehow, but uncertain exactly how. Margaery sighed.

And then he burst into hot, desperate tears.

Margaery was not a woman moved often; in fact, beyond her family, she could not think of anyone who had moved her to feel any real emotions, beyond Cersei and Sansa. Cersei in anger and Sansa in…Well, she had not quite figured that out, after all.

The crocodile tears and emotions that she allowed herself when she was being seen were for the benefit of others, always, and certainly did their job.

"She's gone," Joffrey said, sounding horrified as tears slipped from his slit eyes. “She’s really…she’s leaving me.”

"Yes," Margaery nodded, and he turned to glare at her, looking a tad surprised by her nonchalant acceptance of his words.

However, the glare didn’t last long, before his eyes welled up with tears once more.

Margaery bit back another sigh and smiled at her husband. “Sleep, my love. It will feel better in the morning.”

He swallowed hard, and then closed his eyes.

Margaery sat up beside him for a long time, waiting until she heard his hitching breaths even out in sleep, picking at her nails as she did so. Her hands shook as she did so.

When she was sure that her husband slept soundly, Margaery calmly reached for the wet cloth by her husband's bedside and set about methodically wiping at his face until it was clean of tear track marks, and then used the cloth to wipe the berries from her lips, and tossed it to the floor at the end of the bed before curling up in bed beside her husband.

In the morning, her dear husband would not remember most of the night beyond his first drink. Drunkenness had that pleasant effect on him, Margaery had learned to her pleasure, for she feared that her life would not be half so good now if it did not.

And if he remembered some anger, some ill feelings, he would attribute them to the loss of his mother, rather than Margaery.

She could afford this one night of freedom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol, for some reason Word wanted to autocorrect ‘dear husband’ to ‘dead husband.’ I didn’t know it understood my humor.


	47. SANSA XXXII

It was determined that Cersei was to leave for Highgarden in the morning after her wedding, which had remained unconsummated and would continue to do so until she arrived at her husband's home, and she was gone even before Sansa awoke.

Strangely, Sansa did not feel as if some terrible weight had left her shoulders, with the news of Cersei's absence. Rather, something oppressive seemed to be hanging over King’s Landing with that information, as if the entirety of the city was holding its breath, waiting to see how Cersei would retaliate.

Cersei Lannister had left King's Landing, married to Willas Tyrell, the man whom, once upon a time, Sansa might have wed.

She almost could have laughed, at that. The Lannisters always took everything from her, and yet, this time, she could not bring herself to feel badly about it.

Cersei, who had long tormented her since her arrival here, no longer bothering with niceties once it became clear that Sansa was nothing more than a prisoner in a lion's den, could torment her no longer, from the other side of Westeros.

Joffrey might even be easier to contend with, if Sansa was not being attacked on both fronts.

She found that her husband was rather gleeful about the news, as well. Oh, he tried to be overt about it, limiting his joy to mere comments here and there, but she could see the extra bounce in his step, the more numerous smiles, could tell from the way he acted that first morning that he was just as pleased as Sansa ought to be.

She wondered if Cersei Lannister had been to him what Joffrey was to her.

"Some more lemon cakes, wife?" he asked pleasantly as they ate their morning breakfast, and, across the table, Shae raised a brow.

Sansa shrugged. "I suppose."

Tyrion blinked at her. "Something wrong?"

Sansa shook her head. "Of course not. I...I'm fine. Just...not very hungry, this morning."

Tyrion let out a long sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Between you and my brother, I have seen enough wasting away. Shae, give Lady Sansa some more lemon cakes. I rather think she's earned them."

Shae looked slightly amused as she passed the lemon cakes to Sansa, and Sansa dutifully took two.

She ate only half of one, but Lord Tyrion did not seem to notice. Shae did, if the flash of her eyes was any indication, but she said nothing.

"Well," Tyrion said, when she had finished picking at her food and he had downed another bottle of wine, "I'd best be going. The Small Council will want to meet, if my father has anything to say about it. And he won't like that the Tyrell girl made him look a fool at the wedding. There'll be seven hells to pay."

Sansa blinked at him. "You don't think...that she'll have to pay it, do you?" she asked nervously.

Tyrion sent her a small smile. "From what I've observed of our new queen, she is very resilient. I merely meant that my father will no doubt have something to say about the Tyrell granaries and soldiers who are still in the Reach." He paused. "What will you be doing today, my lady?"

She blinked; she hadn't really thought about it. Perhaps she would go to visit Margaery again, or Ellaria. Margaery would be more somber, Ellaria frustrating, as she tried to suss out the woman's purpose.

"I'm not sure," she told her husband honestly, and was rather surprised to see the warmth in his eyes when he bid her good day.

For once, it didn't look like pity, and she was relieved to see it.

"Do you have something you would like to do today, my lady?" Shae asked, when Lord Tyrion had left them in peace.

Sansa hesitated. "Would you like to go down to the harbor with me today, to look at the ships?"

Shae gave her a long look.

Sansa knew that the other woman had been somewhat surprised when she returned to King's Landing after going swimming with Margaery, knew and had not spoken to her about it since that day, some part of her worried that Shae would call her a coward for not running, not even making a real attempt, even thought she knew it had been Shae who had suggested she stay here.

Shae smiled, finally. "I would like that, my lady. Let me just go and get grab your shawl, so you don't catch a chill out there."

Sansa nodded, left to herself a moment later, and she sighed, resting her chin in her hands. Lord Tyrion had left the door to their chambers open, and that was why she heard them.

Two serving girls, and she was rather certain that they were the same girls she had reprimanded earlier, saying the horrible things they had said about Margaery after what had happened to her.

And, despite herself this time, Sansa found that she couldn't help but listen.

By the time they had reached the end of the hall and gone out of earshot, and Shae had returned, Sansa rather wished she hadn't.

"My lady?" she heard Shae's voice, trying to reach out to her, and she flinched away a little. "My lady, are you unwell?"

She was. Oh, she was.

She had seen the day that Cersei had approached Reanna Tyrell, had seen a deal made in Margaery's blood and said nothing, and Margaery had paid a steep price for it. Had said nothing, and Lady Reanna had died for it.

It seemed that Cersei's reach went farther than the Tyrells had thought, if she was still capable of murdering someone on the road to Highgarden.

Sansa would never be safe from her, not here, not in Dorne, if that was the case.

And this was her fault.

“I…I’m going to be sick,” she informed Shae, and barely noticed as the other woman pulled her to the nearest chamber pot just in time.


	48. SANSA XXXIII

Lady Reanna was dead, slaughtered in her chambers like an animal, the blood rumored to have stained the wooden flooring beyond repair.

She had been cut open from neck to navel.

Sansa did not know how her murderer had managed to muffle her screams, for surely Reanna must have screamed, but she had a good idea as to who the murderer was.

Margaery had grown annoyed, once again, at yet another late arrival by her lady, and swept down to the girl’s chambers in a flurry of skirts with several others of her ladies, no doubt intending to give her quite a lecture. She had been the one to find Lady Reanna.

The murder was to be investigated, by Tyrell agents, because Lady Reanna had been a member of House Tyrell, but Sansa knew already that they would find nothing, just as Margaery had been so convinced that Reanna was in fact seeing Ser Osmund, and not spying for Cersei.

She did not quite understand why, for Margaery hated Cersei and had made her hatred known Sansa, and a part of Sansa would very dearly like to see Cersei punished for something, even if she would never admit such a thing out loud, but Margaery seemed convinced that foul play was not afoot, that she had merely been wrong about the identity of Reanna's lover and that he had killed her when he learned her pregnant.

Or so she had said before going into seclusion, with only her husband and her other ladies allowed to disturb her.

Sansa had been rather sad at the loss.

An unpleasant business, to be sure, but not so unpleasant as the truth, and Margaery was no fool. She had to know it was not the truth, what she had told the court about her lady. Had to know that she was maligning the girl, however justly.

"Sansa?" a voice called, startling her out of her morbid thoughts.

She glanced up, rather surprised to see Lady Ellaria approaching her. "L-Ellaria," she greeted, her voice subdued, and wondered if she would ever be left alone, in this wretched place.

That was why she had come to the Sept, after all. So few people who bothered with Sansa came here, anymore.

Ellaria quickly affected a look of concern, at the tone of Sansa's voice. "Are you all right, my lady? You seem quite..." she shook her head. "Is something the matter?"

Sansa shook her head, and then nodded. "I...need to know something," she said quietly. "I need to know what you're planning, for when I come back with you to Dorne."

"I don't believe you understand," Ellaria said gently. "We don't. Have anything planned for you. It was a split second decision on Oberyn's part, as are most of his decisions, it seems."

Sansa shook her head. "What would happen to me there, then? And," she sent Ellaria a fierce look. "Don't simply tell me that I will be happy. I need to know."

"Sansa," Ellaria said quietly, "I have never lied to you."

Sansa lifted her chin. "Neither have the Lannisters, by that logic. Save for once. And they've made it quite clear that, if I remain in King's Landing, I am going to end up with a Lannister child in my belly. At least they are honest with their intentions, now that they have nothing to lose." She glanced up at Ellaria, picking at a spare piece of lint on her gown. "I am the only Stark the Lannisters have left. I knew that this would not be easy from the moment Prince Oberyn invited me to Dorne. I only wish I knew why you and he would be willing to pay such a price.”

Ellaria sank down beside her. “When Elia died, Oberyn was on his way to King’s Landing with an army,” she said quietly, staring down at her hands. “And I watched as her blamed himself for years after that, thinking that if only he had been sooner…”

“No,” Sansa interrupted her, and Ellaria glanced up. She hesitated upon saying her next words and potentially losing her strange allies, but they came up on their own. “A girl who made the Lannisters angry has just died. I don’t care to hear more emotional stories that explain away your reasoning. I would have you tell me what I want to know, or you can find someone else to take to Dorne with you.”

Ellaria’s eyes shuttered. “Very well. Ask your questions, but know that, as you have been, you may not be satisfied with them.”

“Will I become a prisoner there, inside a different gilded cage?” Sansa asked, glancing around at her surroundings.

“No,” Ellaria answered immediately. At Sansa’s look, she went on, “You made the decision to come with my Oberyn when he leaves here, Sansa. No one forced you to do that, and if you do not like it in Dorne…well, I do not rightly know what will happen to you, but we will not force you to remain there.”

“Are you taking me back as a way to gain power to the North?” she went on.

Ellaria raised a brow. “Our Southern blood runs a little too hot for the North, Lady Sansa.”

“Yes or no.”

A sigh. “You remind me rather of one of my daughters. No.”

“If the Lannisters…” she bit her lip, “Come after me, will you hand me over to them?”

This time, Ellaria did hesitate. “We would do everything within our power to help you, Sansa. And it saddens me greatly that no one else has bothered to do even that, before this.”

Sansa sucked in a breath. “And how do I know that any of the things that you say to me now are the truth?”

Ellaria’s eyes dimmed, but it was not from an emotion that Sansa quite recognized, and that rather unnerved her. “You do not, beyond our words, sweet girl, and I can understand the appeal of remaining in a gilded cage rather than facing the unknown. But I do not give my word in ill faith to anyone, and neither does Oberyn. His brother Doran will understand your plight, as well. You will be safe there, Sansa. No army, Lannister or Targaryen, has ever penetrated Dorne, and nor will it.”

She just had one final question. “Why does Prince Oberyn remain here? Why haven’t we left yet? What is his so important business that we must remain here?”

"Sansa..."

Sansa glanced up at her, eyes blown wide.

Ellaria hesitated, and then gave her a little smile. "Oberyn will be finished with his business here soon."

But Sansa had been hearing that for too long to believe it now, much as she would have liked to, and she knew that it would simply not be enough. She had to do this. She had to save herself, because no one else was going to do it for her.


	49. SANSA XXXIV

Sansa sighed, glancing up at her husband where he stood at the end of their table, evidently not having left for his courtly duties for the day. "My lord?"

Her husband took a deep breath, as though steeling himself, and then, "I was wondering if we might...talk?"

Sansa stiffened a little, and her husband held up his hands as if to stop her thoughts from leading to their natural progression, considering their last 'talk,' wincing a little.

"Not...not about that. Well...I mean, just to talk, Sansa. I promise you will like what I have to say a bit more this time." He grimaced. "I hope."

Sansa blinked at him as he waited, nodded once and watched him rather warily as he sank down into the seat across from her at the table.

Tyrion looked like he was steeling himself again, which did not bode well for her. He opened his mouth, shut it again, and then spoke.

"With my sister Cersei gone off to Highgarden to birth more Lannister babes, securing our family's power over the Tyrells, my father is far less interested in Winterfell's heir, just now," her lord husband told her carefully.

Sansa smoothed down her dress, and wondered if, after she laid with him, she would find the strength to smother him in the night as he slept.

"So...you're saying that now that she is gone, as long as we do not remind your father of it, he will leave us alone," Sansa said dubiously, raising a brow at her husband.

Her husband glanced away. "I merely meant-"

"That is a short term solution," Sansa said quietly. "And I need something a bit more long-term."

She reached forward, placing her husband's hand on her shoulder, trying not to flinch as she remembered the way he had touched her breasts, on their first night of marriage. "I think you should give me a son, my lord."

Her lord husband swallowed rather hard. "Sansa-" he attempted to pull his hand away, but she followed him, gaze intense.

"I thought...You had made your position on the matter quite clear, some time ago," Tyrion said, rather weakly.

Sansa swallowed thickly, licked her lips. "I've changed my mind."

Her husband looked rather skeptical about that, but wisely did not attempt to contradict her. "My lady-"

She leaned forward, hoped she looked alluring, as Margaery always did when she wanted something from her husband. "I've seen the way you look at me, sometimes. Don't you find me attractive, my lord husband? Don't you..." she swallowed hard. "Want this?"

Tyrion licked his lips, looking rather nervous now, though, from what she had heard, she did not see why he should need to be. "I..."

And this time, Sansa did guide his hand to her clothed breast, laid it down with the surety of someone with far more confidence than she.

"Please," she said quietly, and hoped he could not read the desperation in her face as she spoke.

Tyrion flinched. "A...All right," he said finally, and moved forward, laying her back against the bed gently, glancing at her one more time before starting the process of divesting her clothes.

When she was bare before him, he reached for the strings holding together his trousers, and she pretended not to see the way his hands were shaking, his trousers tenting.

She swallowed hard, biting her lip and thinking of Winterfell. Winterfell, and she swore by the old gods and the new in that moment that she would see it again, no matter what it took.

Even if it meant a Lannister child in her belly.

"I...I'm sorry," Tyrion said, pulling away abruptly, and, at Sansa's shocked look, "I'm sorry. I can’t. It isn't you."

Sansa looked at him incredulously. "You've been with...many ladies, Lord Tyrion," she said quietly, reaching out for him again. "Pretend I am one of them."

Lord Tyrion shook his head. "Sansa..."

She shook her head. "No, not Sansa," she told him, taking his hand in hers, leading it back downward. "Just someone."

He shook his head once more, climbing off of her and sitting down on the bed beside her. "And not a single one of them looked at me like you were just now," he said quietly. "Like they feared me, like they were resigned to this." He glanced at Sansa. "When I look at you...You are beautiful, yes, I would have to be a blind man not to notice that. But...I can't do this. I am sorry."

Sansa gritted her teeth. "Do you think that makes you a gentleman?" she snapped suddenly, and he glanced at her in surprise, but Sansa was far from done. "Because you won't be with a woman when she asks you to? Because you're kind enough to want her to love you?"

Tyrion glanced away. "Why do you want to sleep with me, Sansa?"

She swallowed, glanced down at her hands. "You are my husband."

"That hasn't influenced you before this," he said gently, reaching a hand out toward her, but Sansa flinched away. "Sansa."

"She's dead!" Sansa screamed at him finally. "She's dead, just like my mother, my father, my brother. All of them are dead, don't you understand? Because they didn't do what your sister, your father, Joffrey...wanted them to. And..." she swallowed hard. "You told me we could leave here, if only I had a child."

Tyrion's features softened. "Oh, Sansa..." he murmured, and then he did something he had not done since their wedding day, and long before that.

He pulled her in for an embrace, unyielding when Sansa stiffened against the touch but gentle, not allowing her to pull away even as Sansa squirmed away and tears began to slip down her cheeks.

Sansa sagged into the embrace, closing her eyes and pretending the arms were softer, longer. She didn't think anyone in King's Landing but Margaery had hugged her since her father died.

"She's dead," she whispered into the pillow. "She's dead, and Prince Oberyn cares for nothing but his business, and you care for nothing but your own pride."

"I care about you, Lady Sansa," Tyrion reassured her quietly. "And I promised to do my duty to you as a husband when you took my cloak. Even if I...cannot help you in the way you want, I will try to find a way to get you to Casterly Rock. Yes?"

Sansa hesitated for a moment, and then nodded shakily.

Because, stupid little girl as she may be, she believed him.

Let it never be said that Sansa Stark could not play the game of thrones, when she tried.


	50. SANSA XXXV

Sansa smiled, not ashamed to admit that her heart had been lighter since Tyrion's promise that he would take her from this place as soon as he was able, her days with Joffrey tormenting her shorter than they had ever felt before.

The Martells may have promised to take her to Dorne, where she could be far away from the Lannisters, but she knew Tyrion Lannister. She knew that he did not go back on his word, as he had told her. That was why he had delivered her father's remains to her mother, why he had been so horrified by the Red Wedding.

Let it never be said that Sansa Stark did not know how to play the game of thrones.

She knew she could trust him, even if she didn't want to.

And it was a long journey, between King's Landing and Casterly Rock.

Tyrion had told her to tell no one of their plan while he got permission from his father, explaining that, while he would not tell his father the reason for their departure he would, unfortunately, need the man's permission.

She hoped to the old gods and the new that he had gotten it, as she opened the doors to their chambers.

She could hear his voice, and was just about to turn the corner into their living space when she heard another voice respond, one that made her go still.

"Do you know what he told me? That I merely hadn't...tried hard enough," Tyrion lamented. "Evidently, he 'little believes the conspiracies of maesters in regards to how a man and woman conceive,' and if I would just do my duty to my family as my sister has, I would be useful for that. Or...something like that." A sigh.

Jaime snorted. "He is right on one account. There would have to be some...attempt on your part at all, one would think."

"She's a child."

"I didn't say I blamed you," Jaime snapped, and there was a long pause, something that sounded like the pouring of wine before Tyrion spoke again, his voice softer this time.

"Are you all right, Jaime?"

A harsh intake of breath. "I asked Father to marry me off instead. Revoke my standing in the Kingsguard like he wants so badly and give me away to some Frey or Westerling, and...he refused. I can't..." a ragged breath. "This can't happen. Not again."

"Frankly, I'm surprised you aren't already off with her. Couldn't Cersei make up some excuse for needing her champion by her side? From what we know of the Tyrells, I doubt they would mind."

"Father wouldn't allow me to go with her," Ser Jaime muttered. "We asked. More than once." His voice was tellingly dry.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "Ah."

"I can't stand this," Ser Jaime complained, shoving his plate of food away. "To fight all that way back to her only to have Father marry her off again?"

Tyrion pushed the wine forward. "Our dear sister is quite resilient, Jaime. I'm sure wild horses could not keep her from King's Landing if they tried."

A pause. "He threatened her. It's why she didn't put up a fight. Didn't you think it strange?" An audible gulp, and Sansa thought back to Cersei, how dour and sober she had been on the night of her wedding feast. "She wouldn't have gone so easily if she'd thought there was a way out of it."

"He threatened Cersei." Tyrion sounded almost awed by this, which Sansa found rather sickening. Or maybe he was just amused. "With what? A Frey?"

Another long pause. "As...I understand it, he isn't pleased with the amount of control that the Tyrell girl has over Joffrey, and I can see why, after that display at the...wedding."

"I thought that was what he wanted from her."

"He wanted it from her as long as he could control the Tyrells. They're trash, but they know what they want, and they're quite willing to use their new queen to achieve it. The old Thorn withheld their grain from the city to get our father to reconsider the marriage betrothal. Funny, considering he was the one to propose it in the first place."

"I didn't even notice."

"Well, you wouldn't. Between you and...Cersei, I don't think either of you ingests a drop of anything that isn't wine." Another long sigh, a cup slamming down on a table.

"Quite right. But you still haven't said what he threatened Cersei with."

"From what I understand, he...implied that the Boar King'd more than one son, and that one was as good as another, maybe better." Ser Jaime sounded bitter.

A sharp laugh. And then, incredulous, "He wouldn't. She had to know that. Legacy is the only thing that matters to our father. The family. A dead king doesn't quite fit that."

"I don't think that matters to Cersei," Ser Jaime said flippantly. "Joffrey is her darling boy, and she will hear of no threats against him."

He sounded almost jealous of Joffrey, and Sansa grimaced, mind reeling.

_One was as good as another._

Her hand fell down to her stomach, to the empty place she had wanted Tyrion to fill with child not two days ago, and felt a sharp sense of relief that he hadn't been able to follow through on a wish she had made while she wasn't properly thinking.

That her husband cared for his kingslaying brother was clear to see in their every interaction, and it made Sansa feel faintly ill as she backed out of the room and wiped at her eyes, blinking to realize that they were even wet.

Joffrey had often called her a little fool, in the days after her father had been murdered, taunting her over it and letting her know how naive she had been to believe him her storybook prince.

A reminder, for the times she had forgotten, that her husband was just as much of a monster as the rest of them. That the imp who slept in the same room as she each night was a Lannister.

She knew now that, even if she went with Prince Oberyn to Dorne, it would not be enough. That Cersei or Joffrey or even her lord husband would drag her back to King's Landing because they would never give up their Stark prize, that she would spend the rest of her life here if she could not change fate itself.

And she had already proven herself incapable of killing Joffrey, the worst of the Lannisters. Proven herself incapable of filling with a Lannister babe. She would have to find another solution, one that would not leave her their prisoner for the rest of her life.

She backed away, and hoped her lord husband and Ser Jaime Lannister did not hear her retreating footsteps.


	51. SANSA XXXVI

They were covered in blood, so much of it, everywhere, and yet, when Sansa looked at Margaery, she thought it was the most beautiful sight she had ever seen, Margaery covered in Joffrey's blood, smiling at her as the sun rose behind her back, the blood glistening on Margaery's glowing skin.

Sansa had never seen anything more beautiful.

"We did it," Sansa whispered, moving forward and taking both of Margaery's hands in her own.

Margaery grinned at her. "We did it," she agreed, and suddenly surged forward, capturing Sansa's mouth with her own and kissing her until Sansa couldn't breathe, until she gasped awake, clutching at the sheet of her bed, glancing nervously at Tyrion, who still snored beside her.

She hadn’t eaten dinner with him, taking it while he was still in a meeting with the Small Council, even if she could not depend on Margaery’s company, these days. She had made no comment about the time of her dinner, roughly an hour earlier than Sansa usually took it, and Sansa was rather grateful.

She had also pretended to be asleep when he returned, and Shae had not called her out on the deception though she must have known the truth, when Tyrion asked her about it.

It was all Sansa could do not to give herself away, when he crawled into the bed beside her.

She hadn't thought she would be able to fall asleep, was rather surprised that she had.

Sitting up, Sansa crawled as silent as she was able out of bed, flinching when Tyrion turned and moaned a woman's name in his sleep, before going still again. Sansa breathed in relief, reaching under the bed for the parcel of belongings she had packed for herself.

Another dress, for when she dirtied this one too much to wear. Her shawl. And nothing else, for she wanted nothing more of this place, no reminder of it.

And then Sansa stood and crept from the room, her bag clutched to her chest, and did not look back.

She walked for some time, through the corridors of the Red Keep, knowing that the guards kept the exits of the Keep guarded at all times, and that if she was not careful she would be seen.

But if she went out past the Maidenvault, where Margaery's family stayed even now, she might have a better chance of leaving without being seen. After all, Margaery stayed with Joffrey now, so there would be no Kingsguards there to catch her, for the Lannisters had made it clear how they felt about the Tyrells.

She moved as quickly and quietly as she could, hiding behind a pillar when several servants passed her, but for the most part, she was able to travel unseen altogether, for there were few people milling about the Keep at this time of the night.

When she made it to the Maidenvault, she let out a sigh of relief, and that was her damnation.

"What the hell are you doing out of your rooms, lady?" a very familiar voice asked, and then a sharp, painful hand gripped her wrist, yanking her out of the shadows. "The Queen has demanded a curfew in the Maidenvault." And then Ser Meryn blinked at her. "Lady Sansa."

Sansa swallowed, attempted to take a step back only to remember that Ser Meryn was still gripping her arm in an iron hold. "Ser Meryn-"

He glanced between her and the door just beyond her reach, now, before his eyes lit with a sadistic light. "Were you attempting to leave the Keep without the King's permission, my lady?"

The way he said 'my lady' made her cringe.

"No, I would never-"

"Perhaps we shall go and ask the King, then," Ser Meryn taunted, dragging her forward by the arm. Sansa dug her heels in, but it did little against the size and strength of her foe. "See what he has to say about this."

"Unhand me, Ser Meryn!" she cried out, just as they were passing Margaery's old chambers.

"What is the meaning of this?"

Sansa wilted with relief when she heard that voice, though her tired mind could not fathom why she was hearing Margaery's voice, in that moment. She glanced up, saw Margaery, standing in the hall just outside the door of her old chambers, blinking sleep from her eyes, dressed only in a green silk dressing gown with her hair falling in messy billows around her shoulders.

"Queen Margaery," Sansa said, glancing at Ser Loras behind her, at her other ladies, filing out into the hall. For a moment, Ser Meryn and his threats ceased to exist. "I...I thought that you had taken up residence in King Joffrey's chambers."

Margaery sent her a searching look. "I moved back, soon after the death of...Lady Reanna. Lady Sansa, what is going on here?"

Sansa swallowed. "I was...I was just..."

"She was attempting an escape," Ser Meryn snapped, shaking Sansa's arm where he gripped her wrist. "Little bitch thought to sneak out through the Maindenvault."

"I wasn't!" Sansa cried, turning pleading eyes on Margaery. "Your Grace, I swear. I wouldn't do that." Her voice broke on the last word, and perhaps that was what convinced Margaery, who faltered for a moment before turning to Ser Meryn.

"Release her," she ordered.

Ser Meryn glowered. "Your Grace-"

"I will vouch for the Lady Sansa," Margaery said, her voice cold as she stared at Ser Meryn in lieu of Sansa. "I, well...after what happened to Lady Reanna, I was frightened to utilize any of my ladies for my service. The Lady Sansa graciously offered to go into the city for me, though I insisted she take my brother Ser Loras with her." She shook her head. "I don't know why she thought to go on her own, but the matter is fixed now; my brother is here. Loras, you will accompany Lady Sansa into the city and back, and Ser Meryn may escort me back into my chambers."

Ser Meryn glared, but let go of Sansa's arm. She resisted the urge to rub at her wrist the moment it was released.

"Now, Ser Loras," Margaery told her brother, ushering him forward as Ser Meryn moved to stand hulking behind her.

Loras blinked at his sister, and then nodded, holding his arm out for Sansa. She looked at it for a long moment, glanced back at Margaery just long enough to see her encouraging nod, and then took it.

They walked out of the Keep together, and Sansa felt tears stinging at the back of her eyes, and tried to pretend that this was the triumphant escape she had wanted so desperately, even though she knew it was not.

Ser Loras led her down into the city, which was just beginning to wake itself in the early light of the morning, the first sounds of life emanating from it as Sansa and Loras stepped into the main square in silence.

The ships in the harbor were just beginning to leave, the ones that were not staying, that were going to anywhere but this godsforsaken place.

"Margaery has returned to the Maidenvault?" Sansa asked, after searching frantically for something to say, something that would not make her look so guilty, would not make Loras continue to give her that pitying look.

Ser Loras clutched his hands behind his back. "She has, in fact."

Sansa swallowed. "I thought it brought too much pain to her. She is...better now, I hope?"

Loras glanced at her. "My sister has always kept her true emotions very close to her heart," he said, a bit of the frustration Sansa had felt in that regard bleeding into his voice. "But the death of her lady, I think, has affected her deeply."

Sansa swallowed. "She has my sympathies. I did not know Lady Reanna well, but..."

"The move to King's Landing was difficult on her. On many of the ladies of Highgarden. It is...very different, here," Loras allowed. "Forgive me, Lady Sansa, but what were you really doing in the Maidenvault, if you did not know of my sister's return there?"

Sansa bit her lip. "As your lady sister said, merely an errand for her. She didn't...didn't want it known widely, so she asked me to help her with it."

Loras raised an eyebrow. "It seems to me then, that she would ask anyone else."

Sansa shrugged, glanced around at the crowd surrounding them, the throng of people pressed up on all sides of her. "You can pretend you lost me in the crowd," she told Loras quietly. "No one will know."

Loras gave her a small smile. "And do you think anyone will believe that?"

Sansa swallowed, voiced a thought she wasn't sure she should. But then, she'd been doing that a lot, lately. "Margaery is the Queen."

Loras' look went rather sharp, then. "I think we should return to the Keep, my lady. You have what Margaery sent you for, after all." He nodded to the parcel in her hands.

Sansa sighed. "Yes, I think you're right."

Her thoughts strayed to the vivid dream she'd had not hours before, though she doubted it would ever become a reality, now.


	52. SANSA XXXVII

"There's something I need to tell you," Sansa said, "and I am sorry I didn't tell you before."

Margaery blinked at her, folding her hands in her lap and giving Sansa her full attention.

They were sitting in Margaery's chambers again, the door shut behind Lady Elinor during her last refill of their tea. Chambers which Sansa reflected that it felt rather nice to return to, for they were far more private and...comforting than the gardens, and, even though they were alone now as they usually were there, she felt far safer here, about to tell Margaery something as private as this.

"What is it?" Margaery asked gently, so sweetly, and Sansa swallowed hard.

And then it all came spilling out, the time she had seen Cersei approach Reanna in the corridor, Reanna's strange behavior after that, the bruises she'd seen on Reanna's arm after Margaery's rapist had not succeeded.

"What I don't understand is," Sansa said quietly, sinking into the chair beside Margaery. "Why she would do that, kill Reanna when the girl was clearly working for her. Perhaps to cover up evidence as she left, but..." she thought of the way Reanna's body had been described. Her lord husband had not allowed her to see it, but Shae had seen it with her own eyes, still shuddered every time Sansa caught her thinking about it.

"She was not a spy for Cersei," Margaery said, staring calmly ahead as her hand fiddled with the napkin she was holding.

"But-"

"She was a spy for me," Margaery went on, as if Sansa had not spoken, and then turned, meeting Sansa's eyes. "She was to put herself out there, gain Cersei's attention as an ally against me, and then report to me Cersei's plans concerning me."

Sansa stared at her for a long moment, feeling the first vestiges of horror since she had seen Margaery standing whole and hale beside Joffrey return to her. "She...what?"

Margaery's expression softened. "Sansa..."

"How could you ask her to do something like that?" Sansa demanded, horror filling her.

"Sansa, Lady Reanna volunteered for the chance," Margaery told her gently, still clasping her hands, but Sansa found herself unwilling to pull away, much as she knew that perhaps she should. "She knew that, if she did not, Cersei would find someone else, someone who would not feed her lies, but the truth."

"And now she's dead," Sansa breathed in horror, finding the sudden strength to pull away from Margaery, then.

"Yes," Margaery agreed. "And I am quite saddened at the death of a most beloved friend and confidante," she went on. "I...I did not think that Cersei would stoop to such a thing."

Sansa felt sympathy welling up within her, despite herself. "What will you do?"

Margaery's eyes hardened. "I will bury my friend, and then I will see that she has justice, Sansa. It is all that any of us can do for those that we love, is it not?"

"But...justice against Cersei," Sansa said quietly. "How?"

It was something that she longed for as well, but had never, to her mind, been more than a dream, nor one capable of coming true.

"I don't know," Margaery whispered, voice hoarse. "I don't know."

"Oh, Margaery," Sansa reached for her, but Margaery flinched away, like one of Tommen's frightened kittens whenever Joffrey came near.

Like Sansa, whenever Joffrey came near, and she swallowed hard, lowering her hand.

"I'm not sad," Margaery said quietly. "Or broken, or teary, or anything else you may be thinking. I'm..." she glanced down at her shaking hand, clenched it into a fist. "I'm angry. I'm so angry, all the time, now."

Sansa swallowed. "I'm sorry."

"I don't want to hear that," Margaery told her honestly. "I thought about having him interrogated, tortured," she admitted airily. "Getting him to admit why he did what he did, to admit that she..." she cleared her throat. "But he would never have betrayed Cersei Lannister. And if he had, she would have killed him first. I...didn't deserve to see _her_ kill him, to see her win, again. And...he may have been horrible, may have gladly been Cersei's puppet, for all I know, but...he was still only a puppet. It was Cersei who...She should pay for what happened, and she never will, not that way."

And then, much to Sansa's horror, Margaery began to cry.

Sansa had never thought she would see Margaery cry. Had, on multiple occasions, found herself wondering if Margaery was even capable of it, a question which had disturbed her greatly. The other girl was far too composed, too perfect to let herself be free with her emotions for even a moment.

And yet, here she was.

Crying, in front of Sansa.

And Sansa did the only thing she could think to do, the thing she had been wanting to have happen to her since she arrived in King's Landing. She now understood how Tyrion could turn down her request and then embrace as she cried in the same moment.

She reached out, and pulled Margaery into an embrace that the other girl fought for a moment, before she relaxed into it, deep, silent, shaking sobs rattling against Sansa, her eyes squeezed shut against Sansa's shoulder.

"It's all right," Sansa whispered, awkwardly rubbing her back. "It's all right. It's over now. It's over now."

She couldn't remember, in that moment, the last time she had comforted someone, not Arya, who had never sought it, maybe Bran or Rickon, once or twice, Jeyne, before Petyr Baelish took her away forever, but no one after that.

It felt almost...nice.

"I have you," she whispered, planting a kiss on the other girl's forehead, and Margaery sat up suddenly, sniffling hard and wiping at her eyes with one of her embroidered handkerchiefs.

"I'm sorry," she said finally, smiling at Sansa. "I..."

"You don't have to explain," Sansa said quietly, this weird role reversal as strange to her as it must be to Margaery, now. "Or apologize. Margaery...What happened to you was horrible, and wrong, and now with your friend...you have nothing to be sorry for."

Margaery stared at her for a long moment, eyes still filled with pools, before, hesitantly, she nodded.

"I just don't usually..." she swallowed awkwardly, couldn't seem to keep Sansa's gaze.

Sansa smiled gently, reaching out and squeezing her hand in response. "I know."

Margaery glanced up, smiled at her. "You're a good friend, Sansa Stark."


	53. LORAS II

Loras let out a loud groan as he emptied his load into Olyvar's mouth, bracing himself against the wall and hoping against hope that no one would come around the corner.

Or perhaps he wasn't, really.

"I can't do this again," Loras said, and Olyvar blinked up at him, releasing Loras' cock with an audible pop.

"Can't do what?"

"I..." Loras felt his erection wilt as he pushed Olyvar away, sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "We were fucking on the day my sister was nearly..."

Olyvar glanced up at him, panting, face red, and his lips twisted into that of sympathy. "You weren't to know."

"I was on duty. I was supposed to be guarding her, and instead, I was letting you suck me off in a room down the hall." He clenched, unclenched his fist.

Olyvar watched the movement. "You can't blame yourself for it," he comforted, and Loras glared at him.

"If I can't blame myself, who can I blame?" he demanded. "Who can she blame? It was my duty to guard her, and I failed her."

"Must you spend your whole life guarding your sister?" Olyvar asked softly, his blue eyes going rather wide with sorrow. "She is the Queen. She should have had more than one guard protecting her that day, and besides, she's fine-"

"You're right," Loras interrupted. "She is the Queen, and I am in the Kingsguard. It will be my pleasure and duty to guard her for the rest of my life."

Olyvar gave him a sad look, and then reached for his clothes where they lay in a heap on the floor.

"Loras..."

"Just go," Loras said quietly. "Please."

Olyvar sighed, and then began to redress, nodding to himself.

When he reached the door, he turned back to say one final thing.

"Even the Kingsguard are men who have to live sometime, Loras," Olyvar said quietly, before slipping out the door, letting it slide shut behind him.

Loras tore his fingers through his hair with a silent cry of frustration, and then slumped against the bed.


	54. SANSA XXXVIII

The novelty of Lady Reanna's death had worn off somewhat with the knowledge that her killer had been found and punished. According to Maester Quyburn, Ser Osmund had murdered Lady Reanna before going to Margaery's chambers in his attempt to attack her that day, and no one had found the body until it started to smell.

Sansa knew nothing about bodies after death, beyond what she had seen on the city walls, but she knew that Maester Quyburn was Cersei's pet as much as Ser Osmund had ever been.

She did not understand why Margaery then endorsed him, saying that she had not seen Lady Reanna since that day when Sansa knew for a fact that she had, that they both had, during one of their dinners before Cersei's wedding. Margaery had not even seemed displeased with the girl.

But she remembered what Margaery had said, that Cersei would never face justice in the usual way, and wondered what she was plotting. She could not even bring herself to feel annoyed at the lie, for Ser Osmund certainly deservered to have his name maligned as much as Margaery saw fit.

Still, the whole thing smelled terribly treacherous to her. She knew that to survive, one must play the game, but she preferred the honesty she could get far better.

Not that she could say much better for herself, at the moment.

Sansa had been foolish to accept the offer, all of that time ago, though it felt like no time at all, now; she had no guarantee that he and House Martell were any better than the Lannisters, but for the look in his eyes when he spoke of his sister.

And Sansa had seen that same look in Jaime Lannister's eyes when he spoke of his.

She was not entirely unconvinced, after so much time had passed since she had struck such a bargain with Prince Oberyn, that it was not some sort of honeyed trap, to betray her to the King, considering the amount of time that Prince Oberyn had remained in King's Landing, and his apparent unconcern with leaving.

"What do you want of me?" Sansa demanded, turning on him abruptly, and Oberyn blinked at her, coming to a halt. "Once we reach Dorne, you must have some plans for me. Why is it that you're helping me? Do you...wish to marry me?"

It had been a constant worry, ever since her husband had brought up the thought of having children with her.

"Marry you?" he echoed. And then, "Ah. Because you are a Stark."

"The Last Stark," she corrected, quietly.

"Lady Sansa, I have no intention of dragging you off to Dorne to replace this prison with that one."

"Then why won't you tell me what you want from me?"

Oberyn swallowed, didn't meet her eyes. "Because I don't want anything from you, Sansa Stark. It was not actually my intention, when I came here, to seduce a little girl into running away with me, whatever you may have heard about me. You...Elia spent her last moments in King's Landing, because I was too late to save her and because those who should have protected her abandoned her." He swallowed audibly. "If you still wish to come with me when I leave this place, and can trust my intentions enough for that, you may do whatever you wish when we reach Dorne. I care not."

Sansa felt rather shamefaced, at those words. "Then why...I just...I want to understand, Prince Oberyn. Why haven't we left yet? What is it you're doing here?"

Oberyn gave her a long look. "You confessed to me once that you hate the Lannisters as much as I."

Sansa glanced around, eyes wide at his words, not even whispered. "Prince Oberyn!"

He looked amused at her scandalized expression, rather than surprised. "Do you think that anyone within the walls of King's Landing cares for the Lannisters beyond the Lannisters?" he asked, tone almost teasing. "Your secret is safe, Lady Sansa."

She stared at him. "I don't...What are you planning? Why won't you tell me, if my secret is safe with you?"

He smirked. "Ah. A bargain, then. Smart."

She nodded, biting her lip.

"You have spent some time around these players of the game," he said, and sounded far too appreciative. And then he leaned down, so that his lips pressed against her hair and whispered in her ear, "When we leave King's Landing, you will never have to do so again."

She stood up on tip toe, kissing Prince Oberyn on the cheek, but her heart was heavy.


	55. Letters

My dearest Willas,

I am deeply sorry for the trouble about to, if it has not already done so, throw itself upon your doorstep. Believe me, if there were any other way of alleviating certain pressures here in the capitol, I would have resorted to those first, but Grandmother was insistent that there were none.

And I would have liked to send you a different gift, for what I know is fast approaching as your Nameday. I was going to send you one of Joffrey's infamous hunting bitches, but I sent you this one instead. Please handle her with care. She requires constant attention and feeding, or she will bite.

Marg

~

My dear sister,

Not to worry, you know your dear brother is quite resilient. As for my new wife, she is quite content to shut herself away in her own chambers and not speak a word to anyone save the furniture she routinely destroys.

She is quite the fine houseguest in that respect. She has not even bothered Mother yet, though of course Leonnette is petrified of her anyhow, though of course you know that nothing and no one bothers Mother.

And...well, she does provide some amount of entertainment that has been lacking since your departure.

Willas

~

Willas, you are absolutely horrible.

Marg

~

My dear sister,

And here I thought I was being humorous. At any rate, Cersei is no more interested than I in consummating our new marriage, regardless of what Garlan or Tywin Lannister has to say about it, so I suppose that is one upside to our situation: we have made our first decision as husband and wife together, without a fight.

She spends most of her time in her chambers still, writing letters with what the servants report are the frenzy and anger of a madwoman, and composing them to Tywin Lannister. If he weren't made of stone, I might almost pity him.

Willas

~

Willas,

Don't underestimate her. She was angry at being sent off into exile, and she knew it was my fault that it happened when she left. That's why she... Never mind that. A nasty business, all around.

Your devoted (and worried) sister,

Marg

~

Marg,

You really needn't be worried. She seems to have no designs for me, and, even if she did, Garlan has taken...precautions. As I told you, she does nothing but hide herself away in her chambers each day, and never emerges, even for meals now. The servants deliver them, and take away her chamber pot. I suppose they know for certain whether or not the Lannisters really shit gold.

Willas

~

My stupid brother,

I don't think the most concerning factor of this whole ordeal is figuring out whether a joke about the Lannisters is true. (Although it was amusing to read, I suppose). Cersei is not the sort to sit away plotting if she can help it; whatever she is up to could be bad for all involved, including you. You must have the servants start reading her letters before she sends them out, just in case.

Marg

~

Marg,

The servants are scared shitless of her, although I have enlisted one of them to read her notes. She writes only to her father, the same letters over and over, about how angry she is with him for forcing her into another loveless marriage.

I almost feel sorry for her, but then, she killed one of grandmother's beloved birds the other day, just for sitting on her windowsill.

Willas


	56. SANSA XXXIX

The summons, when it came, did not entirely surprise Sansa. She had only been expecting it since the moment she had learned the truth about what Joffrey really was. Dreading it.

She had thought, for a few absurd moments, that now that she was Lord Tyrion's wife, Joffrey really would leave her alone, as Tyrion had promised he would. That, even if he could always torment her, he couldn't...

"The King demands your presence at once, m'lady," Ser Meryn repeated, and Sansa flinched, standing.

"Of course," she whispered, moving toward the door before Ser Meryn could reach out and grab her. She could remember all too well the feel of his hands beating her, on Joffrey's orders, and she knew that he would not need orders to do so again, whether she was Lord Tyrion's wife or not.

She glanced back into the empty room; Tyrion had gone to some meeting of the Small Council, though it was beyond Sansa why they had to meet at such a late hour of the night, and there was no one here to rescue her.

She should have learned long ago that there was never going to be anyone to rescue her, not from Joffrey, not from anyone.

She didn't know why the lesson took so long to sink in.

And then they rounded the hall, and their way to Joffrey's chambers, so close now that Sansa could feel herself beginning to sweat, was blocked by Ser Jaime Lannister.

She wilted, the small bead of hope she'd allowed herself to feel evaporating.

"Where are you taking the Lady Sansa?" Ser Jaime asked calmly, and Ser Meryn lifted his chin, grasping Sansa by her elbow and glaring back defiantly at the Kingslayer.

"King Joffrey demands her presence," he said levelly, and Sansa felt the Kingslayer's eyes turn to her, in that moment, searching for something he didn't seem to find.

"In the dead of night," he finally said, voice flat, dubious.

Ser Meryn practically growled out his answer, "Yes."

"And what does our King wish to see her for?" Ser Jaime asked, in a tone that Sansa thought implied he already knew.

Ser Meryn's lips curled into a sneer. "It is not the Kingsguard's place to question the orders of the King. Move aside, Lord Commander."

Jaime raised a brow, before turning toward Sansa. "Go back to my brother, Lady Sansa, and stay in your chambers until morning."

Ser Meryn opened his mouth to protest, but Ser Jaime levelled him with a look. "I will deal with the King in the morning. I am the Lord Commander, and I am giving you your orders. You're dismissed, Ser Meryn. Go find some servant girl to torment."

Ser Meryn ground his teeth together, glanced at Sansa once more, and then practically threw her at Ser Jaime, before stomping away.

"Cheerful sod, isn't he?" Ser Jaime muttered at his retreating back, and Sansa stared up at him with wide eyes. He sighed. "Are you all right, Lady Sansa?"

"Joffrey-"

"I will deal with him," he told her, a quiet determination in his voice that she found herself wanting to believe. "Go back to my brother's chambers." He hesitated. "I will walk you there. It likely isn't safe to be prowling about the castle at this time of night."

She wanted to say that she should go anyway, that Joffrey would only be angrier if she did not do everything he asked of her, but something about the look in Ser Jaime's eyes stopped her.

She didn't know what it was; she knew that she couldn't trust him, anymore than she could trust any Lannister, much as her lord husband liked to pretend that she could, and that he was a wicked man who had thrown her brother from a window, but Sansa found herself turning around and timidly following Ser Jaime back to Lord Tyrion's chambers.

They walked in silence, because Sansa could hardly imagine starting a conversation with Ser Jaime and he did not provide one, and by the time they had finally reached Lord Tyrion's chambers (her chambers), she felt terribly relieved to leave the stifling silence that was the Kingslayer's presence.

He stood there awkwardly for a long moment, and she could tell that there was something just on the tip of his tongue, so she waited.

But, when nothing was forthcoming, she stepped forward to open the door anyway.

"Lady Sansa," he did speak then, and Sansa paused, turning around and raising an eyebrow at him expectantly.

She had never imagined Ser Jaime to be a coward, not even when the reports came that he had shoved her brother out of a window. But, in that moment, watching him stare at her with something like wariness in her eyes, she wondered what could possibly be so terrifying about a little girl.

"Tell my brother to keep a better eye on you," he said finally, and then turned and marched away, hand on the pommel of his sword.

Sansa was left staring after him in bewilderment, before she stepped into her chambers and shut the door with a quiet click behind her.

Tyrion, where he lay on the sofa, apparently having returned from his meeting, did not even wake, not that she'd expected him to.

He often came back to their chambers from those meetings drunk, after all.

Sansa shivered, and wondered if he would have even noticed her absence, had Ser Meryn succeeded in his orders.


	57. MARGAERY XV

Margaery knew that the Crown's need for her family's gold and wheat and soldiers would protect her from the most vulgar of her husband's...predilections, when they were wed.

She had also known that she would they would not protect her forever.

"Are you sure?" she asked Lady Rosamund, clutching the girl's hand.

The girl nodded, lowering her eyes. "Yes, my lady. Ser Jaime Lannister intercepted them before Ser Meryn could take the Lady Sansa to King Joffrey's chambers as he demanded, however."

Margaery's lips thinned. "And did the King say why he wanted her?"

Rosamund glanced sideways, not answering, not that Margaery needed an answer.

She knew that she was beautiful; her father believed it to be her greatest asset, and while she and her grandmother disagreed, it had turned many a head in Westeros.

But her physicality was not why Joffrey had found her beautiful, and, though she had managed to keep a hold on him so far, she knew now that she would have to try harder.

Her husband was the King, and believed he could have anything he wanted. He was also insane, which made him unpredictable.

Margaery could not afford to become the predictable, pretty queen of Joffrey Baratheon. And neither could Sansa.

She stood to her feet abruptly. "And where is the King, currently?"

Lady Rosamund's eyes widened. "Your Grace-"

"The King, Lady Rosamund," Margaery said, her patience thinning. "I am sure you must know where he is, after having spent the majority of your day fishing out gossip about him."

Lady Rosamund swallowed hard, and Margaery knew that it was out of concern for her more than anything, but still, it annoyed her.

"He repaired to his royal bedchambers for a moment, after telling his men to prepare for a hunt," she said finally, not meeting Margaery's eyes, swallowing again.

Margaery nodded. "Thank you, Lady Rosamund," she said coolly, and then swept imperiously from the room.

She stalked her way to Joffrey's chambers, glaring at the Kingsguard outside his door who told her the King had asked not to be disturbed until they wisely stepped aside, and then swept into their chambers.

She shivered, remembering the long nights she had spent here when she had refrained from staying in the Maidenvault.

"My queen," Joffrey glanced up and smirked, as she entered the room. "I was just about to go on a hunting trip. You've been doing so well with the targets lately, perhaps you'd like to come with us?"

"Have I...displeased you in the bedchambers in some way, my lord?" Margaery asked calmly, shortly, as she pulled the door shut behind her, ignoring his invitation altogether and affecting a look of sorrow.

Joffrey blinked up at her. "Huh?" he asked intelligently, and Margaery smiled, coming forward and sitting on the edge of the bed, near his feet, as he sat leaned against it.

She thought he might enjoy the symbolism.

"Only...one of my ladies overheard an order for you to bring Sansa Stark to your bedchambers just last night," she said quietly, running her fingers along the hem of his trousers. "You've worried me, my love."

Joffrey stared at her fingers apprehensively.

"I hope you do not punish her for eavesdropping, nor me for my worries over your...interest in another." She swallowed hard. "You are the King, of course, and entitled to anything you wish. Only, I hope that you might tell me, if there is something...more, that you want of me?" she glanced up at him through hooded eyes. "I would do anything for my king."

Joffrey swallowed hard. "It is...It is not something appropriate for a lady, nor for my queen, to subject herself to."

But it was something that he would like to see Sansa Stark subject herself to, his plaything even if he did not keep her chained to his bed.

Yet.

Margaery lifted a brow, deft fingers reaching out to cup her husband through his trousers. He let out a gasp, squirming for a moment, and then swallowed hard and when he glanced down at her, and she could see the madness reflected in his eyes.

Margaery smiled. "I would like very much to please my lord in all things," she said coolly, reaching out and grasping his chin under her deft fingers. "Just say the word."

Joffrey sucked in a breath. "I..."

Margaery reached to pull his trousers down around his knees, but Joffrey's hand reached out suddenly, stopped her. "It...it isn't that," he said, and looked almost embarrassed.

Margaery cocked her head. "Then what, my love?"

He swallowed. "I'd like...I want..." He spun away from her, and Margaery got to her feet, following him. When he spun back to her, he looked almost livid. "I called Lady Sansa because I wanted to hurt her! Because I wanted to watch Ser Meryn slap her pretty cheeks until they bled, and then rip off her dress and slap her virgin cunt until it bled, too, until she was crying on her knees and begging, and I could hit her with my crossbow until she was covered in the prettiest of bruises. Because I need..."

Margaery thought of how, just the other day, Sansa had held her so warmly, so gently, and nearly gagged. That strange, strong girl who had endured so much more than Margaery ever could have, and yet still found the kindness in her heart to give someone else comfort, merely because they were crying.

"Then do it to me."

Joffrey's head shot up. "What?"

She stepped forward, between his thighs, pressing up against his prick, which had hardened at his words. "Hurt me, Your Grace."

He let out a stuttering breath. "You are my queen. I could never..."

She smiled, "I don't mind. I think...If we did it right..." she moved closer, "I think it could be something we would both enjoy."

He swallowed. "Are you...are you sure?"

"Yes."

Joffrey rubbed his hands together, like an excited child. "I'll just call the guard-"

"No," Margaery interrupted, and he glanced at her. She forced herself to grin. "Do it to me yourself, my love. I want to...feel you marking me, with your own hands, or I don't think I could enjoy it." She reached out, taking his hands in her own. He stared down at their entwined fingers. "Please."


	58. SANSA XL

It had been several days since Ser Jaime saved her from having to go to Joffrey’s bed, and Sansa was waiting for the inevitable backlash, the punishment for daring to disobey him.

It had not come, which only served to make her more anxious.

Instead, a dinner had been announced, apparently by Margaery herself, although everyone who was important in King’s Landing had been invited.

Sansa watched as the King and Queen entered the dining room, Margaery's hand placed delicately on Joffrey's, her eyes glinting with a light that seemed almost feverish, a light that reminded Sansa of the look she often saw in Joffrey's eyes, though it was not entirely the same.

Something about the look in Margaery's eyes disturbed her more than seeing her safe and whole by Joffrey's side for the first time after their wedding had done, and Sansa turned her attention back to her empty bowl of soup, wishing that it was full so that she might pretend to eat it, might swirl her spoon about in it and pretend distraction.

She stared down at the silver bowl until she thought she saw it filling with cool, pooling blood.

She did not look up until she heard her husband's sharp intake of breath, and then only with the sort of resignation that came with having heard many of those, at court, and knowing what they usually meant.

She did not immediately see what had caused this reaction; instead, she saw the way that Mace Tyrell's hand went to his mouth in horror, and her husband's face had twisted into something almost resembling pity, which quickly made her look away from him once more.

Ser Loras' hand was on the pommel of his sword, and, for a moment, Sansa thought that he looked as though he had every intention of using it, before his lady grandmother reached out, placing a hand over his and muttering just loudly enough for her to hear, "You fool, put that away before you start a bloody war."

Tywin Lannister, however unruffled, certainly looked annoyed.

Margaery was standing almost completely level with Sansa then, arm still on Joffrey's. Sansa did not see what it was about her that so shocked the others watching, save perhaps for her dress.

She wore a gown of palest gold, clinging tight to her lithe body like a lover, with little beads of red woven into the low collar and the waistline, in lieu of a belt, and resembling, Sansa thought, beads of blood. She wondered how Margaery could stand to wear such a thing.

And then she passed by Sansa, limping a little, unnoticeable almost until that point, and Sansa saw the smooth expanse of her naked back, the dress revealing skin from her neck to the small of her back, where the material suddenly reappeared. And the angry red marks, lines of blood since dried and cleaned, that stretched from the top of her shoulderblades to where they disappeared beneath her gown, not as far as some of the scars that Sansa still wore, but far enough to be easily seen.

Blue bruises sprang out along the back of Margaery's neck, and Sansa could easily imagine the fingers that had wrapped around smooth skin and squeezed, as they did now where they held Margaery's hand.

The marks on her neck would fade. The marks on her back would scar, Sansa knew.

Sansa's eyes found themselves traveling to Widow's Wail, strapped at Joffrey's waist, and the taste of metallic blood in her bowl had suddenly filled her mouth.

The King and Queen appeared not to realize the reaction their entrance had caused, and they made their way to their seats in their usual moods, Margaery turning as her husband held out her chair for her, so that her back was on full display for all.

Sansa wondered if Joffrey had forced her to wear that gown, that all might see what he had done for her, but surely, that would be foolish of him. The Tyrells would want revenge for such a blatant cruelty to their beloved rose.

Unlike Sansa, Margaery had those who would kill for her, Sansa knew.

"Some wine," Joffrey called out, and one of the servants rushed forward to pour it for him. He raised a hand, and the man paused. Sansa thought he might be shaking too badly to pour it, but then Joffrey gestured to Margaery's cup. "For my queen."

Margaery's smile was so bright that Sansa did not know how she could have managed it, with such a deep gash on her back.

Sansa would not have been able to. She was certain that her forced smiles, after Joffrey beat her and bade her thank him for it, were always full of pain.

Margaery's smile was just as full of radiance as ever, and she leaned forward, ignoring the servant to kiss her husband's cheek.

Sansa had never seen Joffrey initiate any sort of intimate physical touch between the two of them, even before they were married, at least not in public.

And so it was doubly strange, to watch as he kissed the scar on Margaery's shoulder, as though it tasted of the sweetest fruit.

She swallowed down blood, and wondered absently when she had bitten her tongue.

Lord Tywin cleared his throat, clearly annoyed with the couple for their tardiness and now for their...display, and Joffrey, not before giving one last kiss to his wife, turned and said, "A toast! To my queen! Let us eat."

Margaery swallowed her wine, and Sansa winced when she saw the mottled blue bruises encircling Margaery's neck, so deep they almost looked like the sapphires of a necklace.

Tyrion muttered under his breath, "It's a wonderful she doesn't try to kill him in his sleep," and Sansa could not help but find herself agreeing with him.

She didn't understand why Margaery hadn't at least tried, yet. She had to see, by now, that being queen was hardly worth all of this.

When the servant leaned forward to refill Margaery's glass again, he tripped as Joffrey jostled the table, and spilled the stuff over the front of Margaery's beautiful, horrid gown.

Margaery let out a noise of surprise, rearing back, but not, Sansa noticed, letting go of her wine glass, as the onlookers went silent.

And then, Joffrey flew into a rage.

There was something about watching one of Joffrey's rages. One should have felt as though they were watching a horrible child throw a temper tantrum, as indeed they were, but there was something more to it than that, being there in person and watching it happen with Joffrey.

He was the King.

"You stupid fool! How dare you ruin my lady's gown!" he screeched at the servant, a vein on his temple throbbing. "I should have you flogged for your insolence!"

The servant began to stammer out some sort of apology, and Margaery rolled her eyes.

Sansa stared.

"Honestly, Joffrey, it means nothing. He can help my ladies wash it out, if you wish. I'm rather...starved." She gestured toward her thus far uneaten plate.

Joffrey spun on her. "It was a beautiful gown, and he must be punished for that, not made to fondle it while he pretends my wife the queen wears it."

Margaery bit her lip; some might have thought her nervous, but to Sansa, and, perhaps, to Joffrey, she almost looked as if she were hiding a smile. "Very well."

Joffrey grinned, gestured to Ser Meryn. "Flog him in the courtyard! I want his back in ribbons when my lady and I are done with our meal, so that she can see it." He grinned at Margaery as he said these words, and she grinned back.

Ser Meryn dragged the stammering, pleading servant from the room as Tywin Lannister rolled his eyes in sync with Olenna Tyrell.

Joffrey kissed Margaery again, full on the lips, harsh and unyielding, and, when they both pulled away, they were panting, and Margaery's lips glistened with little droplets of blood in the light.

Sansa had worn her scars from Joffrey with shame since the very first day they had been given to her.

Margaery wore them with pride.


	59. LORAS III

He gripped her arm, twisting it sideways until a very visible bruise appeared. "I'm going to kill him."

Margaery jerked her arm free, flinching in a way that reminded her brother all too well of what Joffrey must have done to her. "You won't."

Loras stared at her incredulously. "Margaery. You can't be serious."

She sighed, turned slightly away from him, and Loras flinched at the sight of her naked back, of the scars there. Scars that her little bastard of a husband had inflicted.

They were in her rooms now, rooms he was happy that she had returned to, for the privacy it now allotted them, but worried that she had returned to all too quickly in her desire to be away from Joffrey. He still saw the way she flinched at the sight of the bed, when she thought no one was looking.

"I am the Queen. You will not kill my husband and deprive me of that. I will never forgive you if you do," Margaery said, in a dull, toneless voice that sent shivers up his spine.

Loras reached out, grabbed her arm again and spun her back to face him. He winced when he saw the look in her eyes, the fear quickly tempered by annoyance, softened his grip on her.

He told himself that the look in her eyes was not half crazed.

"And I will never forgive myself if I don't. You told me that if he ever...that if things ever got out of control, that there were...contingencies," he accused, raising a brow, for he had yet to see such contingencies.

Margaery pulled away a second time, rubbed at her wrist and gave him a cool smile. "Things are not out of control."

Loras glanced pointedly down at her scars, and Margaery sighed.

"I'm handling it. The whole thing was...my suggestion." She couldn't meet his eyes as she said those words, and he couldn't decide if he could believe them, even as shock rolled through him.

"Your...your suggestion?" Loras repeated dumbly.

Margaery lifted her chin, staring levelly back at him. "Yes. My suggestion. And it saved my reputation, saved our family. You're welcome. Someone had to."

Loras flinched back at the raw anger in her voice, the accusation that she wouldn't say hiding just under the surface.

He both wanted to hear her say it and didn't.

"Margaery, I...I saw you, after that blackguard Ser Osmund..." he shook his head, swallowed hard. He knew he had to be careful with how he worded what he was about to say.

Margaery was a year younger than him, but sometimes, it seemed that she was decades older. She always knew what to say when he needed it, always knew how best to help him. She had been there for him, for as long as he could remember, always the steadying force behind him.

Loras had never understood how to be there for her because of it. Because Margaery was always put together, always knew what she wanted and how to achieve it, always hid her emotions so deeply that sometimes he wondered if she had any.

And, as close as they had always been, he hadn't truly known until he saw the way her hands shook after that bastard dared to touch her.

"I know that you weren't...unaffected by what happened, much as you would like to pretend otherwise."

Margaery turned away, but not before he saw the way her lips tightened, her fingers dug into the fabric of her gown.

"This has nothing to do with that," she spat at the far wall, and Loras sighed, reached out to touch her before lowering his hand.

"I think it does," he said quietly, to her back, pretending he didn't notice the way it stiffened. "I think...I went to see Olyvar again, after what happened to you. And then I told him that I couldn't see him again and it's been killing me ever since, not to."

She turned back, stared at him incredulously. "What comfort is that supposed to bring me? That I am bringing you pain?"

Loras flinched at the raw anger in her eyes. "None. But...I think I understand, Margy. I went back to him even as I hated myself for it, because I crave it now, because you won't tell me that I failed you."

She blinked. "Do you want me to tell you that? Is that what you're waiting for? Me to say that because you weren't doing your duty Cersei's toy was able to come into my chambers and hold me down and-"

"Stop it," Loras pleaded, holding his hands up as if to cover his ears. "Stop, please."

Margaery stared at him pityingly. "Why do you think I said nothing, Loras? Is it easier, to hear that?" She stepped forward, took his hands in hers. They weren't shaking, now. "I don't blame you, Loras. I don't...I don't blame him, either."

Loras swallowed. "Do you blame yourself?" he asked, and Margaery slapped him. And then she sank onto the divan, hiding her face in her hands and ignoring him completely.

Loras stood beside her, a little helpless, unsure if he should speak or should turn and leave her be. Unsure what she wanted from him.

In the end, he turned and slammed the door behind him, because, damn the Seven, he knew why she wanted it. The punishment, even if it wasn't her fault. Even if he knew he would never be able to convince that she had no reason to want it. Understood it all too well.

He'd been pining for it for weeks.

Weeks of pent up frustration, with his decision toward celibacy, with Margaery, were working against him, and Loras found himself stalking down to Littlefinger's establishment once more, imagining fucking Olyvar into his bed, watching him gasp and cry out his name while Loras forbade him from coming.

He found Olyvar in the bed of another man.

If it had been Prince Oberyn, as Olyvar had hinted at some time ago, it would have been all right; the two of them had rather fantasized about that, themselves, and Loras would not begrudge him that.

But it was some smallfolk with coin, and Loras growled when he saw the man inside Olyvar, when he threw open the doors to Olyvar's usual room despite the whore at the front's demands that he wait for her.

Olyvar glanced up, face contorted in the throes of passion, and that frustration turned to anger.

The man with Olyvar gulped, pulling out and reaching for his trousers; he had recognized Loras' white cloak, clearly, if not him, and quickly made himself scarce.

Loras was quick enough to take his place, before Olyvar could get up and talk to him.

"This is a...a pleasant surprise," Olyvar gasped out, arching his back as Loras bit at the appex of his neck and shoulder.

"Bend over the desk," Loras ordered him, when he could speak again, pulling him up from the cushions. "I want to fuck you on it."

He had never seen Olyvar move so quickly in his life.


	60. MARGAERY XVI

"Get out, all of you," Olenna said then. "I wish to speak with my beloved granddaughter and queen alone. You lot are wasting the fresh air, at any rate."

Margaery smiled softly at her mother's words while her cousins all fled the garden veranda as quickly as possible, slipping into the seat one of her cousins vacated with all of the grace of the queen she now was.

She hadn't had a normal conversation with her grandmother in some time, however, and she had a burning suspicion that she knew what this one was going to be about. Margaery was not relishing the thought of that conversation, not given the way that Loras had reacted, when she had attempted to explain herself to him.

"I assume that marriage to King Joffrey is everything you thought it would be," her grandmother said calmly, when they were once more alone, and Margaery glanced up, could see the half-formed question in her grandmother's eyes.

"I went in with no true expectations," the granddaughter said, "only half-formed understandings from what we had heard already. It is...different, but not wholly so."

Her grandmother's eyes narrowed. "And? Details, you foolish girl."

Margaery knew that her grandmother resorted to such insults only when she truly was annoyed by her companions, or feeling defensive, and she knew it was not the former. Much as she adored her grandmother for the worry she could hear in the old woman's voice, she could not afford to reveal herself in such a way, and Margaery found herself rather envying her grandmother for the first time since she was a little girl and had realized that her grandmother was everything she hoped to one day be.

And she also knew that she had provided more than enough details on her marriage to her grandmother before this moment, and yet she could not bring herself to go into more specifics now. Some part of her was...horribly ashamed, by what she had allowed Joffrey to do to her, and even if the proof of his treatment of her was visible before her grandmother's all too keen eyes now, Margaery was strangely reluctant to speak of it.

Margaery swallowed. "Everything that Lady Sansa said was true, grandmother."

Her grandmother sighed, but did not look surprised. Certainly not after what she had seen, just the day before. "And has he hurt you? Your brother Loras seems quite ready to become another Kingslayer, if necessary, and I am afraid that an old woman and an old fool will not be able to stop him."

Margaery snorted, wondered how she had become the only one capable of restraining her brother, when they had so clearly and quickly drifted apart in recent years. "Of course not."

Her grandmother lifted a brow at that, and Margaery shrugged. "He...My husband recognizes a kindred spirit in me," she said quietly. "He won't lay a hand on me the way he did her. Not in any true spite."

"The marks on your back might say differently," her grandmother said then, and there was a certain sadness in her eyes that made Margaery look up. As if she thought Margaery was such a little fool that she did not notice them herself.

"The King did not hurt me," she repeated, stubborn to a fault, wishing that her grandmother would _understand_. "Why is it that, when an event happens, it must always be that a man has instigated it?"

There were very few times in her life that Margaery had ever witnessed her grandmother's surprise at anything.

She knew that, before she had been born, her grandmother had been far from doting to her siblings, or to any of the Tyrell and Redwyne children. Oh, she loved her family, and would do anything for them where she could, but that special warmness in the old crone's heart that might be attributed to any other matriarch was solely for Margaery, and this because her grandmother had sensed a kindred spirit in her, long before Margaery had realized it herself.

Margaery had always loved her grandmother more dearly than most, and respected her opinion in everything. It had been her grandmother who had taught her the game of thrones, though, to be fair, Margaery had taught much of the skills needed to play it to herself.

Some of those skills surprised her grandmother still.

A little pain was worth nothing, in the long run. Ambition was worth nothing, if one could not stomach the pain it took to crawl to the top and hold one's position, there.

And physical pain meant very little to Margaery in lieu of that.

Besides, it had not even been so bad; she had merely pretended that it was for someone else that she did it, another's face looking on, rather than Joffrey's.

For some reason, her mind's eye always supplied Sansa Stark's, though she supposed that was fitting, in some respects.

"It is a dangerous game that you're playing," Olenna said calmly, once she had appeared to regain herself, but the way she clenched and unclenched her hands into fists said differently; she was worried, and a part of Margaery was fiercely relieved that at least someone else was worried about her. "Which is more important, the love of the people or the love of the King?"

She sounded like a tutor, waiting for Margaery to recite the answer to a question that had been drilled into her for months before Olenna had allowed Mace to hand her over to Renly Baratheon.

Margaery shrugged. "Why not both?"

Olenna chuckled; it was a dry sound, and not particularly humored. "I very much doubt that even you could manage both, my dear, no matter how hard you tried." She paused for a moment, cocked her head. "Perhaps if your king was sane."

Margaery lifted her chin. "The people already love me. They understand that I care for them, and do my best to give them food and warmth, more so than Cersei ever did. But I could survive without their love, as she did. It would not be ideal, but I could do it."

"You cannot survive without the King's," Olenna surmised, her voice filled with some sadness Margaery didn't understand.

She knew that her grandmother had been somewhat against the match, in the beginning. That she had spoken against it to Margaery's father, as she had with the match to Renly, though in the end, her father's lust for more power and her own desire to be queen had won out. The first time, it had been Loras' voice, whispering in their father's ear.

Margaery did not regret being the child to whisper in Mace Tyrell's ear of her need to be queen, of their family's need for this alliance, any more than she had before Joffrey had given her these bruises.

"Yes," Margaery whispered, her voice soft.

Her grandmother studied her for a moment longer, before reaching out and placing her hand over Margaery's, bringing it to her chest and squeezing it. "My brave, beautiful girl."

Margaery gave her a watery smile, and Olenna coughed, turning away and lifting her handkerchief to compose herself. She liked showing weakness as little as Margaery, and Margaery could not begrudge her that.

While she waited, she took another sip of her tea.

"I am returning to Highgarden soon," Olenna said calmly, and, at Margaery's startled look, she explained, "I grow tired of the climate here."

"Grandmother-"

"I have no doubt that you will manage without me," Olenna went on, "And I am needed there."

Margaery did not share the same assurances, though she knew the truth of the second part of that statement.

The thought of Cersei, alone with her brother, with only their mother and Garlan to protect him made her sick. Yes, she understood all too well Olenna's wish to return to Highgarden, but she couldn't help wondering if it would do any good.

She still received letters from Willas, often enough, detailing how Cersei had finally started coming out of her rooms, though she had stabbed the first servant to ask her whether or not she and her husband would consummate the marriage any time soon.

On that, at least, Margaery and Cersei were agreed. The marriage could not be consummated; Willas would never survive the experience, and Margaery still had another bride in mind for her dear brother, one who would be less horrid, at the very least.

At her granddaughter's skeptical look, Olenna said, "You are a queen, my dear, but do not forget that you are still a Rose." Olenna placed a hand over hers. "And more than one king has lost his head over a woman with thorns. You will never be safe so long as your husband lives."

Margaery swallowed, nodded. "I never thought I would be, Grandmother. Safe travels."


	61. MARGAERY XVII

She had known that there would be one more person concerned over what had happened to her, that she would have to speak with about it.

She had not thought that Sansa would be so outraged on her behalf, as her grandmother and Loras had been. It was...sweet.

"You told me that he didn't hurt you," Sansa said when she entered the rose gardens and found Margaery plucking flowers, something within her seeming to want badly to catch Margaery off guard, however, when the woman eventually turned around, it was with a dazzling smile, as though she had been waiting for the other girl and was not at all surprised to see her.

"Sansa," she said, and showed her teeth, putting a bundle of flowers under her arm, their thorns fallen in a little pile on the ground.

Sansa was frowning at her, undeterred by the smile as she nodded over Margaery's shoulder, to the marks everyone pretended not to see otherwise. "Has he been doing that since the beginning?"

The corners of Margaery's lips dipped at the inference that she had been lying to Sansa. "I told you that he was not, didn't I?"

Sansa flushed. "You...did, but, now after seeing that...Oh Margaery, I do not know how you can bear being wedded to him so easily."

"Hush, my love," Margaery said, glancing over her shoulder to be sure that they were indeed alone. "You forget yourself."

Sansa's face fell. "Only...I understand, Margaery, what being...the object of his attentions means. If you ever need to speak of it..."

Margaery thought that Sansa Stark could never quite understand that, not as Margaery did. Nor would she understand, if Margaery attempted to explain it to her.

Instead, she linked her arm through the other girl's, giving her a wistful smile. "Did he hurt you in such ways, then?"

Sansa swallowed. "He...he would have the Kingsguard hit me, sometimes, but he was never man enough to do it himself. He much preferred to taunt me, instead."

Margaery tilted up Sansa's chin. "I hope you didn't take his words to heart, Sansa." A narrow look. "Any of them."

Sansa shrugged. "He told me...Before the Battle of Blackwater," Sansa hesitated. "He told me that he would bring his sword back with the blood of Stannis Baratheon on it, and he would make me kiss it." Margaery flinched in sympathy. "But...he didn't." Sansa's pretty features twisted into a sneer. "He fled the battle, like a coward. I'm glad he did; I was terrified that he would make me kiss it, and then cut off my head with it, as he did my father's." She took in a shuddering breath. "It terrified me."

Margaery reached out, pulling her into a hug as Sansa had done for her days earlier. "Oh, Sansa," she murmured, brushing at the girl's hair. Sansa leaned into the touch for a moment only, before pulling away.

"He's horrible. I don't know how you stand him, all the time. Married to him." She shuddered.

"Sansa," Margaery said then, very seriously, "I should like to invite you to come with me on my next trip to give food and help to the smallfolk."

Sansa blinked at her, brows furrowing in confusion at the sudden change in topic, and Margaery elaborated, "My lady mother instilled in me a heart for those less fortunate than ourselves when I was quite young. At the time, I did not quite understand what advantage this had for us, but it always made me happy, to know that I could so help others, that my mere presence, and, I suppose, my food, could mean so much to another person. That they, in turn, could live on happily." She paused, giving Sansa a long look. "My lady mother is not a shrewd woman; she is quite silly at politics."

Sansa laughed hesitantly, because she thought Margaery wanted her to, and not because she quite understood what the other woman was saying.

Margaery did not seem to mind. "She told me, eventually, that she went to such efforts to help others because it could remind her that the poor are always among us, and are always less fortunate than us."

Sansa blinked. "All right," she said finally, still sounding rather unsure. "I'll come with you."

Margaery smiled. "Good. I'm glad."

 _Don't pity me_ , she thought to herself, couldn't bring herself to say the words aloud. _Pity someone who deserves it, when I would do this again in a heartbeat._


	62. MARGAERY XVIII

Margaery knew that, while Joffrey had never thought to extend a kindness to the common people because kindness did not come naturally for him, Sansa had not done so because the idea of helping the lowly smallfolk had never been taught to her, not when she herself was so in need of help and they were so different from she.

But she thought that it would help the other girl, all the same, and Sansa, as uncomfortable as she appeared at first, sticking close to Margaery's side as her ladies held out baskets for Margaery and Sansa to hand out to the smallfolk, seemed to thrive as the day went on.

She was too kind.

Margaery was still trying to figure out how she had survived, thus far.

She found herself, day by day, growing closer and closer to Sansa, a fact which worried her, for this game was a long one, and none were guaranteed to survive it, especially those with the kind heart of the Starks.

And still.

Sansa glanced up at her from where she was knelt on the ground, handing a little boy a sewn coat, and grinned, and Margaery grinned back, as if she couldn't quite control her own smile now, in Sansa's presence.

When Sansa straightened, they continued on, all to shouts of, "Long live her gracious and gentle Majesty, the Queen! Long live the Queen!"

It seemed that the smallfolk had not learned of the evils that she had done, that she had ordered the serving boy killed, after his flogging, to save him from any worse fate, of her other wicked acts since becoming Queen, and for that she felt a guilty gladness.

But perhaps they simply had overlooked it, in lieu of other information.

It seemed that they all knew of the mark branding her back, even without seeing the all of it, as the court had on the day after it had been formed. They saw only a small part of it, and yet the sympathetic looks that they sent her, the loving pity, told her all she needed to know.

"This," she told Sansa, linking her arm through the other girl's as Sansa handed away a rose to one of the children swarming them, "Is what it means to be loved, Sansa Stark."

Sansa was laughing happily, having forgotten her scarring, it seemed, and Margaery found herself quite happy to see that laughter. Found herself wanting to see more of it, regardless of the cost.

"A dress, for Your Grace!" one of the merchants attempting to become the legend of their street in selling wares to the Queen herself called out, and Margaery spun toward them, smiling and letting go of Sansa's arm.

"A gown?" she asked, and the little woman nodded, rubbing her hands together excitedly at having caught the Queen's attention.

"My finest cloths, Your Grace, silk from the Free Cities, and beyond," the little woman told her. "I can have a fine gown made for Your Grace and sent up to the Keep."

Margaery smiled widely, giving her several coins whose amount made the woman's eyes widen. "Very fine, Your Grace, very fine. Have you a color preference?"

Margaery glanced over the silks, and then at Sansa. "Why don't you pick?"

Sansa flushed, and then stepped forward, timidly choosing the cream colored cloth farthest from her.

"I'll have the rest of your payment given to whoever delivers the gown," Margaery promised the little woman, whose eyes widened.

"Not necessary, Your Grace, not necessary."

"I insist," Margaery told her, before spinning away, Sansa looking caught up in the rush behind her. No matter; she would catch up.

"We should return to the Keep, my lady," one of her ladies told her quietly, "For lunch."

Margaery grinned toward the kiosks set up in the streets. "Nonsense," she chided. "We have all that we might need right here. Elinor, use these," she handed over a few gold coins with Joffrey's seal, "Buy us some bread and fish."

Elinor curtseyed and hurried away, to her credit without even a flinch, and Margaery moved toward one of the kiosks selling wine.

"Some of your best vintage, good sir," she told the toothless little man behind the kiosk, giving him a bright smile. "For my ladies and I."

The man's eyes widened. "Of course, Your Grace, of course! The finest!" he reached under the table, pulling out a flask that looked very old indeed. "For Your Grace."

"Wait."

Loras stepped forward then, out of the retinue of Kingsguards following them whom Margaery had tried valiantly to pretend did not exist thus far, a pinched expression on his face. He had been upset ever since their talk after Joffrey's latest banquet, had barely spoken three words to her.

She sighed. "Loras-"

"Someone must test anything the Queen eats or drinks, Your Grace," he told her formally, and then bent forward to do just that. She almost reached out to stop him, but the iron look he gave her while he did so had her hesitating.

As she waited for her overbearing brother to pay his penance to her, she glanced around, saw that, amongst the crowd of adoring nobles watching them, were several men in black robes, strange, red circles carved into their foreheads.

She blinked, and they were gone, and Margaery shook her head, but did not forget the sight. Did not dare to.

A moment later, he pulled the flask from his lips, waited a moment, and then nodded to the wine merchant. "The Queen will take this one."

The man nodded, a little less pleased now, but no less excited. "Of course, of course."

They made their lunch by the sea, watching the ships roll in, and though the fare was not so good as what they might have eaten in the Keep, Margaery was glad enough for the excuse to stay away longer.

She thought that Sansa was, too, until she saw the pensive look on the other girl's face. At least she was no longer watching the ships with such longing.

"Sansa?" she asked.

"Cersei never bothered with such things," Sansa said quietly. "The smallfolk were always beneath her."

"No," Margaery said, brushing at the top of her own sleeve. "I imagine the world would be a far different place, if she had. A better one, perhaps."

Sansa gave her a hesitant smile. "I cannot imagine anything Cersei could do as good," she said finally, and it startled a laugh out of Margaery.

"No, I don't suppose I could, either," she said, giving Sansa a little wink. "Perhaps we ought to return to the Keep, then?"

Sansa shrugged. "Perhaps we could stay...a little longer?"

Margaery's grin widened. "Of course."


	63. MARGAERY XIX

"Oh, oh," Margaery gasped, pretending an orgasm because it would disguise her gasps of pain as Joffrey twisted Widow's Wail across her naked skin.

When it was over, Joffrey wiped the blood on their sheets and Margaery held back a grimace, knowing it would have to be cleaned.

And then he moved to sit beside her on the bed, his eyes a little less blown than they had been the last time they had done this, his breaths a little calmer.

Joffrey had been...distant, since he began hurting her, even if she knew she saw the spark of enjoyment in his eyes every time he lifted his hand against her.

Margaery could not have that.

But she thought she knew what was causing that distance, and the thought both excited and disturbed her.

She had lost her husband in her attempt to keep him. Had opened herself up as vulnerable when that was the one thing he could hate about her.

She knew she had, from the leering glances he threw in Sansa's direction with far more frequency now, to the way he'd been acting around her since her rape. She knew that the words he had spoken to her on the night of his mother's wedding would never have passed his lips were he sober, but he felt them nonetheless, buried deep somehow.

She had genuinely thought that the...hurting would help. She had even enjoyed some of it enough to be convincing, and she was rather startled when he'd stopped.

There were times when she didn't understand Joffrey Baratheon at all. She had thought she understood well enough that he had no care for others' pain, except to revel in it, and how wrong she'd been.

He wouldn't hurt her anymore, because he didn't like to see his lady wife in pain, but he fantasized about hurting Sansa Stark.

Sudden inspiration hit Margaery then, an inspiration born of desperation, and she smiled widely at her husband, who looked at her like a frightened animal in the face of it.

"Could you tell me about the Battle of Blackwater, Your Grace?" she linked her arm through his, pulling him closer to her on the bed, laying her head on his shoulder because she had found, much to her tempered disgust, that she almost always had to initiate contact between them, if she needed it.

He blinked at her, burrowing down into the bed like an animal nesting. "The Battle of Blackwater?"

She nodded eagerly, pretended she had not the stories well enough from her brothers. "Only, I should like to know what they are like, if it is not too terrible to bear thinking of. As a woman, I cannot partake in one myself. My brother Loras has told me often of tourneys, but he does not speak of true battle."

Joffrey shrugged, running his fingers along Margaery's hair. She gritted her teeth, wondered if he would pull at her hair as he had the other night, pull until she screamed. He didn't.

"It was a battle," he said flippantly. "I fought on the frontlines, beside the knights, like my father would have done. Killed a few of them myself, though my lord uncle was concerned that I should die for the effort."

"You must have been so very brave," Margaery consoled, and he shot her a glance that was somewhere between wariness and pleasure, as if he did not quite know what she was up to with this line of questioning, before grunting in acknowledgement.

"The Lady Sansa told me that the women and children were locked away in the Red Keep, to be hidden from Stannis' army," Margaery forged on. "I do not think I could have bore the thought of remaining locked away during a battle, even if I knew that all would be well." She gave an elegant shrug. "I have never been very good at patience. I would have wanted to be out there with you, to know that you were well and...to watch you."

Joffrey lifted a brow at that, glancing at her in new appreciation. "The Targaryens of old used to allow their women onto the battlefield. Some of them even rode dragons."

Margaery's lips twitched, for she did not want to steer the conversation back in that direction. She'd had quite enough of dragon butchering and Targaryen massacres for today. "Would you allow me to go into a battle with you one day, my lord? To watch me kill someone more than an animal in the heat and the blood beside you, and have me watch you in turn?"

Joffrey nodded, looking breathless as he stared at her, and she knew then, without any of her previous doubts, that she had him still.

And that made the pain worth it.

Still, the next time he touched her, moments later, it was not to bring her pain. He stared at her bruises as they made love, and Margaery doubted that he had ever looked upon another's injuries and felt anything resembling what he did as he now looked at Margaery's, and when he came inside of her, he wasn't looking at her bruises at all, but rather at the painting on the wall behind them.

She supposed that was a small mercy, even if she could not fathom what it would mean for their future.

As they lay in the bed a second time, the blood on Margaery's stomach beginning to well and then scar, Margaery felt Joffrey's excited gaze on her, and she lifted her head to meet it.

"Would you like to come with me to the Kingswood?" Joffrey asked, looking almost nervous, and Margaery could almost believe, in that moment, that he was just another boy, nervous and silly.

The slight smirk he gave her, though, killed that thought.

It was always there, hiding underneath whatever charms he managed to dig to the surface, that mask that hinted at so much more cruelty than Margaery had already seen him display a thousand times over.

She would be lying if she said it did not frighten her, but Margaery had seen more frightening things.

It helped that, most of the time, she was able to handle him. To an extent.

She winced as she thought of the way her thighs had stuck with blood for the last two days.

She had not been a virgin on the night he took her to bed, of course, unofficially, but that had not seemed to keep her husband from drawing blood as though she were one.

Her only comfort was that he had not taken her in such a way since, had seemed almost...repulsed every time she voiced the idea, and would ask if her moon's blood had come before changing the subject.

She did not truly know what to make of that. He did not seem to have lost interest in her, that much was clear.

He didn't want to hurt her. Joffrey...loved her, and Margaery didn't know if the thought made her sick or elated.

A part of her was very much relieved for that, though she would be far more relieved if there was a child in her.

Margaery nodded, widening her eyes in what she thought must look like excitement. "Truly, my love?"

He glanced around the room as if worried they would be overheard, even if they were alone, before narrowing his eyes on Margaery. "You told me once that you thought it might be fun, to watch something die. Perhaps I'll even let you do the killing."

Margaery's lips twitched, and she leaned forward, until they were nearly pressed against one another and Joffrey pulled back, as he always did.

"I would like that very much, my love."

He grinned. "We should go now, then!" he said, jumping out of the bed as though he were half his age.

Margaery blinked at him, sitting up in bed. "Now, my love?"

He glanced back at her, even as he rang the bell for his personal servants. "And why not? You're ready; I've seen you at the targets."

Margaery bit her lip, refrained from telling him that she was tired from their lovemaking, because she had just come to the conclusion that she would have him better the less weak he found her, the less vulnerable, and then, "The Kingsguard and your usual hunting companions will surely not want to go out at such an hour. And how is the hunting, so late in the night?"

He waved a hand dismissively. "I am the King. They will do as they are told. And besides, I did not mean hunting tonight."

She blinked at him. "When, then?"

He smirked. "There is a hunting lodge off in the Kingswood, some distance from here. It will take the night to ride there, and we can hunt all day tomorrow." He grinned, noticed that she did not seem to share his elation, and faltered.

Perhaps it was too suspicious, to wonder at his motives for wanting to take her away from King's Landing in the dead of night, but Margaery would be more suspicious if the idea were not obviously spur of the moment.

"Ready the hunting dogs then, Your Grace," she said with a smirk, lofting out of bed and tossing on the gown she had left at the foot of their bed when their lovemaking began.

Joffrey grinned.


	64. MARGAERY XX

The Kingsguard and the other members of the Court whom Joffrey enjoyed dragging along on hunts because they were suitably sycophantic were none too pleased about being dragged from their beds in the dead of night because their king and queen wished to go hunting, and Margaery found herself idly wishing that one of them would shoot said king on the hunt because of their annoyance, even if she knew how unlikely a wish it was.

She could, however, see some of them giving her strange, confused glances, no doubt confused about why Joffrey was bringing her along, even if some of them had seen how he loved to teach her to shoot his crossbow.

By the time they were all ready, it was barely morning.

Her brother Loras helped her onto her horse with rigid, stiff movements; she knew that she had hurt him with what she had said about the horrible day that Ser Osmund had assaulted her, knew that she should never have said those words, now that her head was clear enough to think such things.

Before all of this, she and Loras had been so close, and Margaery missed that, horribly. Missed the brother who had been replaced by this stern, cool Kingsguard.

“What’s this about?” he whispered to her through clenched teeth, lest Joffrey, who was seated on a stallion just in front of her, overhear.

Margaery shook her head; she didn’t want to worry Loras, for their king’s whims changed with the wind, but her newfound knowledge about her husband’s true feelings for her had her feeling quite safe.

Even if she still couldn’t quite believe it.

“Come on!” Joffrey shouted impatiently, when the entire tired troupe seemed to want nothing more than to wait, and the kennel men let the hunting dogs off their ropes, the feral creatures snarling and snapping at the bit.

Margaery found herself wondering if Joffrey had ever thought of setting dogs after humans, instead of rabbits or harts. She shivered, pulling her white fur wrap more tightly around her shoulders and reaching for the reins from her brother’s strangely unwilling hands.

She sent him a small smile, and then kicked her horse until it stood astride with Joffrey’s own, ignoring the strange look her husband sent her as she did so.

“Shall we?” she asked him, forcing a grin, and Joffrey grinned back at her, kicked his horse, and started off at a fast gallop after the dogs.

Margaery had grown up in Highgarden though, a fact that few seemed to take to heart, and she knew a horseman when she saw one; her sadistic young husband was hardly that, and she bit back a snort as she saw the way he seemed to huddle against his stallion, kicking it when there was no need to do so and clutching to the reins like a lifeline.

She did not know how long they rode for until they found their first cluster of rabbits, the dogs setting on them before Joffrey’s servant could even hand him his crossbow, but by then the light from the slowly rising sun was just barely trickling through the trees of the Kingswood, and Margaery was glad of her wrap, for she was just close to freezing.

She wondered if her husband’s blood ran hot, looking at him now, grinning as one of his men picked up a dead rabbit by the ears, as he smirked and waited for the sycophants around him to applaud his hunting.

She noticed that, though several other men shot down rabbits, they were careful not to laud their accomplishments above their King’s.

And then they were moving again, Margaery rather surprised that her lord husband had not asked her to shoot at anything, since, as she understood it that was rather the reason this hunt was taking place at all. When she asked him, however, he was quite indignant.

“And have your first kill be nothing more than a spring hare?” he asked, raising a brow at her. “No, we will have to find something more elegant, for you.”

Margaery smiled, pretended to be complimented by the words, wondered if Joffrey was planning on waiting until they found some member of the smallfolk who was not meant to be wandering Joffrey’s woods.

They did not find anything more for some time, and eventually stopped in a small green clearing, where Margaery was expecting their servants to pitch tents in anticipation for a longer hunt, for surely Joffrey would not be satisfied just yet.

Instead, they rode just a bit further, until a small cottage came into view. Margaery blinked at the sight of it; somehow, she had not imagined a cottage to be their destination within these woods, though she supposed that there must have been some king with more finesse than Joffrey or Robert Baratheon, who would have preferred not to pitch a tent during a hunt.

“Do you like it?” Joffrey murmured into her ear, and Margaery forced herself not to jump. Instead, she turned to him with a dazzling smile.

“I love it,” she told him. “But I thought we were hunting, not resting.”

Joffrey grinned. ‘We’ll sleep here until mid-morning. The harts will be more likely to run, then.”

Margaery looked at the bloodlust in her husband’s eyes, no doubt exacerbated by the hunt, and doubted they would do much sleeping.

She was correct, in that assumption, and when the two of them finally emerged from the cabin, she found herself almost feeling sorry for the dozens of men who had been forced to listen to them, though she found that more than a few of them were looking at her with the same pity in their eyes.

And, as they marched through the grassy forest floor this time, rather than riding, Joffrey suddenly turned to her, ignoring the yipping of the hounds or the men around them.

“When was the first time you wanted to kill something?” Joffrey asked her abruptly, and she blinked at him as she attempted to formulate an answer he would find acceptable.

She wondered at his use of the word ‘something,’ if he meant specifically an animal or if even humans were nothing more than things to him.

Things to play with for his own amusement, as Joffrey had once said.

"I have long since had...urges," Margaery said carefully, ignoring Loras’ horrified look and noting the way that Joffrey licked his lips as she spoke. Encouraged, she continued, "It is just that, well, for a lady, it is difficult to satisfy such urges."

Joffrey grinned, taking her wrist in his hand. "Well, you don't have to worry about that any longer, my lady. My Queen can do whatever she wishes." His eyes flashed. "I'd like to see these...urges."

Margaery grinned as someone blew the horn to indicate that their prey was in sight. “I think that you are about to, my love,” she murmured, and Joffrey grinned happily.

He insisted on Margaery being the first to take a shot when the first deer came into sight, and Margaery felt her heart clog her throat as he handed her the lovely golden crossbow he’d had made for her, what seemed like so long ago, now.

The hart lay in the grass about a dozen paces away, the hounds already ripping into its flesh in their efforts to hold it still, the hunting party silent around her, waiting for her to take the shot, and Margaery could see the hart’s frightened, big eyes as it gazed up at her.

For a moment, she saw another pair of frightened, big eyes, blue rather than brown, and Margaery’s hand nearly faltered.

Luckily, her husband thought it only adrenaline, and he moved behind her, steadying her.

"Like this," Joffrey said, taking her hand and moving it up the crossbow, his touch slow, firm.

She leaned back against him, hearing a startled little gasp as their bodies touched, squaring her shoulders and moving her finger around the trigger of the bow. "Like this, my lord?" she asked, pretending that she had forgotten the way he had taught her how to use one of these, before.

He smiled, nipping at her ear with just a touch of something beyond affection, and Margaery suppressed a shiver. "Perfect. Now kill it."

Margaery forced a grin, her finger pulling the trigger, and she watched as, just a few feet away, the startled stag fell to the ground, a bolt through its heart.

Dead, just like that, with the twitch of a finger.

And Margaery felt nothing, watching it die, but a faint thrill of unease.

As she watched the light die from its eyes, hearing Joffrey's panting, excited breaths behind her, hearing the dutiful cheers of the hunting party, Margaery wondered if this would be the only creature she ever killed. Doubted it.

She hadn’t realized that she had scraped her cheek when she took the shot, not until Joffrey reached out and tilted her chin up, licked the scrape delightedly even as Margaery failed to even glance at him, staring instead at the dead hart.

She wondered how soon it would be before Joffrey wanted her to kill something else.

Something human.


	65. SANSA XLI

“Lady Lannister!” Joffrey called out, in a taunting, happy voice as Sansa attempted to evade him in the throne room she had only been crossing to get to the library because she had heard that Joffrey had taken his wife on a hunt and would likely not be back for several days.

Of course they had come back early, just this once, and Sansa felt dread pool in her stomach as she turned back around and forced herself to curtsey before her king.

She supposed it was a good thing, that Margaery could have some reprieve from her vile husband, if she avoided him after the hunt.

“Your Grace?” she asked, as Joffrey came to stand before her.

Joffrey’s gaze flicked down her body, before his hand reached out and, in full view of the court and his two Kingsguard, which, she could see, was filled with about a half of a dozen people, and none of them her allies, cupped her breast through the thin light blue gown she wore.

Still, they had all fallen silent and were staring openly, and she felt her cheeks blush bright crimson with mortification as they watched this unfold with morbid interest, hating every one of them almost more than Joffrey in this moment.

Sansa tried to pull back, but Joffrey only followed her, smirking and tightening his hold on her breast.

She was reminded, for a moment, of her wedding night with Tyrion, of how he had reached for her breasts in a similar fashion before he left her alone, and choked back sudden tears.

“Don’t you like my touch, Lady Lannister?” he asked mockingly. “You ought to appreciate anything a king deems fit to give you.”

Sansa choked on air as his fingers dug into her smooth flesh, the thin cloth barely serving as a barrier, and bit down hard on her tongue to avoid crying out.

“Your Grace-,”

“I asked you a question, you ungrateful bitch,” Joffrey snapped, and she could feel his fingernails digging in now, wondered if he hurt Margaery like this when they-

But of course, she already knew the answer to that, now.

“Of course, Your Grace,” she demurred, bowing her head and hoping that, if he did not meet her eyes, he would not see the hateful lie there.

Joffrey let out a little humming sound, letting go of her, and Sansa blinked back tears of relief. “Of course you do,” he said, pulling out a handkerchief and wiping his hand on it, as though he had been sullied by her touch, and not the other way around. “You’re nothing more than a little whore, after all.”

Sansa nodded. “Yes, Your Grace.”

Joffrey looked almost annoyed by that response.

"My lady wife grows jealous of my attentions to you, Lady Sansa," Joffrey said with an impish grin, and Sansa sagged with relief, biting back a sob at the words. "She told me so, on our hunt jut yesterday. She thinks that I should pay far more attention to her than, as I believe she put it, 'that Northern castaway.'" He grinned. "I bet you never thought you could make anyone jealous, did you?"

Sansa swallowed hard, lowered her eyes again. "It was never my intent to hurt Queen Margaery, Your Grace," she said, curtseying prettily so that he would not see her smile. "I will endeavor not to, in the future."

Joffrey raised a brow. "Women are so affected by these sorts of things, but I have no desire to hurt the feelings of my most beloved wife. We will simply to have to be more discreet, Lady Sansa."

Sansa lifted her head. "Your Grace?" she asked, swallowing hard when she realized that her voice was trembling.

Joffrey smirked. "You must not hurt my queen, but I am your king, Lady Sansa. Don't you think I'll miss our games?" His voice lowered an octave. "Wouldn't you?"

Sansa gulped. “I...You are my most loved King, Your Grace,” she answered dutifully, but Joffrey merely harrumphed in disgust.

“Hasn’t my fool of uncle gotten you with child yet?” he asked suddenly, and the air left Sansa’s lungs at that painful reminder that their lack of a child would only be left alone for so long, after Cersei’s departure from court.

After all, Cersei had yet to become full with a child from Lord Willas, as far as Sansa had heard, and the Lannister line must continue.

She swallowed hard. “No, Your Grace,” she whispered hoarsely, and Joffrey had to lean forward to hear her, or at least he did so, which resulted in him staring rather obviously down the front of her gown.

She blushed again, when Joffrey lifted his head, looking less than impressed.

“Holding out for me then, are you?” he asked with a wicked grin, and Sansa sucked in a breath, suddenly realizing how her lack of a pregnancy could be taken by Joffrey for the first time.

“Your Grace-,”

“My love!” Margaery’s happy voice echoed from the other side of the room, and Sansa nearly wilted in relief as Margaery and her retinue came into sight.

Margaery was wearing a golden gown that...showed off her assets rather clearly, two thin strips of cloth all that covered her breasts, showing as much skin as could be considered decent in a gown that hugged her flat stomach and waist, opening just below her knees. A ring of solid gold clung tightly to her neck, and Sansa wondered how she could bear to wear such a thing, without feeling choked. She was...rather breathtaking, and Joffrey seemed to lose all thought of Sansa at the sight of his queen.

Joffrey looked shamefaced, surprisingly, though it only lasted for a moment before he moved forward, swept Margaery into his arms. “My queen,” he said possessively, as he gripped around the waist and tugged her against him.

Margaery giggled like a maiden, and Sansa found herself feeling rather sick, wondered if perhaps one of the courtiers in this room had been on her side after all, accounting for Margaery’s miraculous timing.

“The kitchens have agreed to make a feast from the meat we brought back from the hunt, my love,” Margaery confided in him, as if such information was important, and Sansa rather thought she had her answer. “Tonight, even. Won’t that be lovely?”

When Joffrey looked at his lady wife, his eyes seemed to soften, as though he had a bit of humanity left within him, and Sansa wondered how his lady wife could bring both that and his sadistic streak out of him so easily.

“Of course they will,” he said imperiously. “We deserve to eat the fruits of our hunt after such hard work.”

Margaery laughed. “Indeed. Though, I don’t think we ought to invite anyone who wasn’t on the hunt to eat with us. They would certainly take it for granted, don’t you say?”

Joffrey glanced at Sansa again, seeming to remember her for the first time. “Of course they would,” he said finally, and then, “And besides, they didn’t come with us. They wouldn’t understand the thrill of eating what we hunted.”

Sansa had a feeling those words were meant more for her than for Margaery, and she shivered appropriately.

Margaery tugged on her husband’s arm. “Well, perhaps I can show you how much I...appreciated,” she licked her lips, “the hunt before we consume it, my love?”

Joffrey gulped rather audibly. “Yes, I think you had better,” he said finally, and Margaery laughed, a fake, hollow sound that Sansa barely managed not to cringe at. And then she was wafting away, and her ladies, clearly believing that Joffrey would follow.

Joffrey however, glanced back at Sansa, tugged her against him even as Sansa bit her lip to keep from crying out.

“Don’t worry, Stark,” Joffrey hissed in her ear, “I’ll fill you with a child too, if you beg me nicely enough. I might even be gentle about it, then.”

Sansa shuddered, swallowed hard. “Yes, Your Grace,” she whispered hoarsely, and Joffrey laughed.


	66. SANSA XLII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may all thank technicallypsychiccupcake for this totally unplanned chapter, for reminding me last chapter that you guys haven't had an angst break in a long time, and the next chapter is kind of a bitch, so I give you...fluff with a spot of angst thrown in. (Runs and hides)

"I am so sorry that he did that to you," Margaery said gently, reaching out to brush Sansa's hair behind her ears. "Elinor was in the Great Hall when he approached you, and she came to find me as soon as she heard."

Margaery had summoned Sansa to her chambers in the Maidenvault once more for a cup of tea, and Sansa could hardly remember the last time she had done so, eager to go and not wishing to encounter Joffrey once more.

She wondered at that, that Joffrey never seemed to bother his wife in her private chambers, almost as though she had forbidden him from entering them.

The thought almost made her smile, but thinking of Joffrey only reminded her of what Margaery had just barely saved her from earlier.

Sansa frowned. "She didn't need to do that."

Margaery raised a brow, though she looked terribly sad. "Didn't she?"

Sansa hugged herself. "He wouldn't have...gone any further in front of so many people."

Margaery clucked her tongue like she didn't quite believe that anymore than Sansa did, but said nothing more of it.

"He's been acting strangely, lately," she said instead. "Just the other night, he wanted to go hunting merely because I had suggested it, never mind the late hour. He woke half the palace to go."

Sansa had been rather amused at her husband's annoyance at Joffrey's antics, she remembered. She wondered if he had heard about Joffrey's most recent act. "So I heard."

"And then he - oh!" Margaery bit her lip suddenly, so hard the skin around her teeth went white, and she reached a trembling hand to her stomach.

"Margaery?" Sansa asked in alarm.

"It's nothing," Margaery assured her gently. "Just some stomach pains, I'm sure. I had a late midday meal today."

Sansa furrowed her brow, wondered if she should ask further, but Margaery seemed determined not to speak of it.

Strange enough, that was. She knew how hard Margaery strove never to show outward pain to her Joffrey, how in control of herself she always was, in that regard, and wondered if the little amount of pain she was revealing to Sansa heralded something worse or if she merely felt that much more comfortable, to show pain around her.

Or perhaps she had merely been surprised.

Margaery was still beautiful, Sansa thought, even if her face was twisted into one of discomfort, and she shivered at the thought, wondered if it showed just how much time she had spent around Joffrey.

"Anyway, he took me to this cottage in the middle of the Kingswood," Margaery went on, and Sansa pretended not to notice the way she rubbed at her stomach as they continued to sit on the edge of Margaery's bed. "It was...quaint, for a king."

Sansa giggled. "I hope you didn't tell him that."

Margaery raised an imperious brow, though the effect was lost by her quirking smile. "What do you take me for? Of course not." She took a deep breath. "Sansa, there's something I would like to discuss with you."

Sansa glanced at her. "Oh?" she asked, sensing from the sudden seriousness in Margaery's voice and the furrow of her brow that this was something far more important than their earlier japes.

Margaery took a deep breath. "And I want you to understand that there is no need to say yes simply because we are friends, or because I am your queen, and that I do not even know if the Lannisters would allow it."

Sansa felt her breath catch in her throat, reminding her of the time when Margaery had plotted her marriage to Willas.

Margaery bit her lip, scooted a little closer to Sansa on the bed, as though she were remembering just the same thing. "I am planning a visit to Highgarden, in the near future. I have not quite figured out the particulars, but Joffrey wishes to see his mother and I...well, I wish to know that my family is well, despite that witch's presence amongst them now."

Sansa giggled a little, schooled her face into a serious expression when Margaery glanced at her again.

"I am afraid it would not earn you distance from Joffrey, and I would understand if you would rather remain here, where you will be safe from him for only a little while, but...I was wondering if you would like to travel there as one of my ladies, my companions. Many of my ladies and prestigious ladies of the court would be coming with us, of course, but-"

"I would love to," Sansa murmured, not even noticing that she had interrupted Margaery’s almost nervous stammering, for, even if Joffrey would be there, it would be a break from this horrid golden cage, even if only for a little while, and Highgarden was far closer to Dorne than King's Landing. "That sounds wonderful, Margaery."

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask whether Ellaria Sand and Prince Oberyn would be accompanying them, but she knew that she could not let on about such things and give them away, not even to Margaery, as much as she wanted to.

Margaery smiled, relieved. "Good. I-" she reached out again, clutching at her stomach once more, and Sansa followed her hand with her eyes, feeling an unaccountable nervousness for her friend.

Margaery's smile was strained when she lifted her head. "Perhaps I am coming down with something," Margaery said, and sounded rather sorrowful. "We so little get time to spend together these days, and I would hate to ruin it so soon."

Sansa stood, brushed down her dress. "Nonsense. We will have all the time in the world when we go to Highgarden, and you can show me everything about your girlhood there. You will have much to plan for the journey though, and you ought to rest."

Margaery pulled in a breath. "Of course. Thank you, Sansa."

Sansa blinked at her. "Whatever for?"

Margaery smiled. "Merely for being there, my dear girl. You’ve no idea what a comfort you are."

Sansa smiled wanly back at her, although she rather thought she did. After all, Margaery had no idea the wonderful comfort just her presence had been for Sansa, since she had arrived in King’s Landing.


	67. MARGAERY XXI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: rather graphic depiction of a miscarriage, allusions to past rape/non-con

Margaery woke to the most horrible cramps she had ever experienced, looked down and saw that she sat in a mess of blood on her bed.

She was cold, and she pulled the blankets about her tighter until she realized that these, too, were stained with blood, that the reason for her coldness was in fact the blood drying on them, but still, Margaery held them close and shivered.

At first, she thought that perhaps they were merely that, cramps that would go away with a bit of sweet wine, but Margaery had never been one to be so effected by cramps, and this was certainly not some sort of stomachache, as she had originally thought, from eating too many plums the afternoon before.

She'd felt nauseous, the last few days, but had attributed it to killing that damn deer, rather than any true malady, and so had not bothered to consult a maester on this. Had not thought this would be a problem, when she'd seen spots of blood on her smallclothes just a few days before.

Had actually been rather relieved to see them, that she would not have to suffer having Joffrey bed her for a few days.

She felt a rare moment of panic that she couldn't quite explain before she reached between her legs and pulled her hand away, felt blood that was thicker than anything she had ever felt during her moon's blood on her fingers.

She bit her lip as another wave of pain washed through her, a feeling like a hand yanking at her navel, and slowly pulled herself up into a sitting position and grabbed hold of one of the bedposts, the one that Sansa had been sitting against, earlier, her other hand reaching down between her legs, as if to hold the blood in. As if that would achieve anything.

Margaery used the bedpost now to keep herself upright as her legs began to shake and her body was swept over in another wave of agony, nearly blacking out for a moment before she let out a small noise of pain.

She knew the moment it happened, the moment the blood spurted out of her in great bouts along with something that wasn't quite blood, knew what was happening to her in that instant, even if she couldn't quite believe it.

She didn't know quite how long she crouched there on the bed, her body aching and her womanhood spilling more and more blood, didn't know how her too pale skin glistened in sweat or if she was even Margaery anymore, or some other feeble creature she had never thought she would become.

The feeling of her child leaving her womb and spilling painfully out onto the blankets beneath her in a mess of blood and fluids, even if a maester would tell her it was not a child but merely a mess of bloody clots at this point, left Margaery sobbing, for she could not even call a maester with this.

She bit her tongue until she tasted more of her own blood flooding into her mouth, squeezed her eyes shut and rocked back and forth in pain, pulled her knees up to her chest and grimaced at the feeling that gave her, let them fall onto the bed again as her head fell back and knocked against the bedpost.

She hadn't even known she was pregnant.

The thought made her want to laugh hysterically, and instead, another hiccupping sob made its way past her throat. She reached out, picking up the nearest object, a golden Lannister mug that Joffrey had gifted her, and threw it across the room.

It slammed into the far wall, shattering to the ground with a loud crash.

Elinor burst into the room at the sound of the cup breaking, eyes going wide as she saw the pool of blood staining the sheets around Margaery's body, staining her night gown, far more blood than a moon’s blood would warrant, the shattered pieces of the mug on the other side of the room.

"My lady-"

Margaery was staring down at her hands, coated in blood. "Some water, Elinor, and we'll need to change the sheets and throw out these. Burn them; there's too much blood for it to be my moon's blood."

"What..." Elinor gaped. "What happened?"

Margaery shook her head. "Towels, Elinor, and a basin of water. Something for pain. Don't let _anyone_ see you."

Elinor, to her credit, moved quickly, rushing out of the room and coming back only moments later with the desired items, not giving Margaery much time to herself, for which she was absurdly grateful.

"It won't stop bleeding," Margaery whispered in a dead voice as Elinor started to clean her. "It won't stop."

Elinor glanced between her legs, spread them apart gently. "I've heard that sometimes the bleeding can last for several days, weeks, even."

She had not thought to ask Elinor about such knowledge, for, to her mind, Elinor was more innocent than she, but Margaery was sure that she must have known, that the maesters would have given her preparation for such an event as the queen’s head lady.

The pitying look in her eyes as she cleaned Margaery’s skin was all too telling, as well as the bitter taste of sourleaf as Elinor placed it on her tongue.

It did what Margaery wanted, of course, as she chewed on the vile stuff until her insides began to cool and feel almost numb, her body shaking even still.

“I’m sorry,” Elinor murmured, but Margaery glared at her.

“I’m not.”

“Margaery-”

"It seems Ser Osmund left his mark after all, but I won't let him succeed at this, too," Margaery said, tonelessly. It had been so long, holding in that secret, that it felt good to say the words, even if she had vowed to herself not to, that she would never reveal _that_ to anyone. But then, this was only Elinor, and so the words spilled out of her.

"I thought...I thought surely not, and I didn't take the vile stuff that Cersei wanted to give me because I thought surely…And I haven’t noticed any of the signs...I thought that, at this point, it couldn't still haunt me..."

When she looked up, Elinor was staring at her in horror. "But...I thought..."

"I lied," Margaery said calmly, staring straight ahead as she allowed Elinor to clean her, her own hands shaking too badly to manage it herself.

Cleaned her child off of her thighs. Dead, before it had even formed in her belly.

“You what?” Elinor gasped.

“I lied,” Margaery snapped, a little more cruelly this time, but neither of them seemed to notice. She wondered if her lips had already gone red from the sourleaf, as the stuff was rumored to do, wondered how Elinor planned on getting rid of that, of the smell that would follow her miscarriage. “I had to.”

Not that she would have wanted the child, anyway, or would allow herself to mourn its loss. Ser Osmund Kettleblack’s get, his final way of fucking her over from beyond the grave. How could she want to mourn such a monster's spawn?

Elinor faltered, turned to stare at her in horror, and Margaery shifted uncomfortably, could not bring herself to meet her cousin’s eyes, wondered if she had spoken those words out loud, and then realized what she had said that had so disturbed Elinor.

Instead, Margaery stared straight ahead as she answered Elinor’s unspoken question. She knew that if she met Elinor’s eyes, she would break down as she said her next words.

"Do you really think the Lannisters would have allowed me to remain queen for even a moment if they'd learned the truth?" she asked quietly. "I would have been thrown aside as Sansa was, for a much better reason, to make room for some more controllable bride, or Joffrey would have tormented me for my failure as a wife for the rest of our marriage. Cersei would have won."

Elinor's eyes were shining with tears when she looked up to meet Margaery's own. "Margaery..."

She couldn't stand the pity she saw there, in Elinor's eyes. "No can know about this,” she said finally, not pleading, commanding. "Elinor."

It was a statement, not a request.

Elinor nodded, the motion almost frantic. "Of course not, Margaery, but...Why didn't you tell me? I thought…I thought he didn’t succeed, that you were all right," Elinor asked quietly, even as she tossed the ruined sheets into the fire.

Margaery's eyes were on the flames as they ate up the sheets, wide and glassy, unblinking. "Even the walls have ears. And...it wouldn't have mattered."

"Wouldn't have mattered?" Elinor echoed incredulously. Then, as she moved to gather up the rags she had used to clean Margaery as well, she murmured, "Just because you are perfect, does not make you infallible, Margaery." A pause. "We all need help, sometimes, and I may not have known how, but I would have done everything I could to _help_ you."

Margaery's eyes lifted from the flames. "Get out, Elinor."

Elinor swallowed, lifted her chin. "No."

Margaery blinked at her in shock. "Elinor..."

Elinor placed a hand on Margaery's shoulder, pulled her in against her chest. "I'm not going anywhere, Margy. I'm staying right here."

Margaery glared at her for a moment, and then, with a hesitance that did not seem to match Margaery Tyrell at all, she reached out, placing her hand over Elinor's, squeezing it gently in gratitude.

She swallowed. "Someone will notice that the sheets are gone."

Elinor nodded silently. "You'll tell Joffrey that you've had your moon's blood again, then. He'll be angry, but he'll never have to suspect anything else. You’ll…” She paused. “You will have to take it easy, in the next few days. I don't know, uh, everything about losing a...” She swallowed. "But I do know that you cannot do anything strenuous."

Margaery swallowed. "I told him at the beginning of our marriage when I didn’t want to be with him that a woman on her moon’s blood could not have relations. He won’t be pleased,” she said finally, and Elinor choked out a laugh.

“How can I help you?”

Margaery sucked in a breath, clung to her friend and pretended she was the sort of person who could receive comfort in such a way. That she should receive such comfort.

Elinor ran her fingers through Margaery’s hair and murmured soft words against her skin. It took Margaery some time to understand what she was saying.

“You’ve been strong for so long, now,” Elinor was whispering, “Carrying this burden all by yourself.”

“I didn’t know I was pregnant,” Margaery rasped out, even as she knew that was not the burden Elinor was referring to.

“I didn’t mean that,” Elinor whispered softly, and Margaery sucked in a breath, glanced down at her shaking hands.

“Perhaps…How do you know it wasn’t Joffrey’s?” Elinor asked delicately after some time of sitting in silence, but Margaery merely shook her head.

“It wasn’t Joffrey’s,” she said, rather desperately, even if she knew that nothing the two of them had done so far could have resulted in a child. It couldn't be Joffrey's; she couldn't bear that thought. “It wasn’t Joffrey’s. It was… _his_.”

Elinor nodded. “All right. I wish I’d known. I would have found some way for the bastard to die more painfully.”

Margaery snorted out a laugh. “Joffrey probably would have listened,” she said, and then sniffed a little, hated herself for that sound.

“And yet, you merely had his head taken off,” Elinor said, sitting up slightly, staring at Margaery with a look Margaery didn’t dare to interpret.

“I…” Can’t speak of this.

Elinor merely nodded, as if she’d heard the words Margaery couldn’t say, and went back to stroking her hair in silence.

After a while, Elinor whispered, "Come on, love. Let's run you a bath and get you cleaned off before anyone sees you like this, all right?"

Margaery nodded shakily, willed her fingers to stop trembling as Elinor helped her to stand, wished her body still didn't ache with the pain that should have gone with her child.


	68. SANSA XLIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Joffrey (fuller warning at end of chapter, for those who worry they will be triggered)

Ser Jaime could not save her from Joffrey forever, after all.

Soon enough, Ser Meryn came for her again, and neither ser Jaime nor her husband was there to save her.

She walked as if to her execution. In some ways, she thought, it was, for she knew what was coming. Joffrey had been only too clear, on that front.

"Ah, Lady Sansa!" Joffrey called, grinning at her and swinging the door to his chambers open when they arrived, gesturing for Sansa to come in. "We've been waiting for you."

"Forgive me, my lord-" Sansa started, but then stopped abruptly at what she saw when she entered the room fully.

Margaery lay stretched out on the bed, fully nude but with a sheet half-covering her, half-lidded eyes glancing up at Sansa with a look that Sansa could not fail to disguise as lust.

Joffrey sat on the bed beside her, fully clothed and grinning at Sansa.

"Your Grace?"

Joffrey smirked, jumping to his feet and clapping his hands together. "My lady is afflicted with her moon's blood," he informed Sansa. "She can't...entertain me as well when she's on it, for I ever do hate to see her bleed."

Sansa bit her cheek to keep from responding in the way that she wanted to that, and waited for Joffrey to explain what was going on here.

"But I am the King," he said, leering openly at Sansa now, "And I can't be expected not to enjoy myself just because she can't do so fully."

Sansa swallowed hard. "I don't understand-"

"I was going to fuck you," Joffrey said bluntly, "Throw you over the side of the bed and rip your pretty cunt open until you were screaming underneath me, and let my queen watch me put a Lannister baby in you, but she's a bit of the jealous type, my love, and I don't think she'd want you to have a Lannister baby before she does."

Margaery chuckled from the bed, and Sansa's eyes slid over to her once more. It was in the subtle tells that she found it; the chuckle wasn't the kind she used around Sansa, and the area around her lips was pinched a little too tight.

And, in her eyes, concealed behind lust and playfulness, Sansa could see fear. And, beyond that fear, a hint of something that wasn't quite Margaery. A hint of eyes that were too bright, breathing too shallow, too calm.

But she did not hold the stink of alcohol, nor did she seem to have all of her lost her inhibitions, as Sansa might have expected from drunkenness.

Besides, Margaery had expressed her feelings on Cersei’s drunkenness often enough. This was something else, and Sansa wondered if Joffrey knew of it or had forced it upon his lady wife.

She usually couldn't tell when Margaery was playing Joffrey. She wondered if Joffrey had threatened her, when he realized she was on her moon's blood. If that was why Sansa had been summoned and Margaery was putting up no argument to having another woman in the bedchamber.

"So I've...come up with something that I think will be enjoyable for both of us," Joffrey went on. "I was going to just use a whore, but I should have nothing but the best for my queen."

Sansa felt her insides go cold. "I don't...I..."

Joffrey moved forward suddenly, slamming his heavy red lips against her own, and Sansa grunted, pushed her lips open when he seemed to demand it, didn't move beneath him as she felt his fingers digging hard into her sides, wondered if this was what it was like for Margaery every night.

His fingers dug into her sides until she cried out in pain, and Joffrey laughed, pulling away, biting at her lip as he did so, drawing blood.

And then he reached out, rubbing at it, and Sansa was hard-pressed not to bite off his finger. "Hmm," he mused, licking at the blood with his tongue. "Stark blood doesn't really taste like snow."

Sansa forced a smile. "It doesn't, Your Grace. I could have told you that easily enough."

Joffrey frowned at her. "Then again, I haven't tasted enough of it to tell."

Sansa went silent, and Joffrey laughed. "Scared you, did I?"

She swallowed.

"Answer me!"

"Yes, Your Grace," Sansa whispered, swallowing hard and glancing to the side, so that she didn't have to look at him as she spoke.

Joffrey laughed again. He reached out, ripping open the front of Sansa's gown, and she let out a startled cry - not that he had ripped her gown, mind, but that he had done so himself. She had thought that, as always, he would wait for a guard.

She did not think that he had ever brutalized her with his own hands, and wondered why that had changed tonight.

No doubt to impress his lovely wife.

She gulped as the cold air brushed against her naked skin, though she was not the first one to be naked in the room, and she reached up, crossing her arms over her chest in a vain attempt to cover herself.

Joffrey batted her hands away. "Don't," he growled at her, just fiercely enough for Sansa not to do so again.

She lowered her arms to her sides, barely refrained from fidgeting as Joffrey walked slowly around her, glanced up and met Margaery's eyes only for a moment.

Margaery looked away first. She thought she could read the other girl well enough now to see the guilt in her eyes, alongside whatever substance she had taken to get through this.

She supposed Margaery Tyrell was not infallible to Joffrey’s horrors after all, and there was something as heartwarming in that as it was disturbing, for surely it meant Margaery knew what was about to happen.

Behind her, Joffrey reached out to cup her left buttock, squeezing it teasingly, as he said conversationally, "You know, Stark, after all this time, finally seeing you has been such a disappointment."

Sansa licked her dry lips and refrained from crossing her arms over her chest once more.

"Apologize, Lady Lannister!" Joffrey shouted, coming in front of her once more, and Sansa jumped a little. "Apologize for disappointing me."

Sansa swallowed. "I...I'm sorry, Your Grace, that you've been disappointed by me." Her cheeks were stained crimson, she was sure, and she couldn't bear the thought that this was happening in front of Margaery, wished that Joffrey would kill her by the end of it.

Joffrey pouted, eyes roving down her form slowly enough to make Sansa blush even harder.

"I hurt her," he said suddenly, and Sansa blinked at him.

"I...I don't..."

"My wife the Queen," Joffrey said, glancing back at Margaery. She sent him a dazzlingly fake smile, and Sansa didn't know how he couldn't see the fakeness of it. Or, at the very least, the drug fuelling it. "You saw, I think."

She swallowed past a suddenly dry throat. "I did, Your Grace."

He pursed his lips. "But I don't like hurting my queen," he went on, and Sansa buried her surprise deep. She'd rather thought Joffrey would always enjoy hurting everything. That he couldn't enjoy hurting Margaery...she didn't really want to think about that. "I'd much rather hurt you."

Sansa's lips wobbled. "Your Grace-"

"My queen is so much more beautiful than you," he went on, cocking his head. "I can't believe you were almost my queen, once."

Sansa nodded, knowing her part well. "I am far less deserving than Her Grace, Your Grace," she said, cheeks burning, and she hoped, even if she was mortified by what had occurred so far, that Joffrey would send her away, now.

Of course, she knew that now that he had her here, he would not do so at all.

"Kiss her," Joffrey said suddenly, gesturing to where Margaery lay splayed out on the bed, eyes blown wide.

"My lord-" she began, and Joffrey stepped forward, sneering as he towered over her.

"Are you disobeying an order from your King?" Joffrey demanded, his voice turning to that dangerous drawl that Sansa knew all too well was followed by some act of cruelty.

She ducked her head, and then murmured, "My husband would not approve-"

"Your husband may be my uncle, but he's also my subject," Joffrey snapped. "So do as I say."

She had known this day was coming, of course.

Had known, since the day Joffrey took off his mask and she learned what he really was, since the first time he'd made a joke about what he would do to her in the bedchamber, that Joffrey was going to hurt her here, in this large bed, was going to make her wish Ser Meryn Trant hadn't gotten in the way of tossing him off that ledge a thousand times over. Had known that he was going to make her bleed.

She had not known, however, that he would do all of this by making her kiss a drugged Margaery.

"My lord-" Sansa tried, one more time, even as she knew it was futile.

"Kiss her!" Joffrey snapped, stalking forward as if to grab her, and Sansa sighed.

"My lord-"

But then Margaery was there, one leg elegantly pulling Sansa down onto the bed by wrapping around her thigh, sweet lips kissing Sansa's cheek without hesitation, and Sansa blinked at her in shock, barely able to react as those lips pried her own open.

Margaery's actions were almost jerky, and for a moment, she thought that Margaery's eyes looked almost lucid, almost pained, as she stared up into Sansa's, searching for something, but then she was kissing her again, and the moment was lost.

"Well?" Joffrey demanded, from behind them. "Be a good little whore and kiss her back."

"Of course, my lord." She sent Margaery an apologetic glance, but Margaery was not looking at her eyes, was instead peppering kisses down Sansa's neck and letting out approving little sounds, sucking on her skin when Sansa attempted to pull away.

"Just be still, Sansa," Margaery whispered softly in her ear, and Sansa stiffened, "No, not like that. I've got you," she repeated the words Sansa had told her not so long ago, and Sansa barely resisted the urge not to cry when Margaery kissed her again, soft and warm and oh so wrong.

She did not apologize for kissing Sansa, though Sansa did not expect her too, here, in front of Joffrey, and so Sansa did not apologize for kissing her back, despite the drugged haze that Margaery was so clearly in.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Joffrey; his hand down the front of his trousers, leering at them with something wicked in his eyes that she had only seen when he told the Kingsguard to beat her, or ordered someone's horrible death.

She was more disgusted with Joffrey in this moment than she had ever been, save perhaps when he had killed her father and forced her to look upon his decapitated head, and yet that feeling was lost to the pleasure of Margaery's plush lips against hers, gentle and soft and sweet, like one of the candied roses she'd tried from Highgarden once, when Margaery had bade her to.

Margaery smelled of fresh flowers, from this close, as Sansa had always imagined she would.

And then she could hardly imagine anything, could hardly think of anything, for Margaery's tongue was suddenly invading her mouth, lips lightly sucking, hand roving through Sansa's hair.

And then her mouth was on Sansa's again, but instead of a kiss, she whispered, "I'm sorry."

Sansa blinked stupidly, could not bring herself to understand for a few long moments why Margaery should be sorry, and then Joffrey was pulling her to her feet, shoving her against one of the bedposts, and she cried out as her naked back slammed against it, as the warmth of Margaery vanished in an instant.

Joffrey smirked. "How did you like it, Lady Lannister?" he taunted. "Kissing my lady, whom only I have ever kissed."

Sansa let out a shuddering breath, unsure how to answer that. If she said she had, would he ridicule her or be angry with her? If she said she hadn't, would he be offended on his lady's behalf?

Would Margaery be offended?

Sansa shook that last thought from her mind, because, as in control of the situation as Margaery had seemed a moment ago, she knew that Margaery was just as much of a victim of Joffrey in this moment as she was.

"I..."

Joffrey raised a brow, glaring. "Well?"

He was nothing in here; between the two girls, they could overpower him, Sansa thought idly. Push him down and choke him to death.

Ser Meryn Trant stood outside the door, along with two other Kingsguard who had looked markedly less gleeful at the thought of what Sansa was to endure. She glanced away from Margaery, swallowed hard.

Sansa sucked in a breath, shook her head. "She is your queen, Your Grace."

Joffrey shared a look of mock indignation with his lady wife. "You mean you were not satisfied by what little my lady wife deigned to offer a traitor's daughter like you?"

She knew instantly that it had been the wrong answer, and not just from his words, but from the crossbow that Joffrey abruptly lifted, level with her face.

Sansa Stark had always suspected that she would die by a Lannister's hands, as almost the rest of her family had died. She'd had so many nightmares to that effect, and all of the daydreams of throwing Joffrey off of a cliff or killing him by Margaery's side could not change that unavoidable fear.

She had merely thought, in the months since she had grown closer to Margaery and had two men promise to take her from this place, that her death would not come at the hand of Joffrey Baratheon, twitching over the trigger of his crossbow, in his chambers.

For a moment, she forgot to breathe, forgot to think of anything at all, could hear nothing but her frantic, pounding heart in her chest, could see nothing but the twitch of Joffrey's fingers on his crossbow.

And then Joffrey laughed, and tossed the crossbow onto the bed, beside Margaery's feet where they hid beneath the blankets.

Sansa fell to her knees in front of the bed, gasping, her breath returned to her and her chest heaved in terror, like one of the frightened rabbits Joffrey was no doubt teaching Margaery how to kill on their hunts.

Her lower lip was wobbling dangerously, and Sansa could freely admit, in this moment, that she was terrified.

"I think we ought to punish her for that, hadn't we, my lady?" he asked his lady wife, and Sansa turned frantic eyes over to Margaery, pretended she didn't see the glazed look in those eyes as they met her own.

Margaery didn’t answer, merely standing from the bed and walking on feet that looked like they were shaking, for one whose eyes were blown wide with some substance or another, to stand at Joffrey's side, one arm wrapping around his shoulder, her breasts swinging against his clothed chest.

Unlike Sansa, Margaery did not seem the least bit uncomfortable, walking in front of both her husband and Sansa in nothing but her own skin.

Sansa lifted her eyes, flushing as Joffrey's hand wrapped around his lady wife's waist and squeezed at her hips.

Margaery let out a moan that Sansa wasn't entirely sure was faked, and then Joffrey's attention was turning back to her, that vile smirk back in place.

"How ought we to punish her, my lady?" he asked Margaery, and Sansa felt tears stinging in her eyes, tears she would not allow to fall, not before Joffrey. Not again.

"I don't know, my love," Margaery murmured, and Sansa wondered how Joffrey did not hear her voice shake, peppering kisses along Joffrey's neck as she had just been doing to Sansa, moments earlier. Her hands fumbled in his hair for a moment, as if she had quite forgotten how to move them, before they grabbed hold and pulled him forward for a kiss.

Sansa gagged, and Joffrey saw it, his eyes narrowing cruelly.

"I know," he said suddenly, "We ought to beat her, like the whores that I beat when Uncle Tyrion sent them to me," he said, and Margaery's smile faltered for only a moment, before she nodded, looking rather breathless.

"Or, perhaps we could leave her like this," Margaery said suddenly, a fevered light in her eyes as she murmured the suggestion, just loud enough for Sansa to hear, "Send her back to her lord husband in the shame of knowing she has disappointed her king and queen."

It took Sansa a moment to realize that this was Margaery attempting to help her, because that thought terrified her, but she knew the moment Margaery suggested it that it would not be enough for Joffrey.

He shook his head. "No, she's encountered our disappointment before, and continued in her foolish ways. I think we ought to send a better message than that."

Margaery hesitated. "Pardon, love, but she's also been beaten before. Perhaps...a night in the dungeons would make her understand her wrongs."

She sounded almost desperate, but to Sansa, spending a night in the horrible dungeons where her father had spent his last nights hardly sounded better than a beating.

Joffrey's eyes lit up at that idea, and he glanced at Sansa, no doubt coming to the same realization as she was.

"I know!" he said, giggling like an excited child to Margaery. "She's gotten a beating from all of my Kingsguard, yes, but she's never gotten a beating from someone she likes." He smirked at Sansa. "Unless you're going to lie and say you like me, Sansa?"

Perhaps they hadn't been thinking the same thing, after all.

Sansa shivered, knowing that there was only one way that she could respond to that question, and that it would only get her into more trouble.

"Of course I love you, Your Grace," she murmured, looking down at her naked knees. "You are my King and Lord."

Joffrey laughed aloud.

Sansa looked up to see the two of them staring at each other. "See?"

Margaery blinked at him. It took Sansa a moment to realize that the other girl had not spared one glance toward her since getting up from the bed. She wondered if there was a reason for that. Wondered if it helped, as it had for Sansa so long ago, when she watched Joffrey abuse those under his power.

"A beating from me?" Margaery asked, and it was only then that Sansa realized what Joffrey had meant, as Margaery had no doubt sparsed together already.

_"Someone she likes."_

Joffrey grinned. "I know you'd like to," he murmured, stepping forward and holding something out to her. It took Sansa a moment to realize that it was the end of his crossbow, and she blinked, wondering how it had gotten from the bed into his hands without her noticing. "Just like when we're hunting."

He wrapped his arms around Margaery, pulling her back flush against his chest, holding the crossbow until she took it in nimble fingers, that, despite the situation, weren't shaking.

Sansa felt a tear slip down her cheek, then another.

"We can't kill her," Margaery said suddenly, and Sansa found herself only somewhat grateful for the reminder. The other half of her was disappointed.

"Of course not," Joffrey told her, frowning a little. "Although that would be fun. Perhaps next time I will find a whore. But, it's still fun to watch her squirm."

Margaery licked her lower lip. "How do you want it?" she asked, and Joffrey moved away from her, clapped his hands like an excited child.

"Over the bed," he said, and then seemed saddened when Sansa did not immediately move to comply. "Move!"

Sansa climbed to her feet, panting heavily, her heart beating wildly inside of her head, and stood awkwardly in front of the bed, her back to them, her chest rising and falling a bit more steadily now.

Margaery was not Joffrey. Margaery would not hurt her as much as a beating from Joffrey would, even if the blunt end of the crossbow made her cringe to think of it marring her skin.

She wondered if it was what had left those horrible scars on Margaery's skin, before.

And then the first blow struck down across her shoulders, with no warning whatsoever from behind her, and Sansa gasped, letting out a sharp cry of pain that she didn't get the chance to hold back, wincing when she opened her eyes and saw Joffrey sitting on the bed in front of her, staring at her as though he was enraptured.

Behind her, she heard Margaery grunt in what almost might have been pain, though Sansa did not know what she would feel pain about. She was not the one being beaten, after all.

"Harder," Joffrey snapped at Margaery and then, as if remembering that he spoke to his beloved wife, "My lady. She'll survive it. She has before."

He looked more in love with Sansa as he watched her in pain now than he ever had while they had been affianced, and Sansa gritted her teeth and leaned her hands against the bedpost for leverage when the second blow fell.

She saw stars that time, heard Margaery murmur something that might have been an apology and might have been an expression of excitement for Joffrey's sake, and she wondered what strange drug it was that Margaery had taken, and which she doubted Joffrey knew she had done.

Sansa wondered if he would turn his rage on Margaery now, if she pointed it out.

When Sansa came up for air again, after the third strike caused her body to nearly fold on itself and she heard Joffrey's wicked laughter, it took her a moment to even see Joffrey again. All she could see was stars, pain.

And Joffrey, rubbing his prick in front of her through his trousers.

Sansa squeezed her eyes shut as the next blow fell on her side, because she did not want to see Joffrey seeing her in such a vulnerable state, never again. Did not want to see the look of enjoyment on his face.

Courtesy is a woman's armor, her septa had once told her.

Courtesy was doing nothing for her, now.

She was aware enough to realize that Margaery had not hit her anywhere that would permanently damage her, if she could find it within herself to be grateful for that, aware that the blows from a wooden crossbow could be much worse, and yet.

And yet.

She pictured having any sort of conversation with Margaery in the future, pictured the conversation they had just recently had, and knew she would wonder if Margaery had offered Sansa up to save her own skin, even if she could forgive her for it.

She would have merely liked to have known.

"Perhaps I'll bring the Kingsguard in next time, to watch," Joffrey snickered suddenly, and Margaery spoke up, lucidly, for the first time. She was panting, from the exertion.

The exertion of beating Sansa.

"I don't think the King would appreciate the Kingsguard watching this," Margaery murmured, and Joffrey blinked at her. "After all, it is one thing to share in this pleasure with me, quite another with guards who have already been honored by Your Grace."

Joffrey blinked again, and then nodded. "Of course, you are right, my queen. Perhaps only Sansa, then."

Sansa breathed in relief, tears slipping fast and hot down her cheeks, for, at least in this moment, Margaery had stopped hitting her with the crossbow.

She wondered if the welts and bruises and spots of blood that appeared from this beating would be better or worse than those she had received from the Kingsguard. Margaery was not hitting her so hard as they always had, but she had a far stronger arm than Sansa had been expecting.

She was only doing this because of Joffrey. Because she had to.

If Sansa repeated that litany enough in the safety of her own mind, she might just start to believe it.

Margaery paused, and Sansa heard the crossbow thunk to the ground behind her. She nearly sobbed with relief. "Perhaps, my lord. For tonight, though, would you like to finish?"

Sansa flushed scarlet at those words, but Joffrey only grinned, turning toward her, then. "Tell me, aunt, has my lord uncle used you yet like this? I do know he so loves to use his whores. He must have told you the story of what I did with the ones he sent me."

Sansa managed to stammer out some answer, not meeting his eyes, until Joffrey seemed to grow bored of her stammering and snapped, "Well, get on with it, then."

Sansa was expecting another beating. She was not expecting Margaery to spin her around, hand reaching out to steady her, and then to kiss her again. And again. And again, and Sansa was ashamed to admit that, despite the throbbing pain in her back, the fact that she could feel blood oozing around Margaery's fingers where she grabbed her, did not know if it was hers or Margaery’s even if she did not know why it should be Margaery’s, she could lose herself to this sensation.

She was merely relieved that it did not progress beyond kissing. She did not think she could have borne that.

It did not progress beyond kissing for Joffrey, though. When she opened her eyes, she could just see him beyond the frame of Margaery's face, could see as his body seized and the hand inside his trousers retracted, before he bounced to his feet and turned to watch them.

Sansa felt physically ill with her hatred toward him, with the hatred she felt toward Margaery in this moment, that dull, throbbing feeling that she had always felt toward whatever Kingsguard had just been ordered to beat her, even if she knew they were only doing as they were told.

"Did you like that, my lady?" Joffrey asked, and Margaery bit her lip, let out a ragged breath.

Sansa wondered how Joffrey did not notice her stuttering response. “It was...I...very much, my love,” she said finally, and Sansa could almost believe the words. “You spoil me even when I cannot do the things to you that we so enjoy.”

Joffrey almost looked like he was flushing, for a moment, before he grinned as well. "Well, I'm glad," he told her. "I wanted you to like it. You don't have to be jealous of her, you know. And this was your treat, for having to bleed again. Unfortunately, I doubt there will be a next time," he said, and now he was leering at Sansa again. "You'll have a child by then, no doubt."

Sansa wondered, through her haze-filled mind, who he was talking to, then. If a child would protect either one of them from bleeding because of Joffrey.

"No doubt, my love," Margaery agreed, though her voice sounded slightly strangled, and Sansa saw that she had gone rather pale, her hand moving to her naked stomach as if of its own accord.

Joffrey licked his lips. "Oh, yes." And then he seemed to notice Sansa, still there. "What in the seven hells are you waiting for? Get out."

Sansa gulped, moved off of the bed and moved to collect her clothing off of the floor, face burning.

The King and Queen did not even appear to notice her departure, when she finally managed to pull herself together enough to do so, too wrapped up in one another.

Tyrion, however, had noticed her absence, for perhaps the first time.

"Where were you, my lady?" Lord Tyrion asked, eyes glinting with suspicion as Sansa shut the door behind herself.

Sansa swallowed hard. "I was...taking a walk in the gardens. I wasn't aware that I needed to inform you of it, my lord."

Her lord husband's eyes narrowed, and Sansa felt her stomach clench as she stumbled toward the bed, pretending tiredness rather than pain, biting her lips so hard they bled to keep from crying out.

"So late at night?" he asked from behind her, and Sansa flinched at how quickly he had approached, at how harsh his voice was.

She wished that he would leave, so that she could lie here and close her eyes and then put the cream that Shae had brought to her the last time Joffrey'd had her beaten - so long ago now - on her back.

"Yes," she whispered, knowing that wouldn't happen until tomorrow. Knowing that the wounds on her back would be bruises by then, would hurt even worse than they did now.

And knowing that she would have to make a conscious effort to avoid Prince Oberyn over the next few days, for she had no doubt that was where her husband suspected she had been, and while Lord Tyrion was a friend for now, she did not know how long that would last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Full warning: Dubious consent, depiction of physical abuse, threats of rape, drug use


	69. SANSA XLIV

She remembered what Margaery had once told her, that some women liked big men, some small, some tall, some...other women.

And Sansa had laughed in surprise at such words, but she couldn't get the thought of Margaery's puffy, pink lips from her mind, could still feel them pressed against her own.

Beautiful, that moment had been, before Joffrey had ruined it as he ruined everything, but her dreams did not seem to remember Joffrey being present at all.

In them, it was only her and Margaery, their kissing progressing until they were both under the sheets of Joffrey’s great bed, though, here, they were in Margaery’s chambers, Margaery kissing a line down her body before she did things to Sansa – wonderful, beautiful things that Sansa had not thought possible – that Sansa had never imagined before, and Sansa felt such pleasure that-

When Sansa awoke, her stomach felt like it was on fire, and she lifted a hand to her mouth, covered it before the contents of her stomach could end up splayed across her bed.

She was grateful, for a moment, that Lord Tyrion was not there, that he had already left for the day so that he would not see her like this, but the moment did not last long, and soon enough, Sansa found herself rushing to the chamber pot in the corner of the room. She barely had time to kneel in front of it before last night's dinner made a reappearance, and Sansa felt angry tears stinging at her eyes.

She would have to explain this away to one of the servants who came to clean the room. Tyrion trusted only Shae, but Shae was not always around to do so, and she knew that the moment word got out amongst the servants that she was throwing up her meals, Shae would have something to say about it. To Tyrion, most likely.

Sansa couldn't bear that thought, and vomited some more.

When there was nothing left within her and her throat burned and her back ached from the exertion, Sansa sat up a bit, wiping at her eyes and feeling her teeth rot in her mouth.

She had dreamt about Margaery, in the throes of passion, because of what Joffrey had forced her to do. And, much as she hated herself for it, Sansa had enjoyed it.

Both in the dream and last night.

Not the part where she was beaten, of course, where Margaery had raised her hands against Sansa despite their close friendship, where she had found herself wondering if she would ever be able to trust Margaery again, but...the other part.

The part where Margaery had kissed her, drugged, too sweet kiss or not.

When she had lived in Winterfell, Sansa had never heard of the sort of relations between two men and two women that sometimes took place in King's Landing. The epitome of such...relations, too innocent was she to truly know of them, was a knight, like the Knight of Flowers, come to sweep her off her feet and marry her.

She had not even thought of such relations being possible until she came to King's Landing, heard about the whores that Joffrey had abused, heard about Prince Oberyn's many lovers since coming to King's Landing, both male and female, heard the rumors about the Knight of Flowers whom she had idolized since he gave her that flower at the tourney that she hadn’t believed.

Cersei took great delight in mentioning Prince Oberyn’s lovers to her, every time it seemed that Sansa and Prince Oberyn had a conversation that had been overheard, but Cersei was away in Highgarden now, and besides, Sansa had not known whether she spoke just to hurt her, as was usually the case, or not.

In truth, she had not really understood how such relations...actually took place, not really. She understood from her septa the...general way that relations took place between a husband and his wife, but little more for detail.

She had simply assumed that such things took place between two women for a man's pleasure, but what she had felt last night when she kissed Margaery...

Sansa shook her head, vomited up the last of what remained in her stomach. It was a ridiculous thought, and she knew she was only focusing on that one thought because she could not bear to focus on the rest of it.

The part where Margaery had abused her, for Joffrey's enjoyment, even if Margaery had no other choice, at the time.

Sansa had heard the words Joffrey had been saying, before he turned to beating her. She had no doubt that his decision not to rape her, which he had been fixed on for so long, was Margaery's doing, even if a beating was hardly better.

But she had survived beatings before this one, and she would survive this one, as well. She had to.

She picked up the salve that Shae had given her from where she’d hidden it in her dresser, grimacing when she realized that it would be difficult to apply to her back on her own, but that she could not ask Shae for assistance here.

Shae would want to tell Tyrion, and Sansa could not bear that thought any more than she could bear the thought of him learning of her sickness.

The lid of the salve came off in Sansa's hand, and, with an angered cry, she threw it across the room, watched it slam into the wall with a loud thud that made her wince as she heard it crack.

But she doubted that Shae would notice if any of it was missing, and so Sansa took a liberal amount onto her fingers, stripping off her gown and applying it as best as she was able as far as she could reach, and where she could not reach, grimacing and hoping for the best.

It was all Sansa Stark had ever been able to hope for, after all.

She heard a knock on the door halfway through applying the putrid smelling stuff, and Sansa froze, her eyes going wide with horror.

"Just a moment!" she called, and hoped that whomever was on the other side would wait just because she had asked them to, slipping back into her gown, running across the room to pick up the cracked lid once more, and tossing the salve back into its hiding space, even if it was a bit more haphazard now than it had been before.

The door creaked open just as Sansa vaulted back onto the bed, the vomit bucket forgotten in her haste, and she cursed herself as Shae entered the room with a smile and a platter of food.

"Something to eat, my lady?" Shae asked, as she entered the room, and Sansa glanced up from the bed where she lay and shook her head, turning as quietly as she could onto her back so that Shae would not see the mess it was before she did so.

There were no use in hiding the vomit bucket now, but she could at least hide that. She hoped.

"I...I'm feeling a bit under the weather, actually," Sansa said quietly. “Fever.”

That, at least, was true.

Shae tutted, coming forward and pressing the back of her hand against Sansa's forehead. Sansa tried not to flinch as the woman's nose wrinkled, and she glanced back at the bucket, her eyes turning to Sansa once more with far too much understanding in them.

"Some soup, then," the other woman suggested, and Sansa bit her lip, knew that if she put the other woman off too much, she would begin to suspect something else.

"All right," she whispered, and was relieved when Shae smiled, unsuspecting. Then the other woman promised to go and fetch some food from the kitchens, and Sansa fell back into the bed and covered her face with her hand, bit her lip hard enough to draw blood, turned on her side and sobbed into the pillow.


	70. TYRION I

Tyrion Lannister was not a man accustomed to many surprises, since his arrival in King's Landing. His removal as Hand of the King had been a surprise, his marriage to Sansa Stark one as well, though less so, as he understood his family's wicked mind.

The news of her family's death had also been a surprise.

The arrival of the new Queen into his cramped offices as Master of Coin was also a surprise, though he hoped it would be less of a horrible one than the ones to come before it.

She arrived with half of her retinue, ladies and Kingsguard surrounding her as they had since Cersei's ill thought out plot against her, dressed in a simple, loose white gown that failed to account for the elaborate designs she had worn since arriving here, and wearing a pensive smile.

"Lord Tyrion," Margaery greeted, and the little man blinked at her, before stepping forward.

"Your Grace," he dipped his head into a bow. "It is not often that you seek my company. What can I do for you?"

She smiled, a small smile. "And I deeply regret not doing so, Lord Tyrion." She waved her ladies back, though Ser Meryn Trant stared at Tyrion suspiciously even as he followed the other ladies to allow them some privacy.

Tyrion could not resist smirking at the other man.

His smile became a tad forced, then. "As I said. Anything that I might be able to do for you?"

"I have noticed the way that my lord husband the King looks at the Lady Sansa," Margaery segued suddenly, staring intently at him.

Tyrion swallowed uncomfortably. "I do believe that the whole of court has seen the very same, my lady."

"I do not believe that he will stop unless the Lady Sansa is no longer at court to distract him," Margaery said coolly.

Tyrion raised a brow. "From what I have observed of you, Queen Margaery, you are a highly intelligent woman. The last Stark will never be allowed to leave King's Landing."

Margaery nodded. "A shame. For I do believe that a lady of the House of Lannister would."

"I thought you enjoyed her company," Tyrion said quietly, eying her with concern. He knew that the young Tyrell queen was a manipulator; one need only see her for a few moments around Joffrey to understand that, but Sansa was strangely fond of her, and, now that Sansa had been married off, he could think of no reason for the queen to encourage a friendship between the two of them for her own personal gain. Nor for her to suddenly want Sansa gone, when Joffrey's lusting after her had been noticeable throughout the court for months. "Is there a reason for this sudden change?"

"I do enjoy her company," Margaery told him solemnly. "That is the very reason why I suggest such a thing, Lord Tyrion."

Tyrion's eyes narrowed. "You think that...her company would not remain the same, should she remain in King's Landing?"

Margaery took a deep breath, gave him a wide smile, and he realized that Ser Meryn was glancing at them suspiciously, now. "I think it will be irrevocably changed if something is not changed about her environment, and soon, Lord Tyrion."

He swallowed hard, wondered what she knew that had no doubt come from another of Joffrey's vile boasts.

"Thank you for informing me of this, Your Grace."

She hesitated, and then said, in a slightly louder voice than before, "The King would like to have a banquet, soon. You should inform the Small Council of this and ensure that we have the funds for it. I am sure that House Tyrell would be more than happy to provide any needed funds, now that our houses are so firmly united."

He lifted a brow at that, but the little queen was already sweeping away with her ladies and Ser Meryn behind her.

He wondered if he should be offended at her insinuation that he would not help Sansa without some sort of bribe, but he supposed that this new young queen knew as little of him as he did of her.

And he was grateful for the warning, however cryptic. He would not do Sansa the disservice of not acting on it.

With that resolve, Tyrion turned back to his accountings.


	71. MARGAERY XXII

Elinor had convinced her, after much wrangling, that she should see someone. That if she did not let a maester examine her, there could be lasting, detrimental effects that Elinor would not know how to heal.

Margaery knew all of that, of course; but if anyone saw her, their loose lips could see her killed, her family ruined.

And then Elinor told her of her worries that, if she were not careful, the damage done during her miscarriage could be permanent, could keep her from ever having Joffrey's child.

Elinor didn't know any more than Margaery did, and that was finally what convinced her. She had already proven that she was willing to sacrifice someone for the sake of her womb, after all, so she might as well sacrifice someone she didn't care about, as well.

"Maester Gluin," Margaery smiled warmly as the Tyrell maester slipped into the room behind Elinor. "How kind of you to come so quickly."

Maester Gluin glanced at Elinor. "Well, her ladyship implied that it was a matter of some urgency."

Margaery nodded. "Of course. I can trust you to be discreet?"

"Always, Your Grace," Maester Gluin promised, giving her a little bow as he stepped further into the room and Elinor closed the door behind him on the two Kingsguard standing outside.

Maester Gluin clutched to the little bag in his hands. "What is your malady, Your Grace, and why send for me over the Grandmaester?"

"I would rather this happen with someone I am more comfortable with," Margaery told him quietly.

He nodded. "Ah. It is a...female trouble, then?"

Margaery clicked her tongue. "Indeed."

"Do you believe that you are with child, Your Grace?" the maester asked, sounding uncharacteristically excited. Or perhaps it was simply Margaery's belief that all maesters should be as stiff and boring as Grandmaester Pycelle.

"No," she said quietly. "No, rather the opposite, in fact. I believe that..." she glanced at Elinor, who nodded encouragingly and then came to stand beside where Margaery sat on her divan.

"I believe that I have lost a child," Margaery said finally, swallowing hard. "And...I know little of such things, and neither does Elinor. We thought it best to get some outside advice, on how to...properly approach such an issue. Discreetly."

The maester's eyes widened, and his face morphed into an expression of deepest sympathy, but not before she saw the flicker of surprise there. "My condolences, Your Grace."

Margaery waved a hand. "I hardly knew I was pregnant, Maester Gluin, but your condolences are appreciated."

She knew instantly that it was the wrong thing to say by the look on Maester Gluin's face, that any normal woman would have been as inconsolable as he seemed to believe she should be.

Margaery had been inconsolable. The day she'd lost her child, and the day she'd lost Sansa, as well. She wasn't, any longer.

Margaery cleared her throat. "Now, where would you like me for an examination? I believe one should be...prudent."

His head bobbed. "Indeed, Your Grace. Perhaps on the bed, and your lady can sit with you there, pull your gown up to your hips."

Margaery nodded. "Of course. Elinor?"

Elinor helped her to situate herself on the bed, and Margaery forced her muscles to relax as Maester Gluin moved forward and spread her legs apart, began to inspect her as though she were some sort of brood mare.

She knew that many young girls were forced to undergo similar inspections before marriage, to ascertain whether or not they were lying about being untouched, though she thanked the gods that no one had suggested such a thing for her. She got the feeling that Cersei had desperately wanted to, and then been talked out of it.

She wondered whom she had to thank for that.

Her mind wandered as Maester Gluin began to poke and prod at her body, wandered to Sansa, and she felt nothing but immense guilt at the thought of the girl whom she had worked so hard to befriend since her arrival in King’s Landing.

She had hurt Sansa. Terribly, she knew, and she doubted that Sansa would ever forgive her for it, doubted that Sansa, in her state, had realized what was at stake.

She'd had no idea what Joffrey was planning that night, when she'd told him that she could not lie with him because of her moon's blood. It had been partly true; she'd still been bleeding, but not from that. She'd known even as Ser Meryn Trant dragged Sansa into the room that there was nothing she could do to stop what was about to happen, that the control over Joffrey she'd been so proud of having was so easily lost.

It was the hardest acting she'd done since meeting the little shit of a husband she'd been stuck with, not being able to cry out with Sansa every time she let that crossbow hit the other girl, not being able to turn about and hit Joffrey over the head with it.

And she was no longer sure that the Iron Throne was worth such acting ability, much as she'd once lusted for it.

Margaery sucked in a breath as the maester’s work got a bit too intimate, as her cunt began to grow wet with his work.

He glanced up. “Ah...that sometimes happens, Your Grace. Nothing to be ashamed of.”

Margaery pretended not to hear him, closed her eyes and waited and bit back the cry of pain that wanted to emerge from the way he was examining her.

She had sacrificed Sansa for her own cunt. The maester had better find that it was healing, or Margaery might just fall on Joffrey’s sword at her next opportunity to do so.

“Your Grace?” the maester called, and Margaery blinked, realized that he had been trying to get her attention for some time.

“Yes?”

“Has there been any bleeding?” he asked her.

Margaery bit her lip. “A bit, sporadically, since the day of the event. I have had to tie myself off with a rag, as I do when I have my moon's blood. There was...much, on that day.”

“You should have contacted me sooner,” he told her, gently reprimanding. “There might be internal bleeding.”

Margaery sucked in a breath; she had not thought of that. She hoped that what she had done to Sansa had not caused internal bleeding, but then, Joffrey had done the same to her, time and time again, and she had healed of it.

Much as she hated to think it, because she little wanted anything to assauge the guilt she was feeling, Sansa would heal.

The only question, at this point, was whether or not Margaery would.

The maester lifted his head again.

"There does not seem to be internal bleeding, but as your lady suggested, you should rest as much as you can. And have you been feeling any abdominal pain, or any pain in your lower regions?"

Margaery shook her head, pretended not to feel the slightest bit awkward as the man stuck his instruments inside of her.

"And has there been any trouble when you wish to use the bathroom?" Maester Gluin went on, intent in his work.

Again, Margaery shook her head. "None. But...I have been having some pains, when I...When the King and I have relations."

Maester Gluin blinked at that.

"How long ago did the...miscarriage occur, Your Grace?" the maester asked gently, prodding at her sensitive flesh with his instruments, a look of fierce concentration on his face.

Margaery tilted her head, not wanting to think back to that horrible day but knowing all too well. "Several days."

The maester pulled away abruptly, wiped his hands of the stray juices that had been caught on them while he examined her, put his instruments aside.

"You should not have been...having relations with your husband, in that time," the maester reprimanded her. "Your body has gone through a horrible ordeal, and needs time to heal properly. Did no one tell Your Grace and His Grace this?"

Margaery swallowed. "I understood that it was something I should be careful of," she told the maester.

He blinked at her, his eyes narrowing, and really, Margaery should have known better than to send for him. He had been her maester since she was a young girl, and he would know if she lied as easily as her own grandmother might.

Well, perhaps not quite so easily, but Margaery regretted sending for him, all the same, even if a Tyrell maester was better than a Lannister.

"The King does not know, does he?" he asked finally, and Margaery stiffened.

"Maester Glu-"

"One would think that the knowledge of the Queen's miscarriage would travel further than it has," Maester Gluin muttered. "Your Grace, you cannot keep such a secret from the King, not if you wish for another child. You should not even be out of bed. Rest, tell His Grace, and in several days, I will examine you again, let you know when Your Grace can return to all of her marital duties."

Margaery sighed. "I do not want His Grace to know."

The maester stared at her. "Your Grace, you will not be able to keep something like this a secret...The child was His Grace's, was it not?"

Margaery looked away. "Of course it was."

Maester Gluin's eyes gleamed. "Your Grace, as your maester, I will need you to tell me the particulars."

Margaery raised a brow. "Do you?"

"Yes, Your Grace. And then, if you do not, I will have to tell the King."

"Are you not loyal, Maester Gluin?" she asked coldly, a hard feeling sweeping through her. It reminded her of how she had felt the moment before she had killed that deer.

"Yes, Your Grace, of course."

"To me or to the Crown?" Margaery demanded. "How long has it been since they bought you, Maester Gluin?"

"They have not-"

"Guards!"

Two members of the Kingsguard appeared, and Margaery was relieved that one of them was not her brother, not for this task. She did not want to force such a task on Loras.

"Send Maester Gluin to the Black Cells," Margaery ordered them. "He has insulted me."

The two guards surged forward, gripped Maester Gluin by the arms. His bag of instruments fell from his hands and clattered to the floor.

"Your Grace, I have only-"

A suddenly thought pierced Margaery's thoughts, and she swallowed hard before speaking, glanced at Elinor, who gave her a faint nod, looking ill. "And have his tongue cut out, lest he wish to continue speaking. I will not have it, do you understand?"

Maester Gluin abruptly closed his mouth.

"Cut off his hands as well," Margaery ordered in a moment of panic, and was, for once, gratified that Ser Meryn Trant was there, and could be counted upon to do just that.

Ser Meryn was a strange, sadistic man who took the same level of enjoyment that Joffrey did out of others’ suffering, but she had found that, strangely enough, as much as his leering looks and smirking sometimes disturbed her, he was one of her most loyal Queensguard, save for Loras, of course.

And she wondered what that said about her, that it was the case.

She could not bring herself to order the man’s death, and wondered if what she had ordered was worse. No doubt, he would die of his injuries in that horrid place soon enough.

"Yes, Your Grace."

"Your Grace, I beg of you-" the maester called after her as he was dragged from the room, but she could already see Ser Meryn unsheathing his sword, and a moment after the door swung shut, the loud cry and then splashing sounds.

Beside her, Elinor had gone quite pale, perhaps even a little green.

Margaery wondered if her stomach was not queasy because she had grown used to such occurrences, or because she had ordered the acts herself, wondered what that meant. Wondered if she was any less cruel than Joffrey.

"You will tell anyone who asks that the maester made comments about my ability to please my husband," she ordered Elinor, and, when the girl didn't respond, "Elinor."

Elinor sucked in a breath. "Of course, Margaery. Of course."

Margaery looked away. "He would have talked. I couldn't allow that to happen."

"I know."

"What else would you have had me do?" Margaery demanded, rounding on her. “Elinor...”

Elinor sighed. "Nothing, Cousin. Nothing at all."


	72. SHAE I

Shae had seen Lady Sansa after the news of her family's deaths had arrived; she had been a shell of her former self, barely eating, barely speaking, looking out at the world with the sort of bleak emptiness that Shae had sometimes seen amongst the whores of the North, when she had been stuck there for so long before Tyrion brought her back.

But she had not been tearful, then, merely righteously angry and so empty that Shae had not quite known how to comfort her.

She knew that there was something wrong with her lady; Sansa had been acting even more strangely and hunted than usual, and Shae feared that it was something Joffrey had done, but surely they would have heard about it by now, were that the case.

Joffrey ever so enjoyed boasting about his tormenting of those who could not defend themselves, and especially of Sansa.

Something else, then, but she could not get it out of Sansa, no matter how hard she tried.

The girl had been sick for two days for no reason that Shae could understand; she knew that Tyrion was not sleeping with her, because he had told Shae that he was not and she knew that he would not lie about that, but Sansa had been getting rather close to Prince Oberyn of Dorne, and at first Shae thought that might be the problem.

But then she had realized that the malady that affected her lady Sansa was not a physical one. Her sickness not a sign of some illness that Shae needed to look out for.

And then, this morning.

She had found Sansa kneeling over the chamber pot in the corner of her room as she had found her the last few days, had questioned her on her symptoms and realized that Sansa had none, besides the nausea.

And when she had helped Sansa back to bed and the girl had flinched away from her touch, Shae had been more concerned, had begged her to tell her what was wrong or, she had threatened, she would go to Tyrion about it.

At those words, Sansa had broken down and sobbed, letting her head fall against Shae's as they sat on the edge of the bed as Shae held her and rubbed soothing circles into her shoulders, told her that it would be all right even if she did not know what was wrong.

Although, Shae thought she knew. She had encountered girls like Sansa in brothels, sweet and unassuming and so young for the job they were working at for one reason or another, broken within weeks of their beginning work.

Sansa had not broken after years of being a prisoner in this wretched place, which Shae had always admired, but she looked close to breaking now, and Shae did not know how to help her. She knew that Tyrion had suggested leaving King's Landing for a time, but had not yet gotten such permission from his father.

She also knew that his father was not the paragon of legacy and virtue that his children and the rest of Westeros seemed to believe that he was, but Shae was not quite sure that advertising her own...skills, as such a plan would require, would help any of them.

Lord Tywin would use even the smallest amount of proof to separate her from Tyrion, and she could not allow that to happen.

Shae sighed, switching the plate of food that she had brought to Sansa for her break of fast to her other hand; Sansa had not touched a single crumb, and now, against her better judgment, had left Sansa alone to make the long trek to the kitchens to be rid of the empty plate.

She might have eaten it herself, had it not looked so unappetizing after watching Sansa vomit at the sight of it.

She was halfway to the kitchens when she nearly ran into Queen Margaery and her retinue of ladies and guards.

That was another odd thing; Shae had been glad for Sansa when she had learned of how Sansa and Margaery had renewed their friendship after the royal wedding, glad to see that the girl had another friend here in King's Landing, for she needed all of the friendships she could get.

But, during the last few days, the Queen and Sansa had hardly interacted. She knew that the queen was a busy women, and that any woman who could successfully distract their king from important matters of state did not have the time to always be by Sansa's side, but that they had spent so long apart, and that Sansa had not once mentioned the other girl, was...concerning.

Queen Margaery stopped Shae just as they were about to pass one another with a hand on her arm. Shae glanced up, startled, before her pretty brown eyes narrowed.

"Your Grace?"

"Does she ever eat it?" Margaery asked quietly, dipping her head toward the plate of picked over food.

Shae hesitated. "I..."

Margaery raised a challenging brow.

"Less and less by the day, Your Grace," Shae said, lowering her eyes demurely. "I...do try, but my lady is quite stubborn."

Margaery's smile was a cupid's bow. "She is that." A pause. "Has she...spoken of it, to you?"

Shae swallowed, oddly touched by the Queen's concern for Sansa. Someone ought to be, after all. "No, Your Grace. She prefers to believe that the rest of us have not noticed."

Margaery clucked her tongue. "Well..."

"What has happened, Your Grace?" Shae interrupted suddenly, confused by her own audacity. Tyrion had told her to keep a low profile here, and it seemed that she could not quite manage that, what with the way she had antagonized Cersei and now the new queen.

Margaery blinked at her. "Pardon?"

Shae blushed; she was not given to doing so anymore, not for a long while, but so much had changed since she had come to take care of Sansa.

She was not fool enough to say that Sansa had changed her; she knew that people did not change, that they never would, that, deep down, she was still a whore and Tyrion was still a man who would never marry her, but that did not make her want him any less.

Still, when she had first come to work for Sansa as Tyrion's guise at making her fit in the Keep, she had thought the little girl spoiled and frightened, and had hated her for the first few weeks of her marriage to Tyrion, much though she knew that Sansa was not sharing Tyrion's bed.

And now she was questioning the Queen about Sansa's feelings because the girl had cried on her shoulder, and she wanted nothing more than to comfort her, even if she didn't know how.

"My lady, she is...no longer herself. I was wondering if you knew anything about that?"

For the first time since she had first encountered the new young queen, Shae thought she had caught the other woman completely unawares.

Margaery blinked at her, going very pale and swallowing nervously. And then, with a bright smile that Shae recognized all too well, one that she had once given every single one of her customers before she had met Tyrion and one she had seen Queen Margaery give King Joffrey, Margaery said, "I am sorry to hear that. Lady Sansa is a dear friend, and although I am sure I do not know what ails her, I hope she recovers from it soon."

Shae nodded, dipped her head. "As do I, Your Grace."

Margaery gave her a long look. "You seem to care very dearly for your ward. Most servants do not."

Shae lifted her chin. "She is a very dear girl," she said, defying the queen to object.

Margaery merely swallowed and, giving Shae one more nod, picked up her skirts and made her way down the rest of the corridor with the rest of her servants. If Shae did not know better, she would almost say that the queen was fleeing, but then, the Tyrell queen had nothing to fear from Shae.


	73. TYRION II

The one saving grace about his little shit of a nephew was that his new queen had him completely whipped.

Of course, that was only a blessing when the queen was actually present. Apparently, she was ill with some sort of malady she had gotten while on that godsforsaken hunt the king had dragged her from her bed in the middle of the night to attend, and locked away in her chambers in the Maidenvault.

Joffrey was particularly annoying today, as a result, although Tyrion was rather surprised he had bothered to show up at a meeting of the Small Council without his queen present.

Perhaps he'd run out of people to bully, what with Lady Sansa being ill, as well. Perhaps some sort of epidemic was at hand, and Tyrion should have been more worried.

Tyrion started in on his report as the lowly Master of Coin when his father waved a hand for him to do so, looking down at his notes. He'd heard Lord Varys reporting on such things before, and Cersei had summarily dismissed them as not important.

But the Iron Bank was not going to give them another loan if they were unable to keep the Greyjoys in line, and Tyrion knew that something needed to be done about them, now, unless they wanted a repeat of what had happened during the Greyjoy Rebellion.

"The Greyjoys have amassed a fleet the likes of which would be dangerous if crossed in battle, and-"

“Is your wife’s cunt that boring for you, Uncle?” Joffrey interrupted mockingly, and the whole table fell silent at those words. Tyrion ground his teeth.

“The Iron Islands haven't been a threat since Greyjoy Rebellion. My mother knew as much, when she was still here." Joffrey smirked. "Or maybe she’s bored of you. I’m sure I could find her more entertainment elsewhere.” He smirked as he said the words, leaving his meaning clear. “My queen wouldn’t mind sharing, I’m sure.”

Tywin cleared his throat. “If you can’t bring yourself to act like a king at these meetings, Your Grace, you may excuse yourself.”

Joffrey glared at him. “I’m the King. You can’t just kick me out of my own Small Council.”

And then he seemed to remember the last time Tywin had done so, and fell silent.

Prince Oberyn cleared his throat, then. “It seems to me that a more pressing matter than whether or not Lady Lannister satisfies her husband is whether or not the Iron Islands are a threat to the Crown, as Lord Tyrion suggests. Perhaps more effort should be put into investigating the matter.”

Joffrey snorted derisively, clearly taking after his mother in his view of the threat of the Iron Islands. “A couple of sailors a thousand miles away with wooden paddles are hardly a concern. Besides, I don’t want to talk about that. My lady wife wants to go to Highgarden to visit her family and my lady mother, and I want the Small Council to approve such a visit and pay for it.”

Joffrey had said many stupid things since becoming King, and long before then, but Tyrion did not think anything he had said so far had quite shocked Tywin Lannister as this simple statement did.

“For what purpose?” Tywin demanded coldly.

Joffrey glared back at him, and then lowered his eyes. “I want to visit my mother, I’ve already told you. She’s barely written since going there, and I’d like to know she’s all right. And Margaery-”

“Do you doubt your wife’s family’s ability to care for your mother, Your Grace?” Tywin went on regardless.

Joffrey flushed. “Of course not.”

“I assure you, Her Grace will undergo nothing but the utmost care and happiness while in Highgarden-” Mace rumbled from his place at the end of the table, and Tyrion wondered if he had only just woken from a nap.

“I don’t care!” Joffrey snapped. “I want to see her!”

Tywin looked very close to rolling his eyes. “Tyrion, perhaps as Master of Coin you can explain to our young king why it would be foolish and impossible to fund a trip for him to travel to the Reach on a whim, and our Master of War can explain why this would endanger the King at a time when the Crown is vulnerable.”

Joffrey’s face turned puce. “I don’t need lectures from my uncle!” he snapped, glaring at Tyrion in lieu of Tywin.

“No, what I think you need is a good hiding, and your mother isn’t here to keep you from one,” Tywin snapped suddenly, and Tyrion felt his jaw drop at the words, before his father visibly composed himself. “Nevertheless, the Crown will not be funding any such whimsical venture, and you will be remaining in King’s Landing, along with the Queen. Perhaps if there were an heir to ensure the protection of the Crown in your absence, things would be different.”

Joffrey pouted. “What in the seven hells are we keeping Tommen around for, then?” he demanded petulantly.

Tywin looked rather close to snapping again; Tyrion was rather surprised he had made it this long.

“Tommen is the Prince of Westeros, and, should you die without a trueborn heir, he will take your place,” Tywin lectured him. “In the mean time, I think that you and your young queen should focus on making an heir of your own, rather than vacations to Highgarden.”

Joffrey crossed his arms, glared, looking rather pale at that suggestion, before he fled from the room.

Oberyn chuckled, but silenced himself when Tywin glared his way. Tyrion did not blame the Dornish Prince; if he’d had the balls, he might have chuckled himself.

Tywin rolled his eyes, then. “Moving on to more important matters...”


	74. SANSA XLV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is...finally...a kiss. Merry Christmas.

"I am thinking that perhaps it is the right time to take my young wife to Casterly Rock," Tyrion said, over their dinner that evening, and Sansa froze, with her hand still poised over her drink. She glanced at him, did not respond.

They did not normally speak, over their morning meals. She knew that sometimes he wished to do so, but her cutting silence usually stopped him.

This evening, it was much the same until now, for her injuries, however better they felt due to the salve, still pained her, and she did not know if she could keep up the charade that everything was fine in front of her husband if he forced conversation between them.

And now this.

She had been waiting, for either Tyrion or Prince Oberyn to respond to her wish to leave this place soon. She had honestly not thought it would be Tyrion first.

But, with the beating she had taken, the thought of a riding a horse all the way to Casterly Rock made her cringe, even if it meant she would be far from here.

Much as she hated the thought, she would have to delay, in some way that would not gain her lord husband's suspicion.

"You might benefit from time away from Court just now," Tyrion went on, when Sansa failed to respond.

She swallowed, horrified that he somehow knew what had happened, but she thought he would have mentioned it outright if he did, would not look so calm.

Sansa blinked at him. "Would your lord father allow the last Stark heir out from under his thumb? Casterly Rock is some ways from here. I thought that was the trouble before."

Tyrion narrowed his eyes at her. "Not so long ago, I remember a lady who would have gladly left King's Landing behind at the first opportunity. And I have spoken to him, have almost convinced him that it would be for the best. For my duties, of course. And someone should check up on Littlefinger. What happened to her?"

Sansa shrugged, standing and straightening her gown. "She grew up."

"Lady Sansa-"

"May I be dismissed, Lord Tyrion? I have an audience with Queen Margaery, and I wouldn't want to be late."

He sighed, taking a long drink of his wine. "Of course, my lady."

She walked toward the door, nodding once to Shae, who was sending her a concerned look, before calling back to Tyrion, "My lord?"

He glanced up, seeming surprised that she was still in the room; she supposed she deserved that, after all, she usually ran from him at any given opportunity.

Perhaps he thought that she had not encouraged his suggestion because she was terrified of living alone in Casterly Rock with him. As if she would be any less safer from him there than here.

"You should not seek to give me false hope where there is none, my lord," she said, her voice soft, and she was ashamed to find that it was nearly cracking by the end of her sentence.

He opened his mouth, as though he might say something, might reassure her somehow, but then closed it once more, just as Sansa shut the door to their chambers behind her.

A younger Sansa would have jumped at the opportunity, would have found herself fantasizing over the idea of being able to leave this wretched place full of Lannisters, escape her horrid little husband and go home to Winterfell, where she belonged.

Casterly Rock was just as full of Lannisters as King's Landing, and the Boltons, who had helped to kill her brother and mother, had Winterfell, now.

What was the point in leaving? She was just as safe here as she would be anywhere.

Sansa stood, wondered if Tyrion would object if she took another gulp of wine in order to gather her courage, and in the end didn’t do so, going off to find Margaery as she had told Tyrion she would.

Truth be told, she'd been avoiding Margaery throughout the day, staying in her rooms because Margaery seemed oddly hesitant to seek her out there. It was safe there, then.

And she hated the thought that she now needed to hide from Margaery as well as from everyone else in King’s Landing. That Margaery, who had been her constant in all of this, had beaten her, just like any of Joffrey’s Kingsguard. That she had just learned how much she cared for Margaery.

It would have been so much more convenient to have learned this long ago, or long in the future, if they had one. Not now.

She sucked in a breath, determined not to think of such things as she made her way to Margaery’s chambers, lest she turn around.

She didn’t even know why she was going, what she was going to say when she arrived. Didn’t know if she wanted to rail against Margaery or sob in her arms.

When the door to Margaery’s chambers opened at her hesitant knock, Sansa was surprised to find Margaery by herself. It was certainly unusual, for the other girl.

“Sansa,” Margaery said, her voice soft and surprised, and she reached up with a movement that was oddly self-conscious, wrapping her crimson robe more firmly around her shoulders, and Sansa found herself blushing, remembering how she had seen Margaery naked, not two nights before.

Sansa licked her lips. “May…May I come in?”

Margaery nodded instantly, held the door open for her, closed it behind her, and Sansa tried not to think about how it reminded her of that horrible night.

Margaery’s rooms were dark, smoky, and it took Sansa a moment to realize that she was burning incense by her bed, accounting for the tangy smell filling the air.

“Margaery…” Sansa turned to the other girl as she watched Margaery sit nimbly – almost painfully, though Sansa did not know what right she had to pretend at pain when Sansa had been hissing and cringing since that night – on the edge of the bed.

She stopped speaking then, unsure what to say. Margaery, at any rate, spoke before she could find her own words.

"Sansa, I would like to apologize for the other night," Margaery said in a rush.

Sansa blinked. She could not remember the last time someone had apologized to her.

“Joffrey...I told him that I was on my moon’s blood, because I...” Margaery glanced away. “Anyway, it was my fault that he called for you. He was...punishing me, for denying him. I...do not have as much pull over him as I once believed, as I have been finding out lately.” She swallowed, “But...that does not excuse what I did to you. It was reprehensible, and I...I understand if you cannot forgive me for it, if I have killed everything that was once between us with my actions.”

Sansa stared at her. “Margaery, I...”

She stopped then, because she was not sure herself if she could forgive Margaery for this, as Margaery had implied, and she did not want to rush to say she would now, where she might have with anyone else.

Margaery was her friend, or had been. She would understand.

Instead, Sansa nodded stiffly, and Margaery seemed to wilt before her.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Sansa said at last, grudgingly. “Joffrey is a beast.”

She did not feel guilty, uttering those words here, in the safety of the chambers she had just dreamt so vividly about...

Luckily, Margaery mistook her blush for fear over what she had said, and moved to shut the door more firmly.

“That is...kind of you to say, Sansa, but I shall hold myself accountable for it, anyway. I...” she hesitated, her eyes soft and kind and very different from everything they had been the night before. “If your lord husband has any plans to leave King’s Landing soon, then I think that you should not waste any opportunity for anything here.”

Sansa blinked at her, remembered the words Tyrion had spoken to her just before she came here. “You spoke to him.”

Margaery looked away, nodded. “I do not...I do not think that what occurred two nights ago will be the last of Joffrey’s attentions toward you. I...worry.”

Sansa did not know whether to thank her for that or yell at her for it.

“What about you?” Sansa blurted out suddenly, and Margaery blinked at her in clear surprise.

Sansa forged on, “I do not think I am the only who suffered that night, Margaery. And, though I hurt from it, I also...When he made us kiss, I mean...That is...I am sorry for that. That...that you suffered, as well, before and after that. I suppose that Joffrey hurt you in such ways...before.”

Seven hells, she sounded like the little fool Cersei had always called her.

"I...It's...quite all right," Margaery said gently, eyes still blown wide in clear surprise that Sansa never saw from the other girl, reaching out to touch her shoulder, and Sansa flinched away.

Margaery nodded, lowered her arm, still looked shocked that Sansa would think of her, after what had happened. Sansa herself was rather shocked, if she was being honest, but she forced herself to be strong, to not show it. "It doesn’t matter.”

Sansa shook her head, frantic to not be the victim here. Or, failing that, the only one. "No, he...he gave you something. Or...but you had something. Something to make you...I shouldn't have took advantage like that, kissing you. I should have-"

Margaery's hand closed over her own. "Sansa," she murmured, and the other girl glanced up then, finally meeting Margaery's eyes.

What she saw there...confused her. Certainly there should be anger in Margaery's eyes, or disgust, or guilt, or something that resembled the upset that Sansa was expecting.

But there wasn't.

Instead there was something that Sansa didn't quite recognize, something that both excited and scared her.

And then Margaery was leaning forward, eyes closing as Sansa had imagined they would in her dreams, hand reaching out, closing over her own-

Margaery's lips were just as sweet as they had been with Joffrey watching, just as fat and wet and Sansa closed her eyes and leaned into the kiss, pressing her hand to the back of Margaery's head, pulling the other girl closer to her and reveling in the taste of Margaery, even as Margaery's lips opened and she found Margaery's teeth pressing against her mouth.

Sansa was not sure who had started the kiss, though she was vaguely certain that they both had moved forward together, only that she never wanted it to stop, as their tongues pressed together and she felt Margaery inside of her, heard the other girl moan into her mouth, felt Margaery's hands on her waist, travelling downward.

Felt wetness between her thighs.

Sansa pulled away suddenly, jumping to her feet.

Margaery, for her part, recovered rather quickly, opening her eyes and smoothing down the front of her dressing robe, not at all flushed as she sent Sansa a small, nervous smile.

"I should...Ishouldgo," Sansa gasped out, and then turned and ran, ignoring the Queen as she called out after her.


	75. SANSA XLVI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is...more kissing. And talking. And some angst. Happy Holidays, and all that.

She had thought that Margaery would do her the courtesy of leaving her to lick her wounds for a while, but evidently she could not be counted on for that.

Margaery, it seemed, had followed her directly from her chambers, and Sansa was at least relieved that Shae or Tyrion were not there to see this.

"Your Grace," she blinked, as Margaery stepped just inside the door before Sansa could close it, sticking her foot firmly in the doorway.

A part of Sansa was tempted to just close it anyway, to hurt her like she had hurt Sansa...

No. No, she couldn't think like that.

"Your Grace, I don't think that-"

"Is that to be my punishment, then?" Margaery asked, in a hoarse voice, and Sansa blinked at her. "Your calling me 'Your Grace,' once more?" She swallowed. "Then, I suppose I deserve far worse than that."

Sansa shook her head. "What? No, I-"

"I hurt you, Sansa, and I understand that it was horrible and unforgivable, in some ways," Margaery said quietly, and Sansa blinked at her, sighed, grabbed Margaery by the arm and pulled her into the room, shutting the door behind her.

Margaery raised a brow.

Sansa shook her head. "That's not...I'm not..."

She shook her head, wondered why she could barely speak. "I'm not angry with you," Sansa decided on at last. "It...hurt, what you did to me, knowing that it was you, but...I also know that was Joffrey's intention. I just...think I need more time."

Margaery nodded. "I understand. I...could use some time myself, to think." The way she said it had Sansa wondering what it was Margaery needed to think about, and she almost snapped something to that effect, before it suddenly dawned on her.

Margaery had beaten her because Sansa liked her. Because they were friends. Even Joffrey had noticed it. It could not have been easy, beating someone that she cared about, now that Margaery had demonstrated to her in recent months that she did indeed have a soul.

That didn't make her feel better, but it did help, Sansa supposed.

Margaery glanced around the room, clasping her hands in front of her. It suddenly occurred to Sansa that she seemed nervous, that there were few times that Sansa had ever seen Margaery nervous.

"Before I go," Margaery said suddenly, and Sansa hated herself for the way she turned to her like a loyal pup, "I understand that your…wounds from the other day would be difficult to explain to anyone who might see them, and I know intimately the pain they might cause. Let me help you,” Margaery said gently. “Please, Sansa.”

It was the ‘please’ that did it, in the end, though Sansa was beginning to understand that there was nothing she would deny Margaery.

And besides, someone needed to do it. Sansa did not know how much longer she could go on pretending that everything was all right to her husband. Or to Shae, who was much more suspicious.

Sansa nodded, walked over to the spot behind her dresser where she kept the salve, the salve which had been so difficult lately to easily apply, and brought it back, glanced nervously at Margaery.

"Where should I...?"

Margaery hesitated. "Wherever you'd like," she said finally, opening the salve and grimacing instantly at the smell before scooping up a bit of it onto her finger.

Sansa swallowed, moved over to the bed, lay flat on her back. She flushed a little as she felt the bed dip where Margaery sat on it beside her, and then some more when Margaery began peeling back her gown.

She supposed it was necessary, of course. To apply the salve.

"Is this all right?" Margaery asked gently, when the gown had been moved out of the way, leaving Sansa's back bare. Not as bare as it had been the other night, of course.

Sansa could only nod against the sheets, hope that Tyrion or Shae would not walk in to see the purpling bruises on her back.

Margaery let out a little sigh, and Sansa feared that she was going to apologize again, did not think she could bear listening to it. She turned her head slightly, glancing at Margaery.

"Please, just..."

Margaery seemed to understand, took up another dollop of salve and began softly rubbing the cold cream onto Sansa's back.

Sansa winced as she touched the first bruise, but then the cool stuff began to seep into her injuries, growing cold then hot then cold again, and she let out a little sigh of pleasure.

Margaery's hand froze.

"I am sorry if I distressed you earlier, Lady Sansa," Margaery spoke, and Sansa knew her enough now to recognize the hollowness in her voice, "It was not my intent. Perhaps I was out of turn-"

"You need not apologize to me, Your Grace," Sansa said quietly, lowering her eyes. "I...You did not distress me."

Margaery's eyes widened, and Sansa could see that she had truly surprised the other girl.

"Merely startled me, is all."

And then Margaery was moving forward, so close that Sansa could feel the folds of her silver gown brushing against Sansa's naked back. "I should not have taken advantage of the situation as I did. You are hurting, and I have only complicated matters between us with this."

Sansa swallowed hard, feeling a sudden heat in her cheeks. "They were merely...I mean, I've never-"

Margaery pulled back then, understanding filling her features. "Have you never thought about another that way?" At Sansa's undoubtedly blank expression when she turned her head, she clarified, "Sexually?"

The very word made Sansa blush from her roots.

She had, of course.

A growing girl could not live in Winterfell without something to occupy her thoughts beyond the songs and her sewing, and Theon Greyjoy, disgusting cad though she thought him now, had then been a charming romantic thing in her thoughts, handsome and whimsical in his sad tale of woe.

Like someone out of the songs.

But her thoughts then had been largely innocent, for her mother had explained little of these things to Sansa at the time; she had learned far more from Cersei, who was far more willing to share, even if only to humiliate her.

And then there had been Joffrey, the very thought now making her shudder.

From the moment he had stepped off his horse in Winterfell, she had believed herself in love with him, believed that she would be his queen and love every moment of it.

Those thoughts still made her flush now, when he ridiculed her and stripped her and had her beaten, when he threatened the most obscene things of her.

When he forced her to kiss Margaery for his pleasure.

She had not held a good track with those she thought of in this manner, and something about that made her fear thinking of anyone else in the same way.

She understood, too, that the feeling of wetness between her thighs meant that she was aroused; she had gained that education from Cersei, when the other woman had tormented her and told her that it was unlikely she would ever experience it, that, when she married Tyrion she would be dry as a bone and it would hurt when he-

But she had never thought of a woman in this way, before Margaery.

Margaery, who was unlike anyone she had ever met. Margaery, who was unfailingly kind, even when she was pretending not to be.

Sansa swallowed, and hoped Margaery misinterpreted the gesture. "I..."

Margaery seemed to take that for an answer. "Oh," she murmured. "I merely thought..." She shook her head. "It doesn't matter."

They fell into an awkward silence this time, waves away from the amicable silence they had been in before, while Margaery continued to clean her back.

And then, the salve applied, Margaery reached out and traced one of the bruise's edges, far enough away that it did not hurt, but Sansa stiffened all the same.

"Oh, Sansa..." she whispered, and Sansa turned her head, met the other girl's eyes.

Sansa looked away first. "It's no different than what you have," she said softly, unflinching.

Margaery's smile was pained. "It is kind of you to say so. I do not think that I could be so kind to my abuser."

Sansa flinched back. "You're not my...you didn't...Joffrey made you do that. It wasn't..." she swallowed hard, centered herself. "It wasn't your fault."

Margaery smiled wanly. “I don’t think we shall agree on that, Sansa."

"Why did you let him, then?" Sansa demanded, eyes filling as she pulled herself up into a sitting position, and she blinked them away angrily.

Margaery stared at her, looking surprised. "Sansa, I..."

"Why?" Sansa demanded, and then Margaery was speaking, a torrent of words that Sansa neither understood nor wanted to understand.

"I didn't want to," Margaery said quietly. "I looked at the way he was enjoying hurting you, and I wanted to kill him with my bare hands, the throne be damned. I hated him, in that moment. I hated him before, but I..."

"I don't understand," Sansa said finally, when she'd had the opportunity to mull that over in the silence following Margaery's proclamation. Margaery glanced down at her, and Sansa lifted her chin. "Why? He hurt you, too. Why would it take what happened to me to hate him?" She swallowed hard. "I hated him the moment he cut off my father's head."

Margaery swallowed, and this time, it was she who would not meet Sansa's eyes. "I don't know," she said finally, a vein throbbing on her neck. "The way I feel for you...I cannot explain it, and I can't explain it away. Believe me, I've tried over the months since we met. Is that enough?"

Sansa shook her head. "No, I can't. I can't tell anything about you, Margaery, half the time. I need-"

I need you to tell me.

The words hung in the air for a long moment, before Margaery sighed.

"I took sweetsleep, before Joffrey called me to his chambers. I...my moon's blood has affected me greatly, and a maester gave it to me. I could feel myself burning underneath my skin even as I smiled and felt too calm." She let out a ragged breath. "I felt like it was my back, every time I struck you. Saw the blood and the bruises and they were on my skin. I felt your pain, your screams echoing through my head, and it nearly killed me. I hated myself, in that moment, more than I hated Joffrey. I...And I could do nothing but smile and pretend that I enjoyed hurting the person whom I care about more than...more than..." She swallowed again, looked almost frustrated at her inability to articulate those words.

"Are those just words?" Sansa bit out bitterly. "Like the ones you say to Joffrey?"

Margaery's eyes widened. "Of course not," she murmured. "I...Sansa, you are very dear to me."

They sat in more silence, oppressive and cold like the salve on Sansa's back, before Margaery spoke again.

"I...can't control him," Margaery said softly. "I thought I could; it's why I allowed myself to be married to him in the first place. But...Every time I think I've got a handle on him, he...I don't."

Sansa bit her lip. "I'm sorry," she murmured, knowing that she herself could have been in this situation, had Margaery never arrived to take it from her.

"He...terrifies me," Margaery admitted, because she knew that Sansa would understand, and tell no one.

Sansa waited, not speaking, and Margaery was glad for that.

"But, mostly, he makes me terrified of whom I'm becoming," she whispered. "I have to play a role for him, every moment we're together. And...sometimes I worry that it's becoming more than just a role to play. Except..." she glanced up at Sansa. "You are the only one who still feels real."

Sansa swallowed. "I would like to kiss you," she said, unsure where the words came from, before leaning forward. The other girl nodded, eyes blown wide, and she leaned down, pressing their lips together gently.

Because she’d had a dream every night since...that night, and she needed to know for herself. For real.

The moment Margaery's lips touched hers, Sansa knew.

It didn't feel like the time they had kissed for Joffrey's amusement. She hadn't been sure earlier, when they had kissed and she had been confused, but she knew now, as clearly as if the gods themselves had come down to tell her exactly this.

It felt...different. Better, and suddenly Margaery was surging forward, pushing Sansa's back gently against the bed sheets and kissing her until she was breathless, panting into Margaery's mouth, feeling Margaery's tongue inside her own.

She winced a little as the salve on her back stuck to the sheets, but couldn't bring herself to care as Margaery lowered herself on top of her, kissed her until there was no air left in Sansa's lungs but she couldn't think of pulling away for even a second.

The moment was heady, and she felt a pleasant buzz entering her mind, her blood, streaming out into the rest of her body, and Sansa groaned loudly, arching herself up into Margaery as much as she could, until she didn't think they could be any closer, and she heard Margaery moan as well, not the fake moans she had given Joffrey nights ago, but something real, something that was just for Sansa.

It made Sansa wet between the thighs again, but this time, Sansa couldn't bring herself to care. Told herself to enjoy it, in fact, for a dozen feelings were exploding inside of her, things she had never felt for Theon, or Joffrey, or anyone.

Margaery's hand lowered from Sansa's cheek, skittered along her neck like the coolest of touches, making Sansa shiver, before stopping at the start of Sansa's gown, rolling the fabric between her fingers.

She pulled her lips away from Sansa then, ignoring Sansa's groan of disappointment, gestured to Sansa's gown with her other hand.

"May I...?" she asked quietly, and Sansa blinked at her, flushed and bemused and wondering why Margaery had pulled away. And then she understood the question, and blushed some more.

"Yes," she whispered, and Margaery smiled widely, bent down again, was kissing her again with ruthless abandon that had Sansa moaning and squirming and enjoying every moment of it, her lips swollen from where Margaery bit her, tongue pressing into Margaery's mouth, desperate.

She could hardly think of anything but this moment, the sweetness of Margaery's mouth against hers.

"Are you sure about this?" Margaery asked quietly, pulling at the strings in the front of Sansa's gown.

Sansa swallowed. "I..." She wasn't, of course. She wasn't sure about this, as she wasn't sure about anything, and she was more sure in this moment that she wanted Margaery than she was sure of anything.

Apparently, the pause was too long for Margaery, whose hand lowered to her side, and Sansa found herself instantly mourning the loss of the warm touch.

Sansa attempted to bring it back, but Margaery was stubborn at the best of times, and certainly now.

Margaery pulled back. “We are both hurting, after what happened,” she said gently, putting a finger to Sansa’s lips. “I want this, and you may think that you want this, but...I think that we should wait. That you should be sure. We both wanted to think about this earlier, and we should not let what we are feeling now come ahead of that.”

Breathless, Sansa knew that, were she in her right mind, she would agree.

Sansa Stark had not been in her right mind for some time.

“I don’t care,” she blurted out, and Margaery stared at her, eyes wide. “I don’t,” Sansa insisted. “Margaery, please.”

Margaery swallowed hard, shook her head. “I do,” she said gently, giving Sansa another kiss to the forehead. “Think about it. At least for a day.”

Sansa bit her lip. "All right," she murmured, and Margaery let out a groan.

"What is it?" Sansa asked her.

"It's what you should say, of course," Margaery told her, with a teasing little grin, "But I was rather hoping you wouldn't." She bent down, kissed Sansa chastely on the lips once more and reaching out to fix her hair, before making a graceful exit.

And not a moment too soon, for Shae entered just as she left, blinked at Sansa's rather haphazard appearance, but made no comment, merely smiled at her, clearly thinking that all they had done was patch up whatever had been between them.


	76. SANSA XLVII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sansa has a bit of an epiphany

Margaery had been right when she told Sansa that they should take time to think. Sansa hadn't been able to stop thinking about the kiss since the moment Margaery had left their chambers and she'd been forced to invent some story for Shae that she didn't think the other woman had believed.

But she understood now why Margaery's words had been wise, why she should be glad that they had not...done anything more than what they had. She was still so very confused about her feelings for the other girl, still trapped between the understanding of what Margaery had done to her and her own understanding of her feelings for Margaery.

She didn't know if they had come of some twisted reasoning from what Joffrey had them do, didn't know if what she felt for Margaery was real or a figment of her trauma.

And yet.

Kissing Margaery had been wrong, and foolish, and...one of the best feelings Sansa had ever had.

"Are you all right, Sansa?" Prince Oberyn asked her, and Sansa froze.

They were taking a turn about the gardens, Oberyn regaling her with stories of how superior the water gardens of Dorne were to these, even if she was beginning to suspect she would never see them.

She had been listening, of course, and not thinking about the kisses that Margaery should never have allowed her to give the other girl, but now a more pressing concern hit her.

She had grown used to hiding her current condition from her lord husband, and she understood from Ellaria, and, indeed, from Prince Oberyn's own words, that Oberyn Martell was a bit of a hothead. She did not think that it would be any better to tell him what had occurred at Joffrey's orders.

And besides, she hated the thought of admitting it to anyone who did not already know. Margaery had helped with the salve, and her back buzzed pleasantly, so long as no one touched it. She'd squirmed away from Prince Oberyn placing his hand there earlier, and she had no doubt he'd noticed, but it was nice, to pretend that he hadn't.

Trust him to shatter that illusion, as he had shattered her illusion that she would be safe and far from King's Landing by now.

"Yes, of course," she told him quietly, shaking thoughts of Margaery from her mind. "I just...wish we were gone from this place, by now. Won't you tell me when we can leave? Surely your business is complete."

Oberyn grimaced. "I wish that it was, believe me. I have no wish to remain in this lions' den any longer than you do."

"Then why are we still here?" she asked him, tilting her chin up and meeting his eyes.

And, for the first time, Oberyn gave her an honest answer, one she almost believed, after a long, hesitant pause.

"I have finished my merchant business, it is true, and achieved a permanent spot on the Small Council, which I will be able to maintain from Dorne. But I have other business that needs completing, for my sister's sake."

"Your sister?" Sansa echoed, her brows furrowing.

He gave her a suddenly intense look; it reminded her a bit of the way Margaery had looked at her, the night before, when they were-

"The Mountain still remains in King's Landing," Oberyn told her bluntly. "Tywin Lannister knows of my desire to face the beast in honest combat, but is denying me. However, I have plots to punish him, as well, plots that my brother and I have carefully laid out in preparation of a long game. When we depart for Dorne, Lady Sansa, we may have to go about it...quickly, however weak King's Landing will be when we do so."

"You're planning to murder them?" Sansa asked in surprise, leaning forward as she hissed out the words.

Oberyn gave her a somewhat annoyed look. "I plan to seek justice for my beloved sister's death, and I would be here to see the fruits of my labor through. Surely you would not deny me that."

The accusation in his tone burned, and Sansa flushed, for of course she could not claim such a thing. She still wanted to see Joffrey's head on a pike, as her father's now was, still wanted to have her own justice for the deaths of her mother and brother and the goodsister she had never met, so of course she understood.

"You'll never be able to defeat the Mountain in open combat," Sansa said suddenly, fearfully, remembering the one time she had seen the giant nearly kill Ser Loras.

Oberyn grinned at her. "I think you underestimate me, my lady."

Sansa bit her lip. "I wish you hadn't told me," she confessed suddenly, and he blinked at her.

"You wished to know," he said finally, gently, "And I believe that you should know. Ellaria has wished that I keep my intent from you, as it worries her as much as I think you are now worried, but our plan to take you from this place is not without risk, Lady Sansa, and you should know the risks you are facing."

Sansa blinked at him. "I don't want to face them."

He nodded, his expression somehow gentler still. "Few do," he said quietly. "But your leaving King's Landing and the Lannisters' captivity was a venture that was never going to be without risk, Lady Sansa."

Risk. The word had her thinking about the look Shae had given her when she'd entered Lord Tyrion's chambers after Margaery's exit.

What had she been thinking?

Margaery had beaten her, Joffrey's orders or not. She had hurt her, had forced those kisses upon her not for Sansa's pleasure but for Joffrey's, and had laughed about it with Joffrey while she did it, had slept with him afterward.

And, if Prince Oberyn's plan came to fruition, it might just find more victims than the Lannisters. Margaery was the wife of the worst of the Lannisters, after all.

And yet, Sansa found herself thinking back on all of their interactions since Margaery had come to King's Landing. The gentle touches, the reassuring words, those more on Margaery's side than her own. All the times Margaery had looked at her and Sansa had known what she wanted yet hadn't. All the times Sansa had wanted more and didn't know how to express it.

Once, Sansa had clung to Margaery and her family as closely as they clung to her because she believed that they could offer her protection from the very Lannisters Oberyn seemed intent to punish.

And the things she had felt for Margaery; they were nothing like what she had once felt for Jeyne, she could see that now easily enough.

She had not been so angry with Margaery when she saw her safe in Joffrey's arms in the early days of Margaery's marriage because she felt Margaery had betrayed their friendship. Rather, because she had been jealous, and not of Margaery.

It had taken her a while to realize that, of course. In fact, she did not think she had even understood it when she had kissed Margaery just the other day, not even later, after Margaery had bade her think about what she was doing, and she had seen Joffrey pull Margaery close in front of the entire court and kissed her, and she had remembered her jealousies at the beginning of that marriage.

Remembered how it had burned, to watch Margaery kiss another. Kiss Joffrey.

She knew now that Margaery could not always protect her, that sometimes, that lack of protection would get Sansa hurt, as had been so amply demonstrated the night before, but she thought she could probably bear that, with Margaery by her side.

Because no one could, and Sansa didn't want Margaery to protect her if that was all their friendship meant. She didn't want Margaery because she could protect her. She wanted Margaery because she was beautiful, and kind, and she made Sansa forget, sometimes, that she was even in King's Landing, a captive of the Lannisters. Forget that there was anyone else but Margaery.

Sansa wanted Margaery because she wanted her.

The realization made Sansa stumble a step, and Prince Oberyn reached out to grab her arm, looked more than concerned when she flinched away and almost landed headfirst in the grass.

"Lady Sansa?" he asked gently, face the picture of concern, and Sansa wondered how much of it was real, how much of it simply belonged to the vestiges of his poor sister.

"Is there...Is there something you need me to do?" she asked quietly, out of the corner of her mouth, lest anyone overhear it.

Prince Oberyn studied her silently for a moment, before his lips quirked into a small grin. "Just be ready, Lady Sansa Stark," he told her, but Sansa was no longer sure she would be able to manage even that.


	77. MARGAERY XXIII

"There is a...troubling matter to be brought to Your Grace's attention," Lord Varys said, glancing openly at Margaery while he spoke, though no one at the table besides perhaps Lord Tyrion seemed to notice.

She was the one dragging Joffrey to these meetings of the Small Council, after all, and so Margaery lifted her chin in acknowledgement even as Joffrey asked, "What is it?" with too much enthusiasm.

Perhaps he thought Stannis Baratheon would attack them again, and he would have the opportunity to show his mettle before his lady.

Lord Varys took a deep breath. "There is a...group, a small, religious sect, which is gaining popularity within the city. They claim to worship the Seven, and give out food and shelter to the poorest of the poor."

Joffrey deflated and flicked a nail, clearly bored once more. "So?"

Margaery wondered if this sect explained the strange men she had seen during her outing with Sansa, the ones with circles burned into their foreheads whose eyes she had felt watching her so intently.

Lord Varys looked like he was trying very hard to keep his patience. "Your Grace, a group of smallfolk attempted another riot yesterday. It was the largest riot that has taken place since your trip to Flea Bottom, and it took over two dozen knights to eventually suppress it."

Joffrey still didn't look impressed; in fact, Margaery would wager that the look of annoyance on his face was due to the reminder in front of Margaery of that riot.

"We believe that it is in the best interests of the Crown to show the smallfolk that they are still in our interests, before this sect becomes any more popular without us knowing who they are-" Lord Tyrion began, but Joffrey interrupted before he could say more.

"Do _we_ , Uncle?" He crossed his arms. "Then maybe the Master of Coin should deal with this, and let his King deal with more important matters."

"If the Crown were to show their benevolence through-"

"Does your wife think I'm benevolent, Uncle?" Joffrey interrupted again, smirking, and Margaery resisted the urge to grit her teeth. "I bet she does. I was kind enough not to bring Robb Stark's head here and give it to her as a present, like you wanted. Did you tell her that? I think she ought to know."

Lord Tyrion, however, made no secret of the way he was grinding his. "If the Crown-"

"I don't think you tell her anything," Joffrey went on with a little grin. "I think you don't care about her at all. That's why you haven't bed her yet, despite Grandfather telling you to."

An awkward silence settled around the table; Oberyn Martell looked oddly bemused and amused at the same time, and Margaery's own father was tapping out an awkward rhythm against the table, clearly uncomfortable.

She herself was only here because Joffrey had made a fuss when the meeting was called and declared he wouldn't go at all if his lady could not, simply so that he could grope her under the table as he sat and listened to his Small Council drone on.

Tywin Lannister finally achieved an annoyed sigh, glaring at Lord Tyrion as though Joffrey's insolence were somehow his fault. "What your uncle does with his wife in the privacy of their marriage does not concern you, Your Grace."

Joffrey snorted. "I'm their king. And she was almost married to me, once. I feel a certain measure of...protection, over her."

Margaery thought of Sansa's beaten back, the beating Joffrey had ordered she give the other girl, and didn't snort at his words.

Tywin didn't bother to dignify that with a response. "What your uncle is trying to say is that the Small Council feels the King should be present when we give gifts of food and help to the smallfolk, to show your goodwill toward them," he gritted out.

"But why does it matter so much?" Joffrey whined, an air of petulance entering his voice, and Margaery bit back a sigh.

Margaery did, in fact, understand the tactical advantage of gaining the love of the smallfolk.

They far outnumbered the noble Houses of King's Landing, just as they had in Highgarden, and she had seen the fear in Cersei's eyes as she had spoken of the riot in Flea Bottom, even if Joffrey had refused to act afraid in front of the lady he was attempting to impress.

But the reasons she had given Joffrey were not the reasons that she often found herself walking through the scummy water and muddy paths of Flea Bottom, handing out food and any help that she could give to those less fortunate than she.

She knew that Cersei thought it was an act, that her acts of kindness toward the smallfolk were viewed with disdain in the older woman's eyes, and she knew why.

But the truth was simple enough; she did feel compassion for those people, who lived a life that Margaery could never hope to understand, one full of pain and misery of a far different kind than any of the fighting noble Houses could understand, no matter their own battles. And she wanted to help them, not for the reputation that doing so would give her, but because they needed it, and she could most certainly provide it.

"There are thousands of smallfolk living in Flea Bottom," she said, smiling gently and reaching out to put a hand over his. "While there are not nearly so many of us living in the palace. I have always found it prudent to befriend them, rather than antagonize or ignore them. It leaves them feeling...compassionate towards us."

"I don't need their compassion," Joffrey sneered the word. "I am their King. I demand their fear."

Margaery smiled, clasping her hands together. "Of course not, my love. You need for nothing, as the King. But it is better to have their compassion than their hatred. Then, should we ever have need of them, they will be more willing to comply. And there will be no more riots in the streets."

He sighed. "Or we could just have my Kingsguard fight them, as they did then."

Margaery lifted a brow. "But why do so, when this is so much easier? Forgive me, my love, for I am merely a woman and do not always understand the intricacies of politics, but, as a woman, I prefer to keep any violence contained to the sort that one knows that they can always win."

Joffrey looked at her, and then his face split into a wide grin, and he pulled her close. "Speaking of, I have a surprise for you, my lady."

Margaery forced a grin, pretending that she enjoyed any of Joffrey's surprises. "When?" she whispered, voice filled with excitement.

Lord Tywin cleared his throat. "If Your Grace could stay on topic-"

"I don't want to!" Joffrey snapped, and then seemed to remember who he was speaking to and how well it had gone the last time, paling a bit. He stood up, "Margaery can do it. The people love her, anyway. They won't care that I'm not there. This is...woman's work. I have more important things to do."

Margaery smiled up at him. "Of course, my love. I would cherish the opportunity to show my love for the smallfolk, and to give them anything the Small Council deems appropriate."

Joffrey gestured toward her. "Well then, it's figured out." He grabbed Margaery by the arm, yanking her out of her seat. "Come on, I want to show it to you."

Margaery cast an almost apologetic look toward the Small Council, before allowing Joffrey to drag her away to show her whatever new contraption he'd no doubt had made. Perhaps another crossbow.


	78. MARGAERY XXIV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wanted to get this out before Christmas. More Sansaery goodness.

It wasn’t a crossbow, though. Instead, it was some sort of catapult, but one that shot multiple times when it was prepared, and Margaery found the device more fascinating than she cared to admit.

Joffrey was a sadistic menace, but he could be smart, when he wanted to be. If only he was a weapons designer, rather than a king.

"How far can it shoot?" she found herself asking Joffrey out of pure curiosity, and she wondered if her husband noticed the difference as he moved in front of it, gesturing wildly off of the walls of the Keep.

The wind coming in from the sea was flapping Margaery's gown about her legs as the Lannister flags around them, but she knew exactly why Joffrey had insisted on showing the strange new catapult to her up here.

He wanted to try it out.

"It should be able to shoot all of the way across an enemy's lines, farther than a catapult," he told her excitedly. "The next time Stannis Baratheon is foolish enough to attack my capitol, it won't be wildfire that kills him."

Margaery beamed. "How wonderful. You are...so smart, to have invented such a thing yourself."

Joffrey grinned back at her. "Do you want to try it?"

Margaery smirked. "I thought you'd never ask, my love. There is...nothing more that I would like to do in this moment."

She wondered if her conversation with Joffrey about one day going into battle with him had sparked this invention, if he had made this strange device just for her, and Margaery pretended that she didn't feel a slight high at the thought.

Joffrey guided her hand to the lever on the odd catapult, his other hand lowering to her back, pressing against it almost gently, but the action had her thinking of how he had asked her to beat Sansa, how he had thought she would enjoy it as much as he did, and her good humor faded.

"Just here," Joffrey told her, with a wicked little grin that set Margaery on edge.

She moved her hand where he told her to, pretended not to feel trepidation when he stepped back and told her to pull the lever toward herself.

The moment she did, three sturdy, thicker than normal arrows flew out in rapid succession, soaring above the ramparts and out into the Bay, the arrows suddenly expanding in the air before something shot out of each of them, flying even farther and faster.

Margaery glanced back at Joffrey in bemusement. He grinned at her.

"Catapults," he told her, and Margaery glanced back at the arrows, watched as the strange rocks flew out of them and began to descend toward the water, watched as they exploded in the air in large balls of fire before slamming into the water a good distance away with all of the force of something twice their size. Margaery was relieved that they didn't hit any of the ships, much as she would have loved to see the impact these fire balls would make.

Joffrey was behind her then, pressing into her back, one arm around her waist, pulling her against him, and she could feel the hardness of his excitement against her spine.

"Do you like it?" he whispered. "They still need some work, of course, but they're better than the wildfire my uncle used during the Battle of Blackwater. And with a dozen of these, we could wipe out any army that dares come near us."

Margaery turned to face him as the balls disappeared into the water, wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him close and pretended the action didn't sicken her.

"I love it, Your Grace," she told him quietly. "It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. You should have the metal workers build a thousand of these, and then we would never face another army that dared attack us."

It was the right thing to say; Joffrey's eyes flashed with mirth at the idea, and then he was kissing her, hard enough that when he pulled away, her lips began to well with blood.

He wasn't getting off on that, though, she knew now.

"I should," he told her, with a little grin. "And make the distance longer, too. Then I could blow up that dragon bitch when she finally crosses the sea, and any of those stupid peasants who think they can riot in my streets."

Margaery chuckled. "Do you think that, next time, I could watch you make them?" she asked him suddenly. "Only...I think it would be rather fun."

Joffrey looked as though she had just handed him Daenerys Targaryen's head on a silver platter. "Yes," he rasped, and Margaery bit back the larger smile she wanted to give herself at her victory.

Even if, as she had told Sansa, she was still having a harder time of keeping control of her husband now that she finally understood him, she could still play him.

The time she spent with Joffrey scared her, perhaps more than it would have scared sweet Sansa, or some other bride, because, more often than not, she found herself less bothered than she knew she should have been by Joffrey's antics. Found herself hypnotized by his cruelty. And the lies that she told him because she knew that they would bring him closer to her...were sounding less and less like lies, in her heart of hearts.

It had been five days since Joffrey had called Sansa to their chambers because Margaery had told him she was having her moon's blood. Three days since Sansa had, surprising Margaery totally, kissed her, eight days since her miscarriage.

She swallowed hard, felt her hand move down to her stomach despite herself. She still felt pain, from the miscarriage, not the sort of pain that a mother might have felt at losing her child, but real, throbbing pain that was beginning to worry her, and Elinor, the only other person who knew anything about it.

She knew that the pain would fade, eventually, so long as she continued to take it easy, but Joffrey would not be held off forever, because, as much as sex seemed to repulse him when it was anyone else, _he loved Margaery_.

The thought was still much of a novelty, still disturbed her, because she knew that she was good at playing him, but she could not fathom this little monster's ardent love for her, despite that.

And she feared that, if she held him off for too much longer, he would send for Sansa again, and this time, he would not just beat her.

Fortunately, Joffrey didn't seem to be thinking of sex, just now. "Maybe we could try one on my uncle, the next time he keeps us late in an inane meeting of the Small Council."

Margaery pretended she found that idea hilarious, and then bid her husband happy playing with his new toy, in far different terms, before rushing away as quickly as she could.

She was bleeding between her thighs again by the time she found Sansa Stark in the chambers she shared with Lord Tyrion, and Margaery ripped a piece of her gown off to stuff it into her smallclothes before she knocked on the door. She wished it wasn't taking her so long to heal from the miscarriage. Wished, because she would rather be plotting up far less innocent things to do to Sansa than simply kissing her.

Sansa opened it, her expression wan until she met Margaery's eyes.

"May I...come in?" Margaery asked, feeling hesitant. It was a strange feeling, for her, and one that she did not like at all.

She wanted to apologize some more, one thousand times for the horrors she had inflicted upon Sansa's body without once thinking of a way to get the other girl out of them, but she knew that Sansa would only hush her again, as she had last time.

Though, if she did it in the same way she had then, Margaery might even enjoy it.

"Where is Lord Tyrion? Or your...maid, that woman, Shae?" Margaery asked, looking around Lord Tyrion's surprisingly sparse chambers. She'd not noticed that, before. Perhaps the rumors were true, about how much the Lannisters hated their dwarf son.

Sansa shrugged. "Lord Tyrion is counting money for the Crown again, I suppose," she said, looking just as nervous as Margaery felt. "And Shae had some sort of business to deal with. She wouldn't tell me what."

Margaery nodded, and then went for the throat.

"Do you still feel the way you did, when you told me that you wanted space to think?" Margaery asked quietly, crossing her arms in front of her chest and nervously rubbing at her arms.

She seemed unable to stop moving her arms, lately.

"I understand that the discussion we'd had prior to...what happened between us was fraught with emotion, and what we did was an emotional response to it, and that I hurt you terribly and I should probably give you more time to think, but...I don't think it was just that, on my part, and if you feel the same..." Sansa stared at her blankly, and Margaery bit her lip. "Perhaps I should just go."

Sansa glanced up, eyes going wide like a frightened deer. She glanced around, as if worried that someone would come out and question them, but Margaery knew enough about the way King's Landing worked now to know that no one would.

"I...Yes," Sansa said finally, after a deep breath. "I...do. And I don't need more time to think about it."

Margaery paused. "Are you certain?"

Sansa blinked. "Yes. Margaery, I've thought about it quite a bit, and I don't know if this is because of what happened with Joffrey, or if it's something else, but I don't want to _think_ about it anymore."

That was all the answer Margaery needed.

Her legs moved forward of their own accord, until suddenly Margaery was standing directly in front of Sansa, reaching a hand that was far too hesitant for her own tastes out to brush the hair from Sansa's face, pressed her hand to Sansa's cheek.

Sansa tilted her head toward Margaery's hand, pressed her cheek into Margaery's palm, and Margaery let out a slow breath, let her thumb graze Sansa's lips, pulling them gently apart.

Margaery's eyes flicked down to follow the movement, and she swallowed convulsively, flicked her eyes up to meet Sansa's again before she bent forward to kiss Sansa's trembling lips.

Sansa melted into the first touch, her body leaning into Margaery's, hands reaching out to fumble with Margaery's gown, as if she did not quite know where to reach.

Sansa's kiss was clumsy and hesitant, as it had been the last and first time Margaery had kissed her, and Margaery tilted her head, smiled into the kiss, reached out with her free hand and wrapped an arm around Sansa's waist, pulled the other girl flush against her, deepened the kiss until she could feel Sansa's chest stuttering for breath against her, pulled back.

"Is this all right?" Margaery asked, looking Sansa over. She was flushed, the pretty kind of flushed that made something pleasant twirl in Margaery's stomach, a little sweaty, but she smelled of lemon cakes, so Margaery could hardly be moved to mind.

The other girl nodded, breathlessly. "Margaery," she whispered, and her voice came out like a desperate whine.

"Tell me to stop, Sansa," Margaery whispered insistently against her skin, waited a few breaths, and then kissed her again, hands roaming to the edges of Sansa's gown, pulling it off of her shoulders.

Sansa shook her head. "Don't stop," she murmured, throwing her head back and exposing her neck.

Margaery wondered at Sansa's earlier words for a moment, wondered if they were only doing this because of what Joffrey had forced them to do, but then she saw Sansa's bare shoulder and she couldn't quite restrain herself from kissing up and down the other girl's skin until she had Sansa moaning beneath her.

And when she sucked at that pale skin and Sansa's breath stuttered, her eyes blown wide, Margaery remembered that she'd wanted Sansa Stark from the moment she'd first laid eyes on her standing on that little dock by the sea, so alone and solitary that Margaery could not stay away.

Sansa's hands seemed to understand their purpose now, and Margaery bit back a small chuckle as one reached out to trace down her clothed spine, even as her lips reached Sansa's neck and she sucked at the soft, exposed skin there until Sansa let out a noise that she doubted Sansa would have liked anyone else to hear.

Sweet gods, Sansa tasted divine; just as Margaery had always imagined her, without the impediment of Joffrey looking on and getting off on the shock and horror Sansa was feeling. Like lemon cakes and spice, and just a bit of snow.

Joffrey'd been wrong about that, Margaery thought with a small frown, licking the vein on Sansa's neck again when she noticed the absolutely sinful way the other girl shuddered at the sensation.

"Sweet gods, Sansa," Margaery whispered, feeling herself growing wet already. She could not remember the last time she'd gotten wet with so little foreplay beforehand.

She was almost afraid to know what that meant.

Sansa bent forward, captured Margaery's lips once more, pulled on Margaery's gown until they were pressed together once more, and Margaery could feel Sansa's nipples hardening through the thin gown she wore, warm and firm and so close to her own body.

Her own hardened in response, and Margaery let out a small groan of pleasure as Sansa's lips parted and let Margaery in. Margaery needed no more encouragement, deepening their kiss and moaning at the sound of Sansa's own moan.

Their teeth clicked together as Sansa opened her mouth wider, and Margaery pushed forward, wanting nothing more than to make Sansa come in this moment-

And then there was a knock at the door, and Sansa was scrambling away from her, blushing furiously as she yanked her gown back into its proper place, fluffed her hair awkwardly.

Margaery smiled and straightened her own gown, licked her thumb and patted Sansa's hair back into place.

Sansa watched the movement with transfixed eyes, blushing as the knock came again.

"Lady Sansa?" Prince Oberyn's unmistakable voice came from the other side, and Margaery's eyes narrowed.

Unmistakable because she would never forget that voice, never forget the harm that man had caused to her family, and she glanced back at Sansa, forced her eyes to soften when she met the other girl's gaze.

"You were expecting him?" she whispered, and Sansa shrugged, looking incredibly nervous at their almost-discovery.

No doubt, Oberyn Martell would have enjoyed entering in on the fun, Margaery thought bitterly, though she would never have given him the satisfaction.

She smoothed down her dress once more, smiled at Sansa again. "I should go, then. Can I..." she bit her lip, suddenly very nervous. "See you again. Soon, I mean?"

Sansa nodded a little too enthusiastically, and then Margaery moved to open the door, giving Prince Oberyn a frosty glare and no greeting as she swept imperiously past him.

Come to think of it, she'd not had a letter from Willas, lately. Perhaps she would go and compose one, and not think of Sansa, flushed and exposed before her. Or of whatever business she had with the Viper.


	79. MARGAERY XXV

"How bad are they really, the riots?" Margaery asked Varys.

It was difficult enough to find herself something to occupy her mind with, in the hours since leaving Sansa's chambers, letting the Dornish Prince usurp her place in Sansa's rooms. Difficult enough not to think of Sansa's lips, pressed against her own, Sansa's heated body, flush against her own...

She had sought out the Spider when she realized she had been talking to her ladies for a full hour and still didn't know what they were discussing. She wasn't normally like this, and it almost infuriated her.

Except that the sudden condition had been caused by Sansa, and that made her lapse in control all right.

The Spider had proven good enough of a distraction, anyway. When she asked him if she might have a word, claiming it concerned her suspicion in one of her ladies, he had insisted they each come separately to the strange corridor they had met in last time.

She wondered if Cersei and Jaime Lannister had ever come here, to fuck in the dark where they would not be found.

She wondered what it would be like to fuck Sansa Stark against one of these shadowed walls, watch her writhe and beg-

Varys cleared his throat, and Margaery bit back a sigh, for the last thing she wanted was for Varys to think her nothing more than an airheaded girl, when she had worked so hard in the shadows to convince him otherwise. When she needed his whispers.

She knew that he disliked the flagrantly abusive rule that the Lannisters had conducted so far, from his quickness in coming to the side of the Tyrells, from his constantly annoyed looks when she came to the meetings of the Small Council, liberal as they were, and her grandmother had told her that he had been a firm supporter of the Targaryens when they yet remained in Westeros, but while Lord Varys' information was often quite helpful, she was not certain how much she should trust him.

She still did not quite understand his motivations in reaching out to her, but rather suspected that they did not wholly align with her own. That, did she learn them, she would have to end their strange alliance, an alliance her grandmother had encouraged ever since the Tyrells had arrived in King's Landing.

Still, in this instance, she doubted that he would prove untrustworthy. Like her, he wanted what was best for the people of King's Landing, even if she was unsure what that meant.

"Your Grace-"

"You would not have suggested that Joffrey himself go out and deliver this food, under heavy guard, I imagine, and had Tywin Lannister agree with you unless the situation was dire," she interrupted him smoothly. "There is no need to pretend less."

The riot in Flea Bottom, before Margaery had even arrived in King's Landing, only went to prove how much the common people hated Joffrey Baratheon, much as they liked Margaery well enough. If the Small Council thought it would be a good idea to send him out amongst the smallfolk, it was either because they wanted him dead or they thought the sight of him passing out food alongside Margaery was the only thing to stop these riots, now.

And Margaery knew that, while everyone in King's Landing would have liked to see Joffrey dead, no one on the Small Council would allow that to happen, not just yet.

The Spider folded his hands together in front of himself. He had the most peculiar aura about him, constantly calm, always assessing. Her grandmother had called him one of the oddest little men she had ever encountered, useful though.

Loras had joked obscenely to Margaery that this was because he had no cock, and Margaery had thrown a pillow at him, back when they were still speaking to one another civilly.

Gods, she missed her brother. Missed his laughter, his teasing, his obscene jokes that she secretly found amusing as well.

But Loras was only a shell of himself now, fulfilling his duty in the Kingsguard with an obsessive dedication, keeping a formal distance from Margaery as any of the Kingsguard did now, as if they had not been the closest of siblings before. Fucking that Olyvar as if he were Renly.

She shook her head, and Varys seemed to take this as an indication of her impatience.

"The riot I mentioned to His Grace was not the first riot to plague Flea Bottom in the recent months," Varys said in his quiet, raspy voice. "This group - the Sparrows, they call themselves - is a finicky bunch, and believes that no one should need wealth. My own little sparrows have informed me that this broad statement includes the Crown."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. Fanatics. Wonderful. Joffrey would hardly be the soothing balm they needed, though, so she supposed it was a good thing that he was not being sent to face them, much as her father had waxed on about what he thought of that idea.

"Are they inciting the people to riot?"

Varys hesitated, and Margaery turned to face him. "It is unclear, my lady. They...preach peace, but their...penance for breaking the laws against the gods are...quite harsh."

Margaery wasn't sure she wanted to know what that meant. "And I would be safe, travelling amongst such people to deliver food to the peasants?"

That was what she really needed to know, of course. What only Varys would tell her.

Varys smiled. "Of course, Your Grace. If you sent Tyrell guards to accompany you."

Margaery sucked in a breath. "The situation has escalated that far?" she demanded. She often took her Kingsguard along with her to visit the people, but if the Spider was telling her to bring her Tyrell bannermen instead, then things truly were dire.

He shook his head. "Indeed, not, but I believe that the reminder that you are but a queen, subject as they all are to the whims of your king, will help to smooth things over better than if you were accompanied by Lannister guards or white cloaks."

Margaery nodded. "And have your sparrows told you anything of the Reach?" she asked, changing the subject abruptly and causing Varys to lift a brow.

"Precious little," Varys told her with a thin smile. "Cersei Lannister hasn't done anything worthy of her reputation, but the people of Reach have yet to meet their newest lady."

Holing herself away in her chambers, throwing tantrums. Margaery had expected more of her, but she was not displeased to be proven wrong by the other woman.

"She's Cersei Tyrell, now," Margaery pointed out, and Lord Varys chuckled.

"That woman will always believe herself a queen, no matter who she weds," he told her, and Margaery nodded, sighing.

"I suppose so. If you hear anything..."

"Of course, Your Grace," Varys bowed his head to her. "You will be the first to know, whether or here or in the Small Council"

Margaery raised a brow. "I hardly believe that, but your information will be most appreciated. My brother is most dear to me; I would hate for anything to happen to him because of her."


	80. SANSA XLVIII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Margaery and Sansa have a much needed talk and Sansa almost gets that orgasm.

She had not managed to stop thinking about that kiss since Margaery had given it to her, since Oberyn had walked into the room and wisely said nothing about their disheveled appearances, and Sansa knew that it would drive her mad unless she did something about it, and soon.

And that was how she had found herself outside of Margaery's chambers not two nights later, hesitantly standing before the door and willing herself to knock. She had just come from Joffrey, who had smiled at her as he used to before she realized he was a beast, and asked her how her day had gone as if he actually cared, and suggested that sometime, she go hunting with him and Margaery.

She had barely kept from being sick all over his riding boots.

She knew she shouldn’t be here. That...whatever it was that was between them was dangerous and wrong and that if they prolonged it, someone would find out. Maybe even Joffrey.

And yet.

The door to Margaery’s chambers had opened before Sansa could quite bring herself to knock, and Lady Elinor was staring out at her, a small smile on her face.

“Lady Sansa,” she said, dipping into a small curtsey that didn’t quite befit Sansa’s station. “Do you need something?”

It was on the tip of Sansa’s tongue to say that she needed Margaery, but she found herself whispering out hesitantly, “I was just...I mean...Oh, it’s quite silly, really...”

Elinor was watching her performance with what could only be described as growing amusement. When Sansa’s stutters trailed off, she tossed her hair over her shoulder and called in quite an unladylike manner, “Your Grace! You have a visitor!”

Sansa blushed crimson as Elinor opened the door wider and beckoned Sansa further into the room, but she supposed that it would look silly now, not to come in after that announcement of her presence.

She stepped into Margaery’s chambers on nimble feet, feeling strangely unwelcome there after what had passed between them despite the many times she had come here before.

Margaery was standing in the corner of the room, behind a tall, almost sheer screen, her ladies flitting about her with strips of cloth in their hands, their expressions almost frantic.

The screen was sheer enough for Sansa to see that Margaery was naked behind it, and she blushed again, casting her eyes in every direction but that one even as Margaery lifted her head above the screen and presented Sansa with a wide smile.

“Sansa!” she called happily, as yet another of her ladies ducked behind the screen with a scrap of green cloth in their hands. “I didn’t know you were coming to visit. What a lovely surprise.”

And she truly looked as though she thought it was one, Sansa couldn’t help but notice, the smile in her eyes like those reserved only for Sansa, so far as she had ever seen.

“Your Grace-” One of Margaery’s ladies called in a voice that was almost impatient, and Margaery let out a breathy laugh, ducking behind the screen once more.

“I’ll be just a moment,” she called from behind it, as Elinor led Sansa over to the chaise in the corner of Margaery’s warm, once inviting chambers and bade her sit on it, asked if she wanted for any refreshments, letting out an almost displeased noise when Sansa shook her head.

Sansa blinked at that, but already Elinor was skittering away, and she lost her chance.

“I could come back...” she said, still hesitant to look toward that screen for all that she had already seen Margaery without her clothes, in Joffrey’s chambers. Somehow, it seemed wrong, to peek at her now.

“Oh, no!” Margaery cried out, sounding almost despondent at the very idea. “Stay. I insist. They are almost done, anyway.”

Elinor let out a snort. “They are hardly that, my lady,” she told Sansa, “But Margaery is like to make them stop soon, anyway. She can never stand still when they’re poking her all with needles.”

“And can you blame me?” Margaery giggled. “Joffrey has commissioned me a new gown to wear, for our next hunting trip. Lannister red and Tyrell green, as if the first hare we come across won’t see us coming from the edge of the Kingswood. Perhaps he thinks they will mistake me for a holly berry, and come to eat me rather than turning the other way and running.”

Sansa bit back a smile, at those words. “Green will help you to blend in, Your Grace,” she said finally, and there was silence for a moment, from behind the screen, save for the odd noise of fabric sliding against fabric and someone cursing as they were no doubt jabbed with a needle.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t have refreshment?” Elinor asked Sansa again, sounding almost nervous, but then Margaery was moving out from behind the screen, hastily pulling on a green silk robe that was almost as sheer as the screen had been a moment before. She looped the ties of it shut and smiled again at Sansa, but not before Sansa caught a swathe of creamy skin that had her mouth watering.

“I think that’s enough standing about for a dress for now, ladies,” Margaery was telling her ladies, despite their protestations. “Joffrey doesn’t want to hunt for another week, anyway; he thinks me very ill, and so of course he is staying far clear of me.”

Her ladies laughed at that, even if Sansa could not quite believe the scandal of the words, or that Margaery had felt so free to say them, even if they were true.

She could remember when she had been sick with a fever before the Battle of Blackwater, when she was still Joffrey’s lady and he still sometimes pretended to care for her, how it had kept her free from a beating for that week, for all that it had not helped her after it was gone.

“Away with you all, now,” Margaery crowed, sinking into the loveseat directly across from Sansa, and crossing her legs overtop one another. “I am sure Lady Sansa didn’t come here to talk about my dress.”

From the spark in her eyes, Sansa thought that perhaps the other girl knew exactly what she had come there to speak of, and she found herself blushing again.

Margaery’s ladies sidled out of a side door, Elinor somehow the last to go, sliding the door shut behind her with a conspiratorial little smirk, and Sansa found herself wondering if the other girl _knew_.

The thought, surprisingly enough, was not an altogether unpleasant one. In some ways, yes, but not all.

“So.” Margaery unfolded her legs again, just enough for Sansa to find herself reacquainted with the fact that Margaery wore no smallclothes underneath her robe. She licked her lips, lifted her head to see Margaery grinning impishly at her.

"Did you have some reason for coming to visit?" she asked teasingly, and Sansa flushed, realized she'd entirely forgotten why she'd walked into this room.

And then she remembered, and found herself blushing far more.

“I take it then, that your mind is still the same on this matter?” Margaery asked, her face suddenly very serious, and it took Sansa a moment to remember what she was talking about.

“Oh!” she said, when it came to her, and Sansa found herself wondering why they were rehashing this conversation, when she wanted nothing more than to get on with what they had been doing the other day. “Yes. Yes, it is. I think. I just...”

Margaery leaned forward, eyes full of curiosity rather than concern. "Yes?"

Sansa was finding it hard to think. Her lips were dry, and she licked at them nervously. "I have never really heard of two women...doing what we want to," she confessed finally, and Margaery laughed.

"Haven't you?" she asked with a coy smile. "I do not believe that the gods frown upon it, for what two women do in the privacy of their own chambers is their own concern, unless a man be able to watch it."

Sansa swallowed, thought of Joffrey, and then of some other man, some man who wasn't as vile as Joffrey, watching her and Margaery, just watching, not forcing them to hurt each other.

She found that the idea was not entirely as repulsive as Margaery's tone had made it sound.

So long as it wasn't Joffrey.

And then she shook that thought from her mind, because that wasn't what she was here about.

"But...well, you're married," Sansa finally blurted out, and Margaery smirked at her, leaned forward.

"Do you think the gods mind if I find pleasure outside of a creature such as Joffrey?" she asked with sudden intensity. "No doubt that is why they made him, so that I might not feel the guilt of it." She leaned back. "And besides, he likely would just laugh."

He would, Sansa knew, and that served to assuage any guilt she might have felt anyway, for who cared what Joffrey Baratheon thought, who cared if this went against his very marriage to Margaery?

Certainly not Margaery.

"So," Margaery said again, "Is your mind made up?"

Gods, it was.

She'd angsted over her feelings for Margaery since those stolen kisses, wafting between wondering what her lady mother would think of her if she saw her now and memories of Margaery's sweet smiles and gentle words, so gentle after what felt like a lifetime without.

And she'd come to the conclusion that she wanted nothing more than to see Margaery spread bare as she had been that night in Joffrey's chambers, and damn the consequences. The gods may curse her for what she wanted from the other girl, but, as Cersei had once told her, the gods cared nothing for the plights of mortals.

And they certainly cared very little for Sansa Stark, so they could all hang, as far as she was concerned, in this moment.

Margaery was the only good thing in Sansa's life since she had arrived in King's Landing, the only person Sansa had ever found herself able to be close with, the only one whom she had ever believed truly cared about her since her father's horrific death.

And she was never going to let Margaery out of her sight for very long again.

And if that wasn't a good thing, then she wasn't certain what was.

"Yes," she whispered softly.

Margaery smiled gently. “Are you certain? My own is quite muddled on the matter myself.”

Sansa blinked at her, heart sinking, and Margaery quickly moved forward, kneeling at her feet ad taking both of Sansa's hands in her own.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Margaery whispered. “Gods, Sansa, I’ve wanted you since the moment I first laid eyes on you, and that isn’t going to change. Only, what happened with Joffrey...” She swallowed. “I’m not sure that we should. I don’t want to...to do this, only later for us to-”

Sansa kissed the next words off Margaery’s lips, for they sounded decidedly like something she did not want to hear in this moment, and then Margaery was moaning into the kiss, lurching forward and pushing herself up between Sansa’s knees, her soft breasts sliding against Sansa’s stomach through the thin fabric of her robe.

Now that she had kissed the other girl, she could confess that she had little idea what to do next, but Margaery seemed not to mind.

Sansa felt cool sparks running down her back as Margaery pulled her closer, pressed their lips more tightly together, felt Margaery open her mouth and opened her own in turn. Margaery's mouth was warm and wet and soft, and Sansa pressed forward as though she were a starving woman seeking the only thing that would nourish her.

And, in this moment, she supposed it was.

Sansa’s hands curled in Margaery's hair, then her silky robe, then reached for the ties to Margaery’s robe, amazingly accurate, she couldn't help but think absently, given how distracted she was, sliding it off with almost shaking fingers, and Margaery grinned at her, taking the loops for herself and finishing the task quickly enough, her robe pooling open to expose the soft, beautiful skin beneath.

For a moment, all Sansa could do was stare, chewing on her lower lip, nevermind that she had already seen all of this before, in Joffrey's chambers. Margaery was beautiful, and all the more so for the fact that they were alone just now.

The robe still clung to her arms, but the rest of her, soft curves and pale skin, was bared before Sansa, all that smooth skin that seemed to go on forever, hair that fell around her shoulders and neck, perfectly out of the way of everything that Sansa so desperately wanted to drink in.

The scars from Joffrey's handling of her were mostly faded now, though Sansa knew they would never go away forever and it irked her that she had to know that so intimately, strange and wrong against Margaery's pale, thin throat, but still beautiful as everything to do with Margaery would always be.

Her breasts swung with the motion of the robe coming free of them, round and so inviting that Sansa had to hold her hands in her lap to keep from reaching out to touch them almost instinctively, Margaery's nipples already hardened into little pebbles as she stared at them, almost straining against the skin there. And down, to the smooth lines of her stomach, the soft pouch before a small expanse of brown hair dipped between her legs.

Sansa licked her lips, swallowing hard.

A part of her wasn't sure if she was still dreaming.

Margaery rolled her shoulders, the robe spilling off of her shoulders and pooling around her knees, and that was quite all that Sansa could bear, reaching out and dragging her fingers along Margaery’s shoulders, pulling her as close as she dared.

Margaery, fortunately, was willing enough to go, climbing onto Sansa’s lap without a second’s hesitation, surprisingly not a burden as she situated herself across Sansa’s legs, her eyes blooming with lust, and not a hint of the sweetsleep she’d had in Joffrey’s chambers.

And then she was kissing Sansa again, hands reaching out to pull them flush before twining in Sansa’s hair. Sansa let her head loll with the motion, for Margaery's hand was gently teasing rather than ripping at her hair as one of Joffrey's guards' would have been, in the only other situation in which Sansa had ever had her hair pulled upon.

No, perhaps...perhaps a lifetime ago, or two lifetimes ago, she could remember a boyish little sister yanking at her elaborate curls, could remember snapping at her to stop it...

She didn't quite need to push such thoughts from her mind as Margaery gave her hair another playful little tug and then suddenly Margaery's tongue was _inside_ her mouth, pressing against her own and then wrapping around it, pulling them even more tightly together as Margaery's hands roamed down from her hair and one wrapped around her breast.

She thought, for a moment, of the way Joffrey had touched her in the Great Hall, posessive and cruelly as his fingers wrapped around her breast, but this was nothing like that. Margaery's hands were soft and gentle, kneading at her breasts through a cloak Sansa hadn't realized she was still wearing.

And that seemed rather silly, didn't it, that she still wore clothes while Margaery wore nothing at all, but she couldn't find the time to do something about that when Margaery's hand suddenly squeezed at her breast, gently exploring, and she let out a sharp gasp at the sensation, which seemed to extend all of the way from her breast down to deep inside her core, and she bit down hard enough on her lower lip to draw blood as she felt her thighs growing wet once more.

This time, she promised herself, she would not run.

She let out another little wanton moan, however, as Margaery's fingers reached for her gown, began slipping it off of her all too slowly, until Sansa's fingers tangled in the other girl's and in the ties in her frenzy to get the constricting thing off of her.

Margaery let out a dark little chuckle that did horrible things to Sansa, sent that shiver down her spine again as cool sparks made their way into her most private region, and she closed her eyes and moaned until she was certain someone would hear them and come to see what was going on.

And that thought sent a sudden wave of terror through Sansa, for she sat up abruptly, pulling at Margaery's arm.

She mourned immediately the loss of Margaery's mouth on hers, but she supposed that would just have to be born.

"Someone will...someone will hear," she gasped out, but Margaery only chuckled again.

"Elinor will keep them out," Margaery promised the other girl, and while Sansa had her reservations about _Elinor_ hearing, she couldn't quite voice them as Margaery suddenly bent down and wrapped her lips around Sansa's reddening nipple.

She let out a small cry, more out of surprise at the action than anything, but then Margaery's lips were gently sucking, and though the sensation was still a strange one, it was one that she found she quite liked. One that she didn't want to ever stop.

Still, she felt rather inadequate in response, just sitting here and allowing Margaery to...to do that, to her, and so she let her hands grope out against Margaery's shoulders, roll down Margaery's buttersoft skin until they were brushing against Margaery's naked breasts, and she found that she didn't quite know what to do, then.

She couldn't exactly reciprocate Margaery's own actions, after all, not with the way they were now positioned, Margaery almost curled below her on the sofa, and besides, she wasn't sure that she would be able to.

Margaery's tongue suddenly lapped against Sansa's nipple, and she felt a jolt that went all of the way down to her core, freezing up at the sensation.

Margaery pulled away abruptly, and Sansa hoped that she did not quite hear the keening sound that emerged from Sansa's lips in response.

"Was that...not good?" Margaery asked, and Sansa found herself staring at those plump pink lips and not quite hearing the question.

Instead, she moved forward, pressing her own lips to Margaery's once more, and Margaery was suddenly so close to her that she could feel Margaery's wetness pressing against the skirt pooled around her waist, which she was rather surprised to realize she was still wearing.

She stifled a gasp at the touch of skin to cloth, and then Margaery seemed to have read her thoughts, for her hands suddenly moved down from Sansa's breasts to the cloth at her waist, though she did not attempt to move it as she brushed at the skin underneath it.

Sansa jerked even as she wondered why Margaery was not moving it, until Margaery's hands began to stroke in earnest at the skirt, her touch light as a butterfly but fast and rhythmic, until Sansa was moaning again for a much different reason, and she was sure that if Margaery did not soon let up she would burst-

"Stop," Margaery gasped out, and Sansa groaned against her, that spot between her thighs aching at the thought of following Margaery's suggestion. And then Margaery was pushing at her shoulders, pushing her away. "Sansa, we have to...we should stop."

Sansa frowned at the other girl. "Wh...Did I do something wrong?" she asked nervously, and Margaery grinned at her, pecking her on the lips.

"Of course not," she murmured gently, "but..we should still stop. I want to do...more, but...It was lovely. I don't think...I don't think we're ready for much more than that, just yet."

She was babbling, Sansa thought inanely, and she had never heard Margaery babble. She wondered if the other girl did the same thing with Joffrey, and then froze as she realized that thought.

They'd...Oh, gods, they'd...

She let out a nervous chuckle, and Margaery gave her a strange look; perhaps she'd been right, and they should stop.

Sansa shook her head. "I..."

She didn't quite know what to say now, for all that Margaery was babbling. She felt as if something deep inside her had been torn loose, but a good kind of tearing, and she wanted nothing more than to wilt against Margaery and cease to exist.

Margaery must have seen the way her eyes were drooping, for she pursed her lips. "I was thinking that you ought to take a bath, after all of that, but perhaps you'd better take a rest, first," she suggested, and Sansa frowned, reaching to pull up the sleeves of her gown.

Margaery laid a hand over hers, and Sansa found herself staring down at those lithe fingers overtop her own with something approaching wonder.

"In here," she said with an indulgent smile, gesturing to her own bed, and Sansa found herself flushing once more.

And then she couldn't get that crimson stain out of her cheeks, just thinking about why Margaery thought she needed a lie down. About how Margaery had wrapped her lips around Sansa's nipple like-

"Sansa," Margaery said gently, and the name seemed to break her spell. She blinked and shook her head at Margaery.

"Perhaps...perhaps a bath would be good, first," she said, unable to quite imagine taking one in her current state, but then, her gown was sticking to her clothes.

Margaery bit back a smile. "I'm worried you might fall in," she confessed gently, and Sansa flushed further.

"I'm not...I won't fall in," Sansa said, all too aware of how petulant her voice sounded, in that moment.

Margaery chuckled. "Whatever you say, my lady."


	81. TYRION III

"The Iron Islands are a problem that it has become increasingly clear we must deal with," Tywin said, as Tyrion walked into the room, and his youngest son bit the inside of his cheek to withhold a sigh.

Already standing inside the Hand's office, his brother Jaime was tapping his fingers rather aimlessly against the back of the only other chair in the room, looking close to bored already, and Tyrion wondered how long their father had been ranting to him before the messenger Lord Tywin had sent had managed to pull Tyrion from his bed.

Tyrion folded his hands across his chest, wondered for a moment why this shouted matter was not being discussed in a meeting of the Small Council, useless as Tywin Lannister seemed to find it, rather than with the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, son or not, but then he understood.

Jaime had never been a member of the Kingsguard in Lord Tywin’s mind, and Lord Tywin had already come up with a solution to the problem of the Iron Islands.

Tywin had no made no secret of his wish to have Jaime removed from the Kingsguard since the moment it had happened, and with Jaime’s return, sans his sword hand, it had become clear that Tywin expected it to happen more than he’d ever done before. Jaime’s continued stubbornness on this issue had only infuriated their father, in the way that Jaime alone could get away with, out of all Tywin Lannister’s children.

But even Tywin Lannister’s patience had its limit, and Tyrion understood that their lord father’s was very close indeed, to his own amusement, even if he knew that Jaime would rather die than be sent to lord Casterly Rock.

And, judging by the nominally less collected expression on Tywin’s face and the anger still flashing in Jaime’s eyes, hastily hidden beneath a veneer of boredom, that was just what they had been discussing.

Which was why it made sense, really, that Tywin was now speaking of the Iron Islands. But for all that he claimed to control his children; Tyrion had begun to suspect in recent months that he didn’t really know them, first with his foolish idea to foist Cersei off on that poor crippled boy, and now believing that he could embarrass Jaime into agreeing to leave the Kingsguard.

Sometimes Tyrion found himself wondering why Tywin Lannister bothered to deal with his pawn pieces, instead of taking the damned Iron Throne for himself. Kinghood certainly agreed with him.

"They've been a problem for a while," Tyrion said, glancing between brother and father warily, "And we've done nothing so far."

"Because we were distracted by flowers," Tywin gritted out, and Jaime glanced between Tyrion and Tywin with a rather confused look on his face, the anger in his eyes growing only slightly dimmer by the change in topic.

Tyrion hadn’t been spending as much time with him as he knew he should have, in the wake of Cersei’s departure, but Jaime seemed oddly calm anyway, and Tyrion wondered if it had anything to do with the rumors that he spent more time in the White Tower talking with the horribly tall woman he’d brought back from the North than he did guarding the King.

Word was from Bronn, she’d asked to join the Kingsguard, citing her work for Renly, and been laughed down for it by a bratty young king still of the opinion that she’d put a sword through the stomach of the previous king she’d served under.

And while Tyrion himself hadn’t quite made up his mind as to whether Brienne of Tarth had done just that, Jaime seemed quite convinced of her innocence.

“Not a kingslaying bone in her,” he’d quipped, when Tyrion had asked him about it, and Tyrion had pretended not to see the bitterness in his brother’s eyes then.

But still, Jaime and Brienne of Tarth seemed to have grown rather close in their recent travels, much to Cersei’s disdain. Before she’d left, Tyrion remembered hearing her accuse Jaime of falling for “that great ugly thing,” convinced that her twin would have fought harder for her if he had not strayed.

Not that Tyrion wasn’t happy to hear it. Joffrey was perhaps the last person in the Red Keep who needed protecting, anyway, given how he never left it, and it was nice to learn that his brother was interested in someone other than their blood relations.

"So send the flowers to deal with the Iron Islands," Tyrion suggested, forcing himself not to shrink down as he'd wanted to do ever since he was a child and his father had first looked upon him with that particular expression, lips pursed as if he’d just eaten a rather sour lemon. "Ser Garlan Tyrell is a capable military leader, I'm told, and he should do the job nicely. Between the Tyrell and Redwyne forces, we should be able to route them out easily enough.”

"Mace Tyrell will never agree without considerable recompense," Tywin murmured, folding his hands on the desk of the Hand, and Tyrion had the sudden feeling that he was a child being led to a certain point of thought by a particularly cruel maester. “The Iron Islands are far from here, after all, and we have already stolen one son from him.”

But Tyrion would make an attempt, anyway, if only to keep from seeing the way Jaime clenched his fist around his sword’s hilt and glared daggers into that desk.

"So give it to him," Tyrion suggested. "Another ridiculous title, since he seems to like that so much. He can have one of mine, if he likes. That should appease him for a while.”

Tywin shot him a look. “Perhaps Master of Coin, as you seem to be doing so poorly with it lately,” he muttered, and Tyrion shrugged.

“It’s not my doing that the mines of Casterly Rock are running dry, Father, nor that the Ironborn are rebelling,” he muttered under his breath, but rather thought that Lord Tywin heard him anyway, even if he said nothing of it.

His father didn’t react to the barb, however. “The Iron Bank is already threatening to call in the Crown’s many loans, and I will not have them believing they can hold such threats over us. The Greyjoys will be dealt with, and after them, Stannis Baratheon, as it seems the Bank will only stop funding him when they have seen him crushed in battle. When Lord Mace is made the Master of Coin, it will of course be hinted to him that...a contribution from House Tyrell will be necessary.”

Tyrion raised a brow. “I would rather owe the Iron Bank than House Tyrell,” he muttered, and Jaime glanced between them, brows furrowed, a sudden, cold understanding in his eyes. “I do not see the harm in it, for now. The Braavosi have been damnable slick with their allegiances, of late.”

“House Tyrell will get what is theirs, in time,” Lord Tywin promised ominously. “But in the mean time, the Crown is wont to give the flowers all of the credit for putting down a rebellion, as it were. We cannot afford to be seen as so weak before all of Westeros. Therefore,” he glanced purposely at Jaime just as Tyrion opened his mouth to interrupt, “You will go with Garlan Tyrell and help lead his troops.”

“Isn’t that a bit excessive?” Tyrion asked, a tad desperately. “The Greyjoys may think we see them as an actual threat.”

Jaime balked. “My duty is to the King,” he said, not missing a beat. “The King is here.”

Tywin leveled him with a look. “And it is in the interest of the King to keep the Greyjoys from another full-scale rebellion. The King will have other Kingsguard here, more capable of protecting him.”

Jaime gave him an unamused look, lifting his golden hand. “The King doesn’t even believe that I can protect him here by beating on smallfolk. How do you think the Tyrells will perceive me being sent with them to put down the Greyjoys? No doubt they will expect that you’re asking them to put a sword through my back.”

“The Tyrells understand their duty to the Crown. And when you return victorious,” Tywin continued, “The King will grant your request to retire honorably from the Kingsguard.”

Jaime stared incredulously, though he had to have known that this was where their lord father had been headed. “No. I won’t do it.”

“That,” Tywin said, leaning back in his chair, “Is exactly what your sister told me when I informed her that she would be marrying Willas Tyrell the first time. And she ended up doing as she was told, as will you.”

The air felt suddenly cold, and Tyrion inched toward the door as his brother and father stared each other down. Jaime looked away first, but Tyrion thought it was rather a near thing.

"And so I’ll do as you want and breed too, carry on the Lannister name. Perhaps you can marry me to another child bride?" Jaime asked rather belligerently. It was a tone he alone had often used against their father as a child, and thus had never felt the need to hold it back. "I hear Arya Stark is skulking about the Eyrie, these days. You've Sansa Stark already, and she's yet to have a child-"

"If I wanted Sansa Stark shunted off to Casterly Rock where she could be forgotten by the masses, then she would damn well be full with child already," Tywin snapped, and Tyrion jerked at the words. "As it is, she serves a better purpose here. No, you will go with Garlan Tyrell, and when you return you will leave the Kingsguard. Joffrey will grant this, and you will marry who I damn well tell you to."

"What happened to 'you're going to consummate that marriage if it is the last thing I do'?" Tyrion asked incredulously, momentarily forgetting his brother’s plight in lieu of his wife’s.

His lord father looked less than impressed. "It is common enough knowledge that Joffrey thinks of Sansa as his toy, and he makes no efforts to hide this. It is for the good of our House if that rumor is put to rest. If she becomes suddenly pregnant, it will never be. In time, she will have, and that child will deliver us the North. However, she doesn’t need a child, just now, but needs to be a reminder to the people of what happens to those who rebel against the Crown.”

“You mean against House Lannister,” Jaime muttered, and Tyrion suppressed a snort, started humming the Rains of Castamere under his breath.

Tywin glanced at his two male children dispassionately. “Get out,” he finally muttered, and Jaime grinned openly, something which Tyrion would never dare to do.

“A drink?” Jaime asked, once the door to the chambers of the Hand of the King had closed behind them, and Tyrion’s lips twitched.

“I don’t think I ought to be indulging your drinking habits, brother mine. We already know that Cersei has been corrupted by them.”

Jaime gave an almost-flinch at the mention of Cersei, and then shrugged. “Can’t hurt if I don’t indulge as much as you,” he quipped, and Tyrion snorted.

“How is it going with Bronn, then?” he asked, folding his hands behind his back before reflecting that he looked rather too much like their lord father, that way, and letting them fall uselessly to his sides.

Another shrug. “Well enough, I suppose, but not enough for...” he glanced back at the door of the Hand of the King as they descended the steps of the Tower. “Perhaps I just won’t come back, from fighting the Greyjoys,” he muttered. “Father certainly won’t be able to marry me off then.”

“Don’t talk like that,” Tyrion admonished almost instantly. “It isn’t funny.”

Jaime smirked. “Oh, you know it would never happen, Tyrion. Father would have the Stranger throwing me back the moment he heard of it.”

Tyrion sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’ll figure this out, Jaime,” he promised, because he could never bear to see his older brother downtrodden about anything, not when they were young and he hadn’t understood why Jaime might be, the day their lord father had announced his plan to marry Cersei to Prince Rhaegar, and certainly not now.

Jaime smiled wanly. “No,” he murmured, glancing down at the fake hand Cersei’d had so diligently made for him, then scorned. “I don’t think it will matter, anyway.”

Damn. Tyrion was growing tired of seeing that look so much these days, whether it be in his wife's eyes or Jaime's.


	82. MARGAERY XXVI

"Lady Sansa!" Joffrey called out to her, and then held out his hand expectantly, and, with a nervous glance toward her lord husband, who nodded rather stiffly at her, she stepped nimbly forward.

Joffrey had insisted on another family feast, for some unknown reason that he had not seen fit to explain once everyone had arrived for it, and Margaery was tired of guessing. It was no one's nameday, no wars had been won or tourneys announced.

Lord Tywin looked just as bemused as she felt, which she supposed was a rather unaccustomed feeling for him, as he sat some seats away from them, Ser Jaime on one side and Tommen on the other, who, she was beginning to notice, was spending too much time around his grandfather. He was still young yet, barely more than a toddler, she sometimes found herself thinking, but she could not have been the only one to notice how the Old Lion had taken Tommen under his wing when Cersei had left for Highgarden.

But she thought she understood a little better, as she watched Sansa freeze by her husband, staring at Joffrey's proffered hand in something like horror before glancing over at Margaery, seated at Joffrey's right.

And then kept staring.

Margaery would have almost been amused if she were not in fact nervous that someone would notice the rather obvious way Sansa was staring at her form fitting gown, tan, relatively simple and sleeveless but covered in sequined roses and what Margaery suspected were real diamonds.

She had rather thought Sansa might like it, but she hadn't realized it would make Sansa loose all rational thought, or she would not have worn it. And then Sansa started to blush, and Margaery wondered if it would be appropriate to yell at her not to give the game away before it had even started.

She could almost see what the other girl was thinking just by looking into her clear eyes. Could see soft, flushed skin and hear clothes rustling and harsh panting and-

It took a not so subtle nudge from her lord husband to remind her where she was, it seemed, for Sansa started moving again, no longer looking at Margaery as she moved to where Joffrey was still holding out his hand, a tad impatient now, and it was reflecting on his face.

"I'm glad you could join us," Joffrey told Sansa, and then bent down and kissed her hand, and Sansa stared at him with all the confusion that Margaery felt on her face before it went carefully blank as she lifted her head.

She did not, to her credit, mention that she and her husband had known better than to refuse his invitation, merely allowed him to lead her around the table until he pulled out the chair on his left for her and bade her sit.

Tyrion sat beside her, looking furious, and Margaery understood why.

She wondered if this was what Joffrey had been like to Sansa in the beginning of their courtship, while her father still lived and was not considered a traitor, when he had to be nice to her, as he'd had to be nice to Margaery before he understood that she was like him.

Chivalrous. Charming.

By the look on Sansa's face, quickly hidden as Joffrey took his seat, Margaery rather suspected it was, and that rather scared her.

She knew that Joffrey and Sansa had not interacted since he had told Margaery to beat her in his chambers, knew that the way Sansa's hand was shaking as Joffrey let go of it was not a coincidence. And now, Joffrey was acting as her prince charming once more.

Margaery took a sip of her wine. Sansa was smart; she would know that Joffrey was up to something, much as she did not know what.

He had enjoyed her beating more than Margaery had thought, which meant that no doubt, he would call for it again. Soon.

The wine in her mouth tasted vaguely of blood, and Margaery set her cup down once again as the servants brought out their feast and Joffrey took his first bite, the rest of the family theirs.

Joffrey reached out and brushed his hand against Sansa's as they both reached for a roll, and Margaery caught Lord Tywin glaring at Joffrey out of the corner of her eye.

"Prince Tommen," she said with unnecessary loudness, turning to the little boy with a wide, too bright smile, "I hear that my brother Ser Loras has begun to teach you the sword. He says you have quite a talent for it."

Little Prince Tommen's eyes widened as he realized she was addressing him, and he glanced almost nervously at his grandfather before he answered her.

"Yes, Your Grace." A nervous swallow. "I...I think I do." It sounded almost like a question.

His voice was quiet, tiny, as it always was, and Margaery felt a small spark of pity for the child that she could not quite explain.

He didn't look much like Cersei or Jaime. No wonder Cersei didn't appear to love him as she did her oldest boy.

"I suppose that must be very fun to make up for your lessons," she continued, noticing that she had Joffrey's full attention now, that he had left Sansa alone to not eat on her own.

Tommen nodded, a small smile on his face. "Yes, Your Grace. Though Ser Pounce misses more often now."

Margaery affected a look of sympathy. "I suppose he must be very brave," she said in all seriousness. "But now he has a knight to protect him, so he ought to be grateful."

Tommen nodded again, his head bobbing up and down. "Yes, Your-"

"It's only sticks they play with," Joffrey said dismissively, and Margaery felt his hand curl around her waist and pull her to him, grubby fingers digging into her side. "At least my uncle Jaime isn't teaching him, or it wouldn't even be that," he continued, smirking at the golden hand Jaime had sitting uselessly on the table.

Jaime glowered, but Margaery didn't bother to laugh, as Joffrey was no doubt expecting of her. Instead, she took another sip of her wine, wondered for a moment if it really was blood, for all that it tasted like it.

But Joffrey seemed to forget Sansa in his jealousy over Margaery speaking to Tommen instead of him, which was exactly as Margaery had wanted it, so she could not bring herself to complain about how it had happened.

Her grandmother had warned her, after they had interrogated Sansa about Joffrey's treatment of her, that she would likely be safe from Joffrey's ministrations as compared to Sansa, because her family had an army and grain and the Lannisters would keep their king in line.

But the moment Joffrey began to beat her, Loras would kill him. That was why her grandmother worried.

And it had nearly happened as she had suspected, the day Joffrey had finally taken his hand to her, never mind that it had been at her own suggestion. It had taken her rape by Ser Osmund to keep Loras from acting on his desire to kill her husband, as she had known it would the moment she brought it up.

She had hated manipulating her brother in that way, but had known it was the only thing that would stay his hand. She just wished she could bring her brother back from the pit of self-loathing he seemed to have fallen in since that day without watching him put a sword through Joffrey's back and being executed for a Kingslayer, for she worried that it would always be one or the other.

Joffrey hadn't beaten her since he'd had Sansa brought to their rooms, as she'd rather begun to suspect he didn't enjoy seeing Margaery bruised and bleeding as he did Sansa, but she knew it was only a matter of time until he beat one of them again.

And, judging from the way he was now refilling Sansa's wine cup with the utmost care, reaching out to push a curl behind her ear, Margaery rather suspected that this time, it wouldn't just stop at a beating.

She shivered, felt her hands begin to curl in her lap as she glanced down at them, noticed the slight tremor.

She did not want Sansa to undergo what she had at the hands of Osmund Kettleblack. She did not want to see the pain in Sansa's eyes that she worked so hard to conceal from her own.

And she did not want to watch Joffrey stick his sword into Sansa, as he'd been threatening since the moment she'd married Tyrion Lannister.

And the only one she knew who could keep that from happening was silently reattaching his golden hand before reaching for another jug of wine.

She wondered if they were all going to be alcoholics, by the time Joffrey was finally dead.


	83. MARGAERY XXVII

Margaery had not thought overmuch of Brienne of Tarth since she had been released from the White Sword Tower of the Kingsguard after Loras had spoken to her of Renly's death. And while Margaery was not certain she believed the tale Brienne had spun to Loras and he to her of a shadow demon sent by Stannis Baratheon, Loras clearly had been shaken by it, so Margaery had done her best to put thoughts of it from her mind.

Renly may never have been her husband in any way that mattered, but she liked to think that they could have been friends, if they'd had the time to be, and she had adored him, as a child, the handsome prince, for all that she'd envied him for taking away her brother. It did not do to dwell upon his death.

Margaery knew that the other woman had remained in King's Landing since then, though she had no idea why, when she refused to play the game of courtier and would never be invited into the Kingsguard, despite her best attempts.

And when she still mourned Renly, her rightful king.

Margaery remembered those days just before the wedding, when Brienne had come to her in the belief that they shared an understanding, or at least a love, for the man who had loved Margaery's brother best of all, the shocked hurt on the tall woman's face when she had discovered that it was not so, that Margaery had moved on.

Brienne of Tarth had not approached her late king's wife since, and Margaery, in truth, was thankful enough for that, for she did not think she could often bear the look of sad longing for a man who would never have loved Margaery or Brienne, even if he had lived.

But still, Margaery had not quite expected to see her here, back in the White Tower, sitting at a long, shield-shaped table which Loras had described to her, back when he still thought the idea of being part of the Kingsguard fascinating, beside Jaime Lannister.

Staring at him as if he were the sun and moon and stars themselves as he rattled on about something Margaery could not bring herself to focus on, pointing emphatically with his golden hand down at a large, overstuffed book which sat on the table between them.

Whatever it was, it had Brienne laughing for a moment, before her face colored in obvious embarrassment and she sent the Kingslayer a stern look.

The Kingslayer and the woman accused of slaying Renly Baratheon. An odd pair, to be sure, and not the least because Margaery had thought Jaime Lannister wrapped around his sister's finger.

But then, Cersei Lannister was in Highgarden now, and Brienne of Tarth was here.

Margaery barely suppressed a snort. Men.

She was almost tempted to leave them to it, but then, she had come here with a purpose, and she owed it to Sansa to see it done, even if it meant dealing with two lovebirds whose forbidden, unconventional romance bit somewhat too close to home for her, now that she and Sansa were...

Well, whatever they were.

"Lord Commander," Margaery called out, as she stepped into the Round Room, plastering a polite smile on her face as she watched Ser Jaime and Lady Brienne move swiftly away from each other, Brienne flushing red to the roots of her straw blond hair and Ser Jaime slamming the book shut, his lips twitching back a smug smile.

"Queen Margaery," he dipped his head, standing immediately and stepping slightly away from Lady Brienne as she too got to her feet. "Are you looking for your brother, Ser Loras?" he asked, sounding rather flustered.

If she were a different woman, Margaery might have found it endearing, the way a grown man like Jaime Lannister could be so flustered over his feelings for another woman. As it was, she only found it amusing, and thus pretended not to realize that she had been interrupting anything at all.

And a small part of her found it concerning, that Jaime Lannister's flustered look was a bit too similar to Joffrey's, whenever he wanted to show her a new toy and was worried about whether or not Margaery would like it.

Her brother Loras was teaching Prince Tommen the sword just now, as Margaery understood it. The boy was quite taken with the Knight of Flowers, who treated him as more than just a silent child, and Loras seemed not to mind Lord Tywin's constant orders of training the boy to fight.

Margaery sighed. She suspected her brother was rather bored here, though of course she couldn't know for sure. Not with the distance between them, now.

"No, Lord Commander, I'm afraid I was looking for you for a private word," she told him, and then continued sweetly, "Though if this is a bad time, I can return later-"

"No," Jaime interrupted coolly, and then, "Lady Brienne was just leaving."

Brienne shot him a look, and then gave Margaery a stiff bow that she did find rather endearing, and if things had been different perhaps she would have liked to see if Brienne of Tarth, the woman who fancied herself a knight, shared her...persuasions.

As it was, she merely smiled at the other woman and stepped forward when Lady Brienne shut the door after herself, leaving Margaery alone with the Kingslayer.

She suddenly disliked how that was his title, for all of his other achievements, for it could just as easily become her brother's legacy, in time.

Jaime Lannister stared at her for a long moment, before clearing his throat awkwardly, and Margaery found herself suddenly remembering her grandmother's affronted words, that Tywin Lannister had almost offered Margaery to this man, rather than a king, in his plotting.

But of course, the title of Kingsguard had stood in the way, much to her relief.

While Margaery could not deny that Jaime Lannister was a handsome man and would have been a kinder husband than her Joffrey, Margaery had only consented to marrying into this accursed family to become a queen.

Casterly Rock was not all that she wanted out of life, nor what her father had wanted for her.

"Ser Jaime," she said, with her most dazzling smile, "I don't wish to keep too much of your time. I have only a small favor to ask."

He blinked at her, staying behind the shield table, eying her like she was a poisonous serpent. She wondered if he had ever met any women who were not, though she rather doubted that Brienne of Tarth could be considered one. For all the rumors surrounding that woman, she was remarkably without guile.

He dipped his head. "Of course, Your Grace, if it is within my power to grant it."

“Who is on the roster to stand guard over the King tonight?” Margaery asked coyly, and revelled in the way the question seemed to throw him.

While Margaery could admit that the majority of her attentions these days focused on either Sansa or keeping Joffrey from doing something stupid, she resented the implication that she could not even make questions of the Kingsguard roster, when it was these very Kingsguard meant to guard her life.

"Your Grace," he said, after a long pause. "Is there any particular reason you wish to know that?"

She supposed that queens did not go around bothering with such things, but by the Seven, she needed him to _understand_ , and had yet to think of another solution. She could not say it outright, of course, for such things would not be proper from a lady's lips, especially to a man she hardly knew, Kingsguard or not, and she was not entirely sure that he would do anything about it, if Margaery merely _spoke_ of her...concerns.

He would have to see it, to believe it, much as Margaery hated to put Sansa into such a position.

“I have to sleep in those chambers as well,” she reminded him primly. "And I am the Queen." A subtle reminder that she would be answered.

“Ser Meryn, Your Grace,” he told her, and then his pretty forehead – pretty, and so like Cersei’s she sometimes found it disconcerting to look at – wrinkled at her expression. “Is that a problem?”

She bit her lip. “Only...I anticipate that the King might be in some danger, due to the recent threat the Small Council has spoken of with these...Sparrows,” she told him, and ignored the chuckle and condescending answer that seemed ready to follow it. “I would rest more easily if I thought my husband in completely safe hands. I seek only to know that he is under the best of protection. And Ser Meryn..." she shook her head, trailing off.

It was obvious enough to anyone who met him that Ser Meryn had more of a passion for molesting little girls than fighting with a sword, and she thought that would be enough to convince the Lord Commander.

Ser Jaime raised a brow. “Is there a threat you know of, Your Grace?”

He sounded suddenly wary, as well he might, when the protection of the King and Queen rested in his hands, much as he might dislike either one of them.

She shook her head, rather at a loss as to how she would convince him that he should stand guard tonight, for she knew he was too much his sister’s for her to attempt a seduction, and anything else might have him believing the King in danger, or suspicious of his motives for singling him out.

But it was not the King who was in danger, and Jaime Lannister was the only one who could help her here, and so she had to try. “A small one, Your Grace, and so I am hesitant to even give it a voice,” she told him in her quietest, meekest tone, instantly deciding she hated that tone and would never use it again.

"It was from the Master of Whispers, Lord Varys, and you know that his little birds are not always accurate."

Ser Jaime’s eyes narrowed at her, as if he was trying to see through her game, but finally, he nodded. “Ser Meryn is a goodly member of the Kingsguard, but if you would rather Ser Loras replace him-"

That was decidedly _not_ what she wanted. Her brother would hear one peep of what was going on inside those doors and commit treason, and while she would love to see her brother’s sword through Joffrey’s back, she would rather not see her brother die because of it.

She gave Ser Jaime a smile that was more like a grimace, leaning forward and tapping her fingers on his table.

“I have...recommended that Ser Loras be taken off the roster for the King’s chambers,” she said quietly, not quite meeting his eyes, wondering if Cersei had ever played him as a damsel in distress. “I am sure you can imagine why.”

Ser Jaime stiffened, his eyes darkening as he finally set down his quill and giving her his full attention. “I see. Then, perhaps myself, as Lord Commander. Will that suffice?”

She brightened immediately, the foolish girl with a crush on a brave Lord Commander. She could play that part well enough, and men always loved to see their egos stoked, whether they lusted after their sisters or not.

“Oh, I think that would suffice, Ser Jaime. Joff speaks often of your chivalry as a knight.”

She knew at once it was the wrong thing to say, and could have kicked herself. Not for having to utter the nickname ‘Joff’ as though it rolled off her tongue, but for saying that Joffrey spoke well of anyone.

He had certainly made clear his opinion of Ser Jaime's skills with a sword just that afternoon, and she was a fool to have forgotten that.

“Are you certain there is not something else bothering you, Your Grace?” Ser Jaime asked stiffly, picking up his quill once more, but she saw him scratch out Ser Meryn's name, scribble in his own awkwardly, as though his hand wasn’t quite accustomed to writing.

She smiled because she knew he wasn’t looking at her. “No, Lord Commander. And thank you.”

Ser Jaime may be thicker than his famously witty brother, whose own smarts she was beginning to question given that he was remaining in King's Landing despite her warning to him, but he had not been on guard the night Sansa had first been taken to Joffrey's chambers, nor for most of the nights that Margaery had lain with her lord husband, no doubt by his own choosing.

He would do.


	84. SANSA XLIX

She had known Joffrey would call for her again, the moment he had started kissing her hand and acting the doting prince he had been before he killed her father despite her desperate pleas, and Sansa had thought she was prepared for it.

Thought she could lift her chin and let Margaery beat her and know that they had something Joffrey would never understand because of the very fact that he longed for such beatings, that she would know Margaery didn't want to do this and everything would be all right because of her sudden understanding of her feelings for the other girl.

No matter what Sansa felt for Margaery, she was still a stupid little girl, and all of that confidence was gone the moment Ser Meryn threw her into the King's bedchambers and declared that he was to report to the White Tower for the end of his shift for the night, and Joffrey declared that he had no intention of watching Margaery beat her again.

"I think I'd like to fuck you tonight, my goodly aunt," Joffrey said with a smirk from where he sat on the end of his bed beside his wife, his eyes travelling down her form as Sansa froze and felt cold bumps break out on her skin. "Give you that child I've been promising. What do you say to that?"

Sansa turned wide eyes to Margaery, who sat on the bed beside Joffrey, her arm on his shoulder, the picture of calm despite Joffrey's words.

Sansa wished that the other girl looked surprised by the words, but whatever Margaery's expression currently was, it was not one of surprise. It almost looked like boredom, and Sansa found herself annoyed that she still found it so difficult to read the other girl's expressions.

But surely, surely Margaery would save her from...that. She had intervened, or started to, the last time, had kept things at a beating, but Sansa did not know if she could survive a rape, with Margaery looking on.

Margaery's hands were surely close enough that they could move to wrap around Joffrey's neck if she liked, but she didn't do that. Instead, she merely sat next to him with that calm smile on her face, as if she had not a care in the world.

Margaery had kissed Sansa breathless the other night, had groaned into her mouth and declared how much she wanted her, and now she was going to let Joffrey rape her to save both of their lives, but Sansa did not think she would survive that, no matter what Margaery seemed to think.

She didn't understand how Margaery could think that, after her close brush with what had almost been a rape at the hands of Ser Osmund Kettleblack, didn't understand how Margaery could not think this would finally kill the last bit of Sansa Stark that had still been holding on-

"My queen might have been jealous," Joffrey continued, smirking at his lady wife, "but I'm sure she won't begrudge me helping out my poor aunt, so disgraced at Court because of her inability to wet my uncle's cock."

Margaery hummed in response to that, before murmuring, "Your Grace, my jealousy aside, perhaps-"

Joffrey bent forward and kissed her, hard and punishing, and when he pulled back, Margaery held her tongue. "Oh, I'll let you play with her, too," he promised his wife. "Just like last time. To keep things fair. After all," he grinned, turning to look at Sansa again before eying his wife, "She's just a traitor's daughter, and we needn't worry about sharing her."

Sansa bit down hard enough on her lower lip to draw blood, belatedly realizing that this was not a good idea at all when Joffrey turned as if he could smell that blood and licked his lips.

She did not dare glance down at his trousers, but suddenly he was standing, moving toward her.

"I'll make you thank me when you grow fat with my baby in you, Lady Lannister," Joffrey promised her, and Sansa sent another panicked look to Margaery before she whispered a response, curtseying low so that she did not have to look at Joffrey's face.

"If that is what you wish, Your Grace," she heard herself say, and wondered why her words did not tremble as the rest of her did.

He slapped her. Hard, and Sansa's head snapped back with the force of the unexpected blow, forcing her onto her back as she lost her balance.

Joffrey cackled, suddenly squatting down beside her and reaching for her, and Sansa couldn't remember how to breathe and thought she might be sick and felt tears prick at her eyes and-

The door to the King's chambers banged open, Ser Jaime Lannister marching into the room and walking over to Sansa, pulling Joffrey up to a standing position by the arm.

Joffrey started sputtering and shouting something about how he was the King and could do as he liked, Ser Jaime's tone low in response to this so that Sansa could not understand his words, but her eyes were only for Margaery.

She watched as the other woman relaxed just a bit, wondered how Margaery had known Ser Jaime would rescue her, inclined her head just a bit.

Margaery sent her the barest hint of a smile before schooling her expression as Joffrey turned to her with wide, upset eyes, clearly expecting her to take his side.

She merely sighed, folding her hands in her lap, murmured something that Sansa's ringing ears didn't catch, and Joffrey was back to glaring at his Lord Commander once more.

But Ser Jaime was no longer paying attention to him, reaching down to pull Sansa to her feet in a grip that was not quite gentle, giving her a onceover before leading her from the room and away from a tantruming Joffrey.

And for once, Sansa couldn't bring herself to think about what sort of hell he would unleash on everyone around him because he hadn't gotten what he wanted. She was too relieved to have gotten away before he stole her last thing to steal from her.

Ser Jaime did not speak to her until they were out in the hall, and then only turned to her and asked with a cursory politeness if she was all right.

Sansa nodded, not quite certain that she could bring herself to speak in that moment, and then Ser Jaime, after a moment's hesitation, had his hand on her arm, dragging her along behind him with an expression on his face that kept her from bothering to ask where they were going.

She wondered for a breathless moment if he was planning on taking her to Tyrion, if she thought she could stomach that humiliation, even if she was not quite sure why she felt such a burning need to keep this of all things from her lord husband, but then Sansa realized that she was taking him out of Maegor's Holdfast altogether, and she blinked in confusion.

Still, she could not bring herself to ask the question on the tip of her tongue, just let Ser Jaime drag her along wondering if he was going to take her outside of the Red Keep and dump her there.

He looked angry enough to do so, even if she could not understand why he was so angry, and didn’t dare ask.

And then she realized where he was taking her, and almost dug in her heels.

Sansa had never been to the Tower of the Hand, but Ser Jaime did not allow her the opportunity to look around as he practically dragged up of the spiraling stairs to the top of it, pushing open the door of the Hand's office without knocking.

Lord Tywin Lannister was sitting at his desk as they entered, and stood to his feet as Ser Jaime dragged Sansa further into the room, raising one pale brow.

"Jaime," Lord Tywin said, looking first at his son and then blinking at Sansa, nearly hidden behind Jaime in a sudden bout of bashfulness, as if when she stepped forward that would make this real. "Lady Sansa." He gave Jaime a bland look that even Sansa understood.

There had better be an explanation for this.

Ser Jaime let go of Sansa abruptly, as if realizing for the first time that he was holding her wrist tightly enough to bruise, and stepped away from her.

"I was Joffrey's guard tonight. He would have raped her if I hadn't intervened," Ser Jaime said bluntly, and Sansa flinched at the words, so harshly spoken.

Flinched at the reminder of Joffrey's body, squatting above her own, at her imagination as it continued the scenario, hands ripping at her gown, Margaery watching on blandly-

"I see," Lord Tywin said, his face still as expressionless as ever, though Sansa thought she detected a hint of anger in his tone. "You may go, Jaime."

Jaime glanced between Sansa and Lord Tywin once more, opened his mouth, “I think I’d rather stay. She is my brother’s wife, after all.”

Tywin sent him a fearsome glare worthy of his namesake as a lion. “That will be all, Lord Commander.”

Jaime gave his father a hard look, glanced at Sansa once more, and then left the room, shutting the door rather forcefully behind him and leaving Sansa alone with the Hand of the King, who had never once acted as though he cared about her.

She'd been a fool, to think Ser Jaime was really rescuing her. He had probably brought her here so that Lord Tywin could order her killed, or make her take an oath of secrecy so that Joffrey could rape her at his pleasure.

Lord Tywin gestured to the seat in front of his desk. "Sit."

She did, and Lord Tywin sat a moment later, scrutinizing her as if he expected her to burst into tears.

And then he reached for the cask of wine on his desk and poured some of it into the glass sitting beside the mountain of paperwork in front of him, handing it to her.

Sansa wondered if it was poisoned. She drank it anyway. She rather hated the taste of wine, but it burned pleasantly down her throat, and so she was rather glad of the feeling now.

Sansa swallowed hard. "Lord Tywin-"

"Has Joffrey raped you?" Tywin asked bluntly, the words cold and polite despite the subject matter, and Sansa shivered. "Before tonight."

She shook her head, then, realizing that was not quite enough for him, spoke.

"No, my lord. He...The Queen tries to keep him from doing anything of...that nature," she whispered, glancing down at her hands and wondering if Tywin Lannister could even hear her, with how quietly she spoke.

"I see," Tywin said, voice heavy, eyebrows knitting together when Sansa glanced back up at him, then at the wall behind him. She wondered if he was surprised by the answer, or not. Was frustrated that, out of all of the people in King's Landing, she could never quite read him. "And does my son Tyrion know about this?"

Sansa went very pale. "No, my lord. I-"

"I see," Tywin repeated, giving her a long look. "It appears I have misjudged you, Lady Sansa."

She lifted her head. "My lord?"

Tywin sighed. "Joffrey will not appreciate his toy being taken away," Tywin said, his words littered with distaste, but Sansa still bristled at being referred to as a toy. "But I will not have it said that my son is being cuckold, nor that another married woman of a noble House has been sullied by another uncontrollable king. The boy will be dealt with."

Sansa blinked at him, understood that he didn't truly care whether Joffrey raped her or not, only that House Lannister's reputation would suffer should anyone learn of this new development.

Swallowed, because, for a moment, it hadn't totally sounded like that.

"My lord?" she asked quietly rather than standing and leaving, as Lord Tywin seemed to expect her to, then. He glanced up, face blank. "Another woman of a noble house?" she questioned, because that was easier than asking how Lord Tywin planned on "dealing" with the King of Westeros.

Lord Tywin's features clouded. "I do believe this conversation has ended, Lady Sansa."

She swallowed again, bent into a curtsey. "Good day, Lord Tywin," she whispered, bowing her head lower than necessary and hoping that he would go back to not noticing her again.


	85. SANSA L

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (In which there is smut, smut, and more smut, and Sansa finally gets that orgasm)

She had expected Margaery to come and check up on her; of course she had.

Sansa merely hadn’t expected it to be when her husband was first leaving for his duties to the Crown. It wasn’t even morning yet, still dark in one of Lord Tyrion’s unusually productive days, at that point, and she was still dressed only in her shift.

She wondered if Margaery had been just as desperate to see her after last night as Sansa had been to see Margaery.

Shae eyed the young queen as she entered the room, glanced at Sansa, and then back at the young queen once more. Something in the woman’s eyes changed, then, and she made some hasty excuse to Sansa about how she had promised one of the other serving women her assistance this morning, and would Sansa be all right without her?

Sansa nodded, a little breathlessly, for the memory of the last time she and Margaery had been alone was flooding her mind, and she almost couldn’t think as she escorted Shae to the door.

When it had shut behind her lady, or Tyrion’s lady, of whoever’s she really was, Sansa turned to face Margaery, still leaning against the surprisingly soothing wood.

Margaery gave her a look Sansa was frustrated she couldn’t identify, before murmuring, “Lock it.”

Sansa had never moved so quickly in her life.

The moment the latch had clicked shut, she turned to find herself enveloped in the sweet, cloying smell and soft touch of Margaery, the other girl surrounding her so completely, and Sansa let out a soft sound that was almost a whine as she melted against Margaery.

Nothing felt safe anymore unless she was in Margaery’s arms. Nothing was safe, anymore, unless she was in Margaery’s arms, because then there was Tywin Lannister with his harsh looks and indiscernible questions, and Joffrey with his crossbow, and the anger on Jaime Lannister’s face that shouldn’t be there on Sansa’s behalf, and-

She buried her head in the silk of Margaery’s sleeve and rubbed her cheek against the utter softness not remembering the last time she had ever worn such a gown.

“Oh, Sansa, I was terrified when Ser Jaime came in,” Margaery told her, rubbing her hands up and down Sansa’s arms as if to ascertain that she was all right. “He looked angry as a demon. I almost thought he was going to...”

_Slay the King again._

Sansa shook her head, lifted it to meet Margaery’s eyes. “He took me to Lord Tywin,” she said, and Margaery’s face seemed to twitch completely. “He told me that...that he won’t allow Joffrey to do anything like that again.”

Margaery raised a brow. “It’s about time,” she muttered, and Sansa couldn’t help but privately agree with her, even if what she said was only,

“He didn’t seem to know that it had gotten...so out of hand.”

Margaery nodded. “I thought he would have done something by now, had he known. But here I thought the Hand of the King knew everything that went on within the Red Keep.”

Sansa chose not to think too hard about that, for surely he would not have allowed things to progress so far, when he had seemed genuinely disgusted with his grandson’s behavior, at the time.

Besides, another worry was occupying her thoughts.

"One thing I don't understand, though," Sansa said quietly, "Is how Ser Jaime knew something was wrong. I think he knew even before Ser Meryn led me inside and returned to the White Tower.”

Margaery didn't quite meet her eyes, then, and Sansa knew the answer to her question before the other girl spoke. “I’m sure he heard through the door,” she murmured. “Joffrey is hardly subtle in his actions, and I have observed that the Kingslayer has a strange sort of honor to him.”

“Margaery.”

Margaery glanced away. “I saw the way he was looking at you, at that meal,” she said finally, and Sansa thought she appeared almost nervous. Sansa wondered if Margaery still thought her scheming could still disturb the woman she cared about.

Sansa was beyond such things, now, she thought.

And besides, this had hardly been a wicked sort of scheming, from what Sansa could tell.

It was almost...sweet, even if it was a little disconcerting for all of her secrets to be laid bare before Lord Tywin and Jaime Lannister.

“Everyone saw that,” Sansa argued. “Even Lord Tywin, and he still seemed somewhat surprised to see me there, in his office.” She shrugged. “For Lord Tywin, anyway.”

Margaery shook her head. “I know Joffrey's kindness, and I know what comes next, Sansa, and so I knew what to look for, but you’ve been spared that so far, and I would spare you from it still, whatever I must do.”

Sansa sucked in a breath, noticed that Margaery’s hands, still rubbing up and down Sansa’s arms, were shaking.

It took her a moment to understand what Margaery was saying. That Margaery had known, the moment they’d had that meal together and Joffrey had doted on Sansa like some kept woman, that he was likely going to rape her soon, and she had done what she could to prevent it.

It had been a near thing, though, even then.

The physical scars from Margaery’s near rape by the hand of Ser Osmund Kettleblack were gone now; the bruises had faded around her throat and on her face, and though Sansa had not seen everything of what was under Margaery’s clothes, she had looked mostly healed there, as well.

But some things never faded, Sansa knew, and she still remembered that day in Flea Bottom when the smallfolk had revolted and she'd nearly been killed, when the Hound had rescued her from those vile men...

Sansa kissed her.

Margaery looked startled, for a moment, before Sansa closed her eyes and lifted her hand to place it around the back of Margaery's neck and pull her closer.

And then she felt Margaery's lips pushing back against her own, and Sansa melted forward, into the sweet, supple curves of Margaery's body, hands grasping for leverage as Margaery's fingers brushed beneath her shift.

It was strange, kissing Margaery, Sansa had come to notice. Not because the other girl's lips were softer than Joffrey's, for it was a near thing, or because she felt any guilt for being with a woman when she was quite certain that the Seven forbid it (and damn them, for she was a Stark, and they belonged to the old gods, anyway).

On the few occasions when Sansa had been able to bear watching Margaery kiss Joffrey, it had been clear who was in control of that situation, no matter what Joffrey Baratheon would have liked to believe.

But when she kissed Sansa...

When she kissed Sansa, her lips were like fire in the first few moments, claiming every part of what was Sansa Stark until Sansa stole it back, sweet at first then rougher, and it seemed to her that Margaery wanted it that way.

That Margaery guided her until she pushed back, that Margaery was begging to be devoured.

Sansa's lips pried Margaery's own open until her tongue was brushing along the roof of Margaery's mouth, and Margaery made a noise that seemed to shoot from her own mouth into Sansa's, and then straight down her spine and into her womanhood, a jolt that sent yet more heat through her.

Sansa wasn't even aware that Margaery was frog-marching her back to the bed, the one Sansa shared with Tyrion but had never soiled with him, until they were falling on it together, falling and giggling at the same time, coming apart for only a moment before Margaery's lips were wrapped around her own once more.

Sansa barely had a moment to suck in a breath of air before it was stolen from her once more, before Margaery had tossed her onto her back on the sheets, and it flew out of her mouth and into Margaery's so quickly she nearly choked.

She heard a low, dark chuckle from above her, and Sansa reached up, having suddenly decided that Margaery was wearing far too many layers to Sansa's shift as she pushed Margaery's sleeves down around her elbows.

Margaery got the idea, pulling back and peeling off her outer shawl, then the top of her gown came to rest in a pool around her waist, and Sansa felt another jolt in her womanhood as she took in the outline of Margaery's pert breasts beneath her white shift, the other girl's nipples standing hard to attention.

Margaery saw her looking, and laughed, reached out a hand to take Sansa's in her own, pulled it up until it was resting on Margaery's breast beneath her shift.

Sansa sucked in a breath, glanced at the other girl before giving her breast an experimental squeeze.

Margaery sucked in a short breath, and Sansa glanced up at her nervously.

At that, the Queen let out a noise of frustration and surged forward once more, took Sansa's mouth again.

Somehow, Sansa forgot to be nervous as she kneaded Margaery's breast beneath her clumsy fingers, felt only frustration that the shift still stood between them, but then, she supposed she still wore hers, as well.

She was panting now, every breath drawn in difficulty, for her one thought was of _Margaery, Margaery, Margaery_...

"Is your lord husband coming back soon?" Margaery asked then, which Sansa thought a rather strange question for the moment until Margaery was hooking her thumbs under Sansa's sleeves and divesting Sansa of her shift in one quick move. Sansa shivered, her nipples hardening as they met the air before she shook her head.

"N-no, and Shae...Shae said she had some business with that other maid, so I'm sure we have some time," she whispered out, and Margaery let out a sound of approval, bending down and wrapping her lips around Sansa's left nipple in one quick movement, before Sansa could quite make out what she was planning to do.

"Margaery!" she yelped, as she felt Margaery's tongue tracing her, gods, tracing her nipple just so, "Joffrey?"

It was becoming even more difficult to formulate coherent sentences, much less complete thoughts.

Margaery pulled away with a frustrated groan at being distracted, her teeth grazing agaist Sansa's nipple in a way that was no doubt meant to be warning. Sansa did not find it so, and she threw her head back, gasping. "In bed. He won't be waking for a while."

Sansa blinked in alarm, head lifting. "You can't know that-"

"I tired him out after you left, else he would have gone running after you," Margaery told her, smiling impishly. "Sansa. Trust me."

And, gods, she did.

Until-

"Your Kingsguard?"

Margaery groaned. "Loras. He'll swear by the Seven that I am in my rooms. _Sansa_."

Reaching forward, Sansa traced the smooth lines of Margaery's stomach, just above where shift and gown had fallen to her lap, felt the soft skin there and wished she couldn't still see it littered with Joffrey's marks, even if they were gone, now.

Margaery bent down, and in the next moment, her mouth wrapped around Sansa's hardened nipple, and she yelped, glancing at the other girl in surprise. Margaery merely grinned impishly around her nipple, before sucking it suddenly.

The sensation very nearly made Sansa scream, and she found herself pushing down hard on Margaery's shoulders just to keep herself upright.

Margaery grunted at the pressure, but didn't pull away, not even a moment later when Sansa's hips bucked up against hers, desperately seeking some sort of contact.

Her womanhood had grown wet again, the way it had that day when Margaery had kissed her or she had kissed Margaery and the sensation had so scared her that she'd run...

She wasn't running now.

Instead, Sansa moved her lips to wherever she could find contact, sucked on Margaery's neck until she was almost certain she would leave a mark that Margaery would be hardpressed to explain to Joffrey, and only that had her pulling away, face paling as the horrible thought occured to her.

She knew she wanted this. Knew she wanted it more than anything, in fact, in this moment.

But this, this thing she had with Margaery that neither of them could explain or explain away, meant that she would be sharing Margaery with Joffrey, possibly for the rest of their lives. There would be no happy ending for her and Margaery, no escape from Joffrey.

Theirs would be a secret thing, forever. Something to be hidden away.

She shivered, but Margaery didn't seem to notice her sudden change in mood, as the wetness against Sansa's thighs grew suddenly cool.

Margaery did, however, suck at her nipple again, until it had hardened once more and all thoughts of Joffrey had been banished from Sansa's mind.

Sansa's back arched, pushing her closer to Margaery, until she could feel the bow of her spine pressed hard into the bed, uncomfortably so, but not uncomfortable enough to consider readjusting her position.

She didn't want to do anything that might cause Margaery to stop, especially a moment later when Margaery's teeth grazed her.

She was finding it rather difficult to breathe when Margaery next spoke.

"I want you," Margaery whispered against her skin, kissing a little bud behind Sansa's ear, then moving downward, and Sansa gasped at the sensation, her lower lip wobbling. "Sansa, I need you."

"Margaery-"

"Tell me you want me, Sansa," Margaery murmured, and Oh, by the Seven, now she was licking that spot on Sansa's neck, and Sansa let out a sound suspiciously like a mewl as she turned her head to give the other girl more access, digging her fingers into Margaery's shoulders.

"Margaery..."

Margaery licked that same spot again. "I'll stop if you ask me to. I will."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "Margaery..."

"Tell me stop, Sansa," Margaery whispered, pulling back a little. She wasn't Joffrey, Sansa knew. She wouldn't take what Sansa did not want to give her, even if she would force Sansa to love her while she played wife to someone else.

And that thought made the decision for her, before Sansa could quite sparse out what she was saying, the words erupting from her lips.

"D-Don't stop," Sansa gasped out, sagging against Margaery’s hold. “Don’t...ever...stop.”

Margaery chuckled lowly. “I don’t think that’s quite possible, my sweet girl, but I’ll do my best.”

Sansa sucked in a breath at the endearment, but didn't have time to ponder it for long, for in the next moment, Margaery was moving away from Sansa's abused nipples, tongue moving in a slow stripe down Sansa's stomach and to her waist, where she was thankfully without a shift, as Margaery still was.

Sansa did not know where Margaery had tossed Sansa's shift in her earlier fervor, and could not quite bring herself to care as Margaery settled herself back on the sheets.

"Wh...What are you...?" Sansa swallowed, fairly certain that she'd just begged Margaery not to stop not a moment ago.

Margaery gave her a long, searching look, and then gestured between the two of them with a flick of her fingers.

"Have you ever done this before?" Margaery asked, and Sansa shook her head, blushing despite how she had not cared a moment ago about her current state of undress.

“Lord Tyr-”

“No,” Margaery shook her head, smiled slightly. “I know that you and Lord Tyrion have not...that is to say, I did not mean with Lord Tyrion.”

Sansa’s eyes grew almost comically wide, and wondered if such a thing really was so shocking to a lady of the North, if those Northern folk really avoided keeping themselves warm to such an extreme, that it should be.

She doubted that, if Margaery had lived in the North, the other girl would feel any differently than she did now.

"No," Sansa admitted, voice small, "Only...only what we did in Joffrey's chambers, and then in mine..."

Margaery let out a harsh laugh. "That can hardly be called anything, my little bird. Can I?" she gestured downward and, with a blush, Sansa nodded.

Margaery's fingers roamed expertly down Sansa's waist, as if in search of something but touching all of the right places along the way, and Sansa gasped when the other girl's nimble fingers slipped under her gown, pulling it up and exposing her thighs to the thick night air.

They trembled suddenly, and Margaery glanced up at her, smiled reassuringly.

"Do you trust me, Sansa?" she whispered, and Sansa nodded so fervently she supposed it was a wonder her head didn't fall off.

Margaery smiled gently, and then she was moving slowly, graceful as a cat, Sansa couldn't help but think idly, as Margaery lay down on her stomach on the bed.

"What are you...?" Sansa blinked as the other girl's head came to land between Sansa's parted, shaking thighs, and she ignored the indulgent smile on Margaery's face as she favored the girl with an incredulous look.

"Sansa," Margaery said gently, one finger reaching out to ghost along Sansa's inner thigh, so lightly it felt like the first snow in the North, "Trust me."

She did, she did, she didn't understand why Margaery kept reminding her to do so when Sansa had never trusted anyone more than she did Margaery in this moment-

Margaery's head bent beneath Sansa's thighs, and then Sansa jerked in surprise as lips sealed around her womanhood in a kiss.

She shot straight up, staring at Margaery with wide eyes, pretending she couldn't make out the outline of a smile where Margaery's mouth was now pressed to her most intimate area.

Sansa wasn't quite sure what she had imagined, when she had pictured two women together, she and Margaery together. She knew, of course, that it would not be the same as with a man, that Margaery had no cock to fill her with, but this...

It felt strange, at first, but this only lasted until Margaery's lips parted, and suddenly Margaery's tongue was brushing against her folds, and the hot wetness that had been building up within Sansa threatened to damn her, in that moment, before they had even...done whatever it was Margaery was clearly planning to do to her.

She wondered if Margaery's tongue felt like a man's cock in a woman, but wetter, gentler somehow, and Sansa suddenly couldn't imagine taking anything other than Margaery's tongue, for the feeling it gave her was so intense, so full-

It felt wonderful, the feeling of Margaery's tongue, flicking in and out of her in slow, even strokes that made Sansa want to shout and forced her to bite her tongue so hard she could taste blood in her own mouth.

It didn't hurt though, strangely.

She willed her body to wait, for Sansa desperately wanted to find out exactly what that was.

Margaery let out another low chuckle at the way Sansa's body was almost shaking in her grip now, and then her tongue dipped between the folds of Sansa's cunny, and Sansa let out a shout that she was sure would bring the guards running-

No one came. No guards were likely to be near Tyrion Lannister's chambers, anyway, not on this side of the Red Keep.

"Margaery," Sansa gasped out, as she felt Margaery's fingers reach up, trace along her thighs before pinching each in turn, and Sansa found herself desperately in need of something to do with her hands, for it was torture to just lay there and let Margaery pull her apart like this. "Margaery, I-"

She couldn't breathe. Her ribs ached with the knowledge that she wasn't drawing in breaths, a pleasant sort of aching that had nothing to do with aching, and she chewed on her lower lip until she could feel a trickle of blood running down her chin, sparing an almost errant thought to the knowledge that she would have to explain it away to Tyrion-

Margaery tweaked her nipple, and this time, Sansa couldn't withhold the moan that erupted from her, for she was sure she would have torn her lip clean off if she'd tried.

She reached out with inexpert fingers, traced along Margaery's naked back as Margaery's tongue worked inside of Sansa, pulling in and out in a slow rhythm that made Sansa see stars.

"Margaery," she whispered again, her fingers moving to the nodes of Margaery's spine, tracing each one individually as if seeking purchase.

"A moment," she thought she heard Margaery murmur, and wasn't quite sure how the other girl managed it without pulling away from her, "More."

Sansa swallowed hard, nodded jerkily.

Sansa thought, in that moment that Margaery had asked her for, that she might die. Almost yearned for death, if she was being truthful with herself, if it meant that she could die from this, rather than having her head taken off her shoulders.

And then Margaery's tongue moved deeper in her than it yet had, and Sansa blacked out as the world exploded around her.


	86. SANSA LI

Sansa opened her eyes to a feeling of all around uncomfortableness, from the sticky sensation currently drying around her thighs and buttocks to the arm wrapped too tightly around her waist, holding her in an almost bruising grip.

It took Sansa a moment to remember where she was, how she had gotten there, and then it all came tumbling back with horrifying swiftness.

She sat up straight in the bed which she shared with her husband, a bed which now carried a strong odor and sheets that were now terribly stained.

She swallowed, glanced at Margaery as the girl groaned and opened her eyes slowly. Sansa was not entirely convinced that she had been sleeping.

And then Margaery smiled at her, and the feeling of apprehension that had filled Sansa to the throat suddenly evaporated at the sight of that smile.

She understood finally what it was that so attracted men to sex, that so overpowered them about it, and made them act so foolishly.

She thought she might do the same, if she were a man with such chances.

"Margaery," she whispered, finding her voice suddenly hoarse. She distantly remembered that she had uttered a silent scream, before she had passed out.

Gods, she had passed out when they had finally...when they had finally...

Sansa was mortified, and her cheeks pinked even as Margaery chuckled and sat up with her, kissed Sansa's shoulder, then her neck.

The kisses brought back the apprehension that Sansa had somehow forgotten had been clawing at her throat, and she gulped, pulled back.

"I...I should go," Sansa said finally, splaying her hands out awkwardly by her sides, quite unsure what to do with them now that they were not reaching for Margaery. "I..."

"Sansa."

Sansa glanced up at her helplessly. "What we just did...Margaery..."

Margaery shifted off the bed, not bothering with clothes as she came to stand before Sansa once more. The gown that had been biding its time around her waist dropped fully to the ground, and Sansa could do nothing but stare.

Margaery traced a finger down Sansa's arm, and the other girl shuddered, found herself pushing her lower body into the bed sheets.

"I would like to do it again sometime," she whispered, and Sansa found herself nodding before she even realized that she was.

“Margaery...”

“Did you enjoy it?” Margaery asked, with unreasonable reasonableness.

Sansa sucked in a breath, mind instantly flashing through just what they had done. “I...”

“Sansa,” Margaery murmured, pointedly.

She hung her head. “I...Yes,” she whispered, and wondered why it felt like a weight off her shoulders, to say so.

Margaery grinned. “I thought you would,” she said finally, and grinned rather impishly.

Sansa mock-glared at her, not quite able to do more than that in her current condition. Swallowed. "But we can't do it again."

Margaery started, glanced at her. "Why ever not?" she asked quietly, looking genuinely surprised by Sansa's words.

Sansa found herself distracted by the hollow in Margaery's throat as she stammered out some response she wasn't even sure was sensical, but that she wished to say that it was dangerous, that if, that if...

Margaery kissed her again, slow and sweet, and Sansa found herself growing wet between her thighs once more, even if she wasn't entirely certain how she could have gotten into such a state so quickly after what had occurred.

She didn't quite know when Margaery's hand had slipped between Sansa's thighs, her cool fingers brushing against Sansa's warm folds and causing her to jolt.

Sansa gasped, glanced up at Margaery with wide eyes, and Margaery grinned at her, curling a finger gently inside of Sansa until Sansa thought she might black out again, as she had before.

Sansa gasped at the sensation, for while it wasn't quite like Margaery's lips had been earlier, this was a sensation she had never quite imagined she would experience, and it drew soft, strangled gasps from her, and damn whoever might be outside the door, for she couldn't bring herself to care.

Margaery was making reassuring sounds as her practiced fingers brushed gentle circles into Sansa's skin, and then further, as her fingers crooked and brushed against the insides of Sansa until she thought she might burst, going slowly but with an unmistakable intent. But Sansa couldn't tell what Margaery was whispering, could barely make out the sounds of words.

Knew nothing but that her cunny ached with need, that it was dripping all over Margaery's buttersoft hands and unto the soft sheets below.

Sansa whimpered, arched her body up into Margaery's fingers, made a keening noise that she hoped Margaery wouldn't acknowledge-

And then there came a very loud knock on the door, and in the next moment Shae's voice, sounding somewhere between amused and concerned. "Lady Sansa? Are you in there?"

Sansa gasped, and Margaery's fingers drew out of her so quickly that Sansa gasped and then grunted at the loss, which wasn't quite painful but still disappointing, pouting lightly before she glanced up at Margaery, and if Sansa weren't careful, she would find herself getting distracted in those lips once more...

"Lady Sansa?"

Margaery met her eyes, tilted her head in the direction of the door, and Sansa sighed.

It should have been daunting, the idea that so soon after their...affair?...had begun, they were already found out by someone they had not intended, for Sansa had figured out already that Lady Elinor knew somewhat by Margaery's choice.

But somehow, Sansa couldn't quite bring herself to be daunted for that reason.

Instead, she wasn't quite certain how she would bring herself to face Lady Shae, the woman who loved Sansa's husband and made little secret of that fact.

"Just a moment, Lady Shae!" she cried, and knew before she did it that she couldn't meet Margaery's eyes again.

She did.

Margaery's lips twitched first, and then Sansa's, and a moment later they had tipped back onto the bed once more, giggling like children much younger than they were, fingers twining against one another where they lay.

Sansa almost forgot that her womanhood was still covered in fluids, that a moment ago she could barely breathe, but then she glanced down at Margaery's fingers, still covered in her essence.

"You should get the door," Margaery finally whispered, when their laughter had subsided.

Sansa groaned, reached for her shift where it had fallen to the ground and hastily attempted to assemble it around her body in a way that didn't imply she had just been...that she and Margaery had...

Margaery reached out, combing her fingers through Sansa's hair with calm, practiced fingers, and Sansa gaped at her when a moment later Margaery brought her own fingers to her lips, wetting it with an obsene popping sound before rubbing at Sansa's arm, wet somehow still.

Sansa stared, quite unable to form any words in that moment.

She flushed furiously, even as Margaery leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, "You'll want a bath before it dries, sweetheart." And then she kissed Sansa's cheek.

And then Margaery, Queen of Westeros bent down and lifted up her shift, put it on with fingers that moved calmly for all that they were quick, her gown following haphazardly after that.

Not a hair was out of place in her elaborate hairstyle, and Margaery slipped back into her shoes, going to the door and opening it with a polite smile to Shae.

Sansa envied her ability to remain composed in any situation in that moment, just as she had before, whenever Margaery stood around Joffrey and remained composed during all of the horrible things he had ever done.

Still, she was rather relieved that she had not had to stand and open the door herself, for she was quite sure she would not have been able to manage even that small feat, after what had just occured.

"Lady Shae," Margaery said, with a dazzling smile, not once glancing back at Sansa, "I see you've returned from your work early."

Shae stared at Margaery, eyes narrowed, before crossing her arms over her chest and stepping back so that Margaery might leave.

Margaery glanced back at Sansa once, a small smile quirking her lips, before she gathered her gown more firmly around herself and stepped nimbly from the room.

Shae stared after her for a long moment, before stepping into the chamber and shutting the door behind herself with unnecessary force.

Sansa swallowed.

Shae didn't speak at first, merely walked over to the bed and stared dispassionately at the sheets as Sansa stood shakily to her feet, still feeling boneless. And then Shae began to strip the bed, and Sansa released a breath she hadn't realized she'd still been holding.

"When I said you ought to be friends with the Queen, this wasn't what I meant," Shae reprimanded her when she finally turned around, arms full of their stained mess, though her voice wasn't as hard as Sansa had expected it to be.

That is, it wasn't as hard as she'd sometimes heard it be around Tyrion, when Shae was angry with him.

"I..." Sansa swallowed hard. "I know."

And gods, she hoped that Shae didn't suspect that, didn't think that was why she and Margaery were now-

It had nothing to do with that. She didn't want Margaery's protection, after all. She didn't want to be with Margaery for her protection, for that would only ensure they both lost it.

Shae gave her a long, slanted glance. "You ought to be more careful. It is not just infidelity they would catch you for, if they could."

Sansa nodded, rather jerkily. Of course, she knew that. "I know."

Shae glanced around the room as if looking for further evidence. "And you cannot expect me to clean the bed after you every single time."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "So you won't...tell?" she asked, her voice coming out tinny and smaller than she'd wanted.

She felt oddly light after the question came out of her, though. Too light, like nothing could touch her, when she knew she shouldn't be so reckless.

Shae gave her an unimpressed look. "I hardly worked as a lady should before I met Lord Tyrion," she told Sansa primly. Sansa flushed. "It doesn't bother me, Lady Sansa. And I know that you carry no love for Lord Tyrion in that way, and that the two of you have an understanding, and so I cannot wholly disapprove. But I do disapprove, because she is the Queen and I...care about you. You should be more careful." She nodded to the door. "And not just with yourselves."

Sansa swallowed, nodded. "Of course. I..."

The smirk Shae sent her was rather pointed. "Still," she said, her tone almost teasing now, "I suppose there are very few in the world who can say they've had a queen."

Sansa stared at her, flabbergasted. "Shae..."

"Just..." Shae frowned at her. "Just be careful, my lady."

Sansa nodded. "We will," she said, and wondered when it had become _we_.


	87. TYRION IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Joffrey gets a reminder of who wields the real power in King's Landing.

"Your Grace," Tywin said as Joffrey entered the Tower of the Hand, in the droll tone he used with particularly thick members of the Small Council, or when he was becoming annoyed and attempting not to show it.

Joffrey didn't appear to notice, though, swanning into the room with all of the confidence of someone who didn't know their head was already on the chopping block.

Tyrion leaned back in his chair and awaited the show yet to happen, still not entirely certain why he had been summoned here along with Jaime and Joffrey, as Tywin had not spoken to him since he'd entered the Tower some moments ago, but rather certain, by the look on Tywin's face, that he would at least enjoy the dressing down Tywin was sure to give their young king.

One had to take their victories where they could find them, these days, and, try as he might, Tyrion was not above petty victories anymore than Cersei, apparently.

Tywin motioned Joffrey to the one chair unoccupied in front of his desk then, directly next to Tyrion, and Joffrey stared at it distastefully, then at Tyrion, then up at his grandfather once more.

Joffrey looked instantly on edge, glancing from Jaime, where he moved to stand guarding the only other door besides the one which Joffrey had just come through with a thunderous expression, and Tyrion, whom Joffrey made sure to sneer at.

Tyrion wondered what had clearly made Jaime so angry, along with their father, whose cold expression was perhaps a shade colder than it usually was, he thought with an inner smirk.

"What is this about, then?" Joffrey said, turning back to Tywin. He had dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was mussed. Tyrion wondered with amusement if the King had been summoned from his bed, and was rather glad that someone was still able to remind the brat that he was very much still a child. "My lady has...certain needs, before breakfast. I hesitate to leave her for long."

Tyrion attempted not to shudder; it was a near thing. He doubted Margaery Tyrell was anything but grateful that her husband had been waylaid.

Tywin was silent for several long moment during which Tyrion suspected he was simply enjoying watching Joffrey squirm, enjoying keeping the King of Westeros waiting because he was able to do so.

Perhaps their lord father was not so different from Cersei Lannister in some ways, either.

"This will not take long," Tywin said, in a voice that implied that it might, and he couldn't be bothered to care how annoyed that made their King, before glancing up from his paperwork.

"Can you tell me the story of why Prince Rhaegar fell, and dragged the Targaryen dynasty down with him, Your Grace?" Tywin inquired, in that same bland tone, and Tyrion blinked at him, rather surprised to have been dragged here to discuss that. "Your mother tells me you have a knack for Targaryen history."

"Amongst other things Targaryen," Tyrion muttered under his breath, and expected to at least get a snort from Jaime for it, but his brother was silent, looked almost stony, when Tyrion glanced at him.

The look was a little too similar to their lord father's, and so he looked away, a bit disturbed once more about what this meeting might entail, for Tywin had refused to inform him until Joffrey arrived.

Joffrey looked bemused at the topic of conversation, as bemused as Tyrion felt, but he answered all the same.

"He was a lunatic, who thought he needed that Stark bitch to give him a third dragon child to fulfill some prophecy because his Dornish princess was barren," he rattled off, getting marginally more excited as he spoke. Tyrion tried not to let his disgust show on his face, but it was a near thing. "So he kidnapped her and tried to get her with child, and my father killed him for it."

He sounded so damned proud, Tyrion thought, glancing at Jaime once again. The brat's real father, who had been killing an altogether different Targaryen, at the time.

Tywin looked less than appeased, tapping his index fingers together idly.

"A rather simplied version of events, but mostly correct. But what I press upon you to understand is this: Rhaegar Targaryen started a war because he could not keep his hands off of what did not belong to him," he told the boy king, voice bringing down the temperature in the room by degrees, and Tyrion felt an awful chill run down his spine, an omen that he might very well know just what this meeting was about. His pettiness over seeing Joffrey dressed down was very suddenly gone.

Joffrey, in turn, had gone rather pale.

Tywin continued, "Lady Sansa is your aunt by marriage, and if you continue in such behavior toward her, you will come dangerously close to reminding the realm of why it rebelled against its previous rulers. House Lannister is a proud House, and will not be dragged down as the Targaryens were because you wish to have your way with this girl. Nor will it offer its unconditional support to a Crown that does not respect it."

"You can't!" Joffrey screeched. "You're my grandfather, and my Hand! If you can't bloody do the job, I'm sure Margaery's father-"

"House Tyrell may have the largest standing army in the kingdoms as of this moment, Your Grace, but even they will not be happy to defend a king setting aside his wife for his lady aunt," Tywin said coolly.

Tyrion felt a wave of fury rush through him on Sansa's behalf at these words, glancing between Tywin and Joffrey with sudden understanding of why, in fact, he had been brought here, ignoring for the moment his surprise that Tywin was so ardently willing to defend Sansa.

Of course he was. It almost made sense, in a way. She was a Lannister by marriage, after all, and the key to the North. Tywin couldn't see her being raped by...

Tyrion stood abruptly to his feet, rounding on his nephew. "If you laid a hand on her-"

"I am the King!" Joffrey snapped, and then turned back to Tywin petulantly. "The realm dare not rebel against me."

"Do you know what the smallfolk call you, Your Grace?" Tywin asked. "The Second Mad King." He paused, lifted a brow. "Do you know what I did with the first?"

Joffrey's face twisted with rage. "It was Uncle Jaime's blade that ran the Mad King through," he snapped, jumping to his feet as well now. "For all he's useless now."

Behind them, Jaime muttered something that might have been, "I can still use a blade for that purpose just fine." Tyrion didn't quite dare to turn around and ask him for clarification on the statement.

Tywin lifted a brow at his grandson, unfazed. "It was my troops that took King's Landing, my help that allowed your miserable wretch of a father to ever father you, Your Grace."

Joffrey stared, flummoxed.

Tyrion found his voice, then, his face gone purple from what he had just come to understand as he leapt to his feet and rounded on the young king.

"If you think to continue to torment my wife in this manner, I'll make good on the promise I made to you at my wedding, and you can return to your wife and her needs this night with a wooden cock," Tyrion hissed.

Sansa may have grown rather dear to him in these recent months, but he knew that she was not dear to Tywin as anything more than a chess piece in his convoluted game, and so, whatever it was Joffrey had done to her, it must have been serious.

Serious enough to warrant dragging the king from his bed to remind him of his precarious position as a king.

Tyrion saw red.

Joffrey paled at the threat, and then turned crimson. "You were drunk, then!" he screeched. "You weren't anything more than drunk!"

"Was I, Your Grace?" Tyrion asked, almost conversationally. "Lady Sansa is my wife. I made a vow to protect her when I married her, and, as I understand it, that means even protecting her from you."

"The king can have what he likes if she gives herself to me freely," Joffrey spat. "And she's a little whore, Sansa Stark, just like her whore of an aunt was when she let Rhaegar Targaryen between her legs even though she belonged to my father-"

Tyrion slapped him.

The sound rang loudly in the otherwise silent chamber, and Joffrey stared at him in shock for a long moment; Tyrion had not slapped him since the riot in Flea Bottom, after all, half an age ago, and he had likely not expected another since.

He thought himself so above Tyrion now, after all, that he could dare to lay a hand on his wife.

"How dare you!" Joffrey shouted; Tyrion thought the veins on his neck might burst, with the way they were popping. "Uncle!" he yelled towards the door, where Jaime stood. "Bring me his head!"

Jaime didn't move from his spot guarding the door, and Joffrey stomped his foot, a child denied what he wanted in the heat of the moment, and very much reminded of it.

Tywin raised one perfectly sculpted brow. Tyrion felt a sudden stab of pity for the man's personal servant, for it had just occurred to Tyrion that the man's life must be hell. "A good king knows when not to show his hand, Your Grace."

Joffrey's mouth worked for a moment, opening and closing as he stared at his grandfather, and Tyrion reflected that it was good indeed that there was someone in this godsforsaken realm whom Joffrey genuinely feared.

It was rather a relief to know that some part of the little monster was still human, in that way.

"I'll write to Mother about this; just see if I don't!" he snapped.

Jaime snorted, by the door.

"Do you think that your mother will take your side?" Tywin asked dryly, then, "I dare say she is no stranger to the mistreatment you wish to heap on the Lady Sansa, for all that she has allowed you to torment the girl in the past."

Jaime stiffened suddenly, and before anyone could react in truth to Tywin's words, he turned and stalked out the door.

Tyrion almost couldn't blame him. He knew that Cersei and Robert's marriage had not altogether been happy, attributing this more to her predilection for her brother and Robert's for whores and drinking, but to hear their lord father openly acknowledge what he had once turned a blind eye on was sure to piss Jaime off.

Even if Tyrion couldn't quite find it within himself to feel sorry for Cersei, anymore.

Joffrey stomped his foot, like a child being sent to bed. "You...!" he seemed to have run out of steam, then, and Tywin stepped forward, glancing down his nose at his grandson.

"You are tired, Your Grace," Tywin told the King coolly. "You will go back to bed, without your queen, and think on what has transpired here. In the afternoon, and every day after, you will refrain from terrorizing your lady aunt, or I will have her removed from your presence, and give you a reminder of just what is owed you, as King of Westeros."

Joffrey seethed, looked ready to scream at his grandfather and shit himself from fear at the same time, before turning on his heel and stalking from the room.

As his cape flowed behind him, he looked rather too much like Jaime had, just moments ago, for Tyrion's taste.

"And you," Tywin rounded on Tyrion suddenly, "Will keep a better eye on your wife. We cannot trust Joffrey's self-control to last for long, after all, as you know very well. This cannot be allowed to escalate further than it has."

Tyrion licked his lips. "I will," he promised. "And what...will happen to the king if I should fail?"

A very morbid part of him desperately wanted to know, for all that he was resolved never to allow that to occur.

Tywin gave him a droll look. "Attend to your wife, Tyrion," he said finally, and Tyrion fled the room while he still had the chance to do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a part of me that thinks that Tywin Lannister was absurdly pleased when he learned that Jaime killed King Aerys, after what it was strongly implied he did to Joanna Lannister, so I think he would not be above taking some pleasure from preventing Joffrey from raping Sansa.


	88. SANSA LII

Sansa’s septa had always told her that, when she finally became a woman, no longer a girl unspoiled, she would feel like an entirely different person, the feeling would be so wonderful.

The feelings she’d had while in Margaery’s bed had been wonderful, but she still felt like Sansa Stark.

Like a lighter, happier version of Sansa Stark, which she herself had not seen in some time, but still Sansa.

That lasted until just after noon, when Margaery had been gone for some hours but still managed to send one of her ladies to invite Sansa to "sewing" the next day, in Margaery's private chambers, and Shae had cleaned up all evidence of their coupling in her own.

And she had sent Sansa some lemon cakes, specially made simply because Margaery wanted to send them to her, and because they were Sansa's favorites.

Sansa lay on the bed and ate them, unable to keep the bright smile from her face as she did so, because even as she tried to concentrate on her food, all she could think of was Margaery, Margaery's lips against her skin, Margaery's hands on her body.

The smell of her, the taste of her...

Sansa ate them and tried not to think of the fluids she had wiped off her thighs in the bath Shae had prepared for her as lemon jam oozed from the little cakes, and couldn't bring herself to meet Shae's eyes after she had eaten.

She did very little that day, and found herself enjoy it, for while she was not sore from what had happened to her as she had heard could happen, but she felt oddly unable to do anything.

Mushy, too soft.

And then Tyrion returned to his chambers, stalking in like a fury, the door slamming shut behind him.

Sansa stood up from the bed where she and Margaery had just...been together, wiping down her gown and watching the crumbs from the lemon cakes fall to the ground in small clumps.

The peace was over, though Sansa supposed it had never truly been there, not really.

She glanced at Shae, who looked just as surprised as she. There was no way Tyrion could have found out the truth about she and Margaery so quickly, not really, and surely, even if he did, it wouldn't make him as angry as he currently looked-

"I just attended a meeting with my lord father," Tyrion said, going toward the wine flask at once, voice rather too light for the anger on his face, and Sansa found herself stiffening.

She glanced at Shae, remembered only a moment too late that Shae had no idea what was about to happen, had no idea why Tyrion meeting with his lord father just the morning after what had almost happened to Sansa might worry her.

"My lord-"

Tyrion took a long, stiff drink, and then sank down onto the sofa. "Has Joffrey raped you, Sansa?" he asked, voice still light.

Sansa sucked in a breath, took a slight step back before she knew what she was doing, but it was Shae who answered, Shae who spoke first.

"Tyrion!"

Tyrion shook his head, held up a hand to Shae. "Sansa."

"How dare you?" Shae demanded, stepping in between Sansa and Tyrion. "How dare you ask such a thing?"

"No," Sansa answered quietly, and Shae and Tyrion both jerked their heads toward her. "No," she repeated, a bit louder this time. "He hasn't raped me. Your father...Ser Jaime rescued me from it the other night."

Tyrion swore, the loud, vicious sort of swearing that Theon might have used when he thought Sansa wasn't around to overhear, or Robb, because he thought it made him something more of a man.

Tyrion's use of the crude word seemed far harsher and more terrifying than either of theirs.

"Sansa..." he said finally, standing and meeting her eyes. He was the first to look away.

Sansa stared at her husband, at the man she had tried so hard to shove from her thoughts ever since their marriage had begun, and even before then. The Imp, whose scarred face and mismatched eyes terrified her almost as much as Joffrey's beautiful, too fine features on most nights.

The man whose eyes had grown with concern for her since the day he had saved her from her most recent beating at Joffrey's hands, who had thrown his golden cloak over her shoulder and promised her his protection.

She hadn't been able to face those eyes for far too long, and it didn't seem right that she should face them now, when she had gone against her vows, however forced they might be, that she had made on her wedding night.

She felt the flash of guilt for doing so, for her mother and her septa's words on how she should treat her future husband, whoever they might be, had not quite left her mind, now that she was no longer intoxicated by the cloying presence of Margaery's skin against her own.

Not that she could bring herself to regret it as much as she knew she ought to.

"Why did you not come to me?" Tyrion asked then, as Sansa sank down onto the bed, hands cradled in front of her. He knelt before her, and Sansa stiffened, pretended she didn't see the flash of guilt on Tyrion's face as she did so.

"I..."

She couldn't say. In truth, she didn't know if she had an excuse that Tyrion would hear. A part of her had known she should go to her husband, that he had protected her against beatings and the like, and that he would protect her against this, as well.

But she'd pushed the feeling down, pushed it down each and every time she'd had a thought of it because a part of her also wasn't certain what he could do. A part of her remembered the way Joffrey had mocked and humiliated him at the wedding, and wondered if he could do anything for her.

A part of her had thought that Margaery would be able to do a better job of it, and Margaery was hardly able to do more than Sansa.

She swallowed, and Tyrion cleared his throat awkwardly, stood to his feet and moved away from her with hooded eyes.

His entire demeanor was more aloof when he next spoke. "Lady Sansa," he said quietly, eyes never meeting her own, "When I married you, I vowed to protect you. I took that vow...I am taking that vow seriously."

Sansa shook her head. "As seriously as you took all the vows you made as my husband?"

Tyrion blinked at her. "Lady Sansa," he repeated, "I made another vow on that night. That I would not force you. I will not become the monster you wish me to become."

Sansa sucked in a breath, glanced at Shae where she still stood in the corner, looking between Sansa and Tyrion with an unreadable expression.

Sansa stared at her husband for a long moment, found herself staring back down at her hands again. "I know that," she whispered finally, because the words needed to be said, because she did know it.

Because her husband wasn't the monster the rest of his family was, no matter what face he wore.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "Yes. Well. My lord father has spoken to Joffrey. He won't touch you again."

Sansa wondered how Lord Tywin could be so sure, and then snorted, saw the look on Tyrion's face and spoke. "You'll forgive me if the protection of a Lannister doesn't mean much to me."

Tyrion flinched, gave her a long look. "I understand that, Sansa. But it is this, or I will have to take you to the Rock, where you will be safe from Joffrey-"

Sansa stood abruptly. "My place is here, or in Winterfell, my lord. I will not go to the Rock."

She would not bend on that. She had no idea how she would keep from going to the Rock, whether she would grab onto the Iron Throne and hold onto it kicking and screaming if she had to while Tyrion dragged her from this place, but she would not go.

She would not go to the Rock, where there were more Lannisters than there were here. Where she would be even farther stuck as a prisoner of Joffrey, even if it was in name only.

Where she would be closer to Winterfell, which belonged to the Boltons now, a closer pawn for the Lannisters to prop up and remind everyone of their victory over the Starks, that one day they would have a Lannister in Winterfell.

Where she would be left to Tyrion Lannister's tender mercies, much as she might trust him here, where he was not within his own home.

She would go with Prince Oberyn to Dorne, a man she hardly knew but whom she believed had a peculiar sort of honor, and she would go with Margaery to Highgarden, she thought, but she would not go with Tyrion to Casterly Rock.

"Sansa, the Queen is no reason to remain in King's Landing," Tyrion said quietly. "I understand that you are...that you believe you are friends, but I do not think this friendship has kept you safe."

"Safe?" Sansa scoffed. "I am hardly safe in King's Landing, my lord. I am a Stark, and I am hardly safe anywhere in Westeros. Margaery is my friend."

It was Tyrion's turn to scoff, at that. "Lady Sansa...Margaery is Joffrey's wife."

Sansa swallowed. "What are you saying?" she demanded, for she owed him that much, after what she had just done.

Tyrion swallowed. "That, as Joffrey's wife and the Rose of Highgarden, she will always choose her House's needs before your own. And right now, those needs align with Joffrey's."

"Would you take from me my only friend in King's Landing, my lord?" Sansa demanded, her tone biting, and she pretended that she could not hardly breathe from hearing Tyrion's words.

Tyrion flinched, but regarded her steadily as he asked, "Is she your friend, Sansa?"

Sansa's eyes widened. "Yes."

Tyrion shook his head. "The wife of the King who wishes to have you at his mercy is your friend? I would rather say she is your competition, and cannot look upon you as anything but what she must get out of her way. Permanently, if she must."

Sansa slapped him. The reaction came instinctively, and she shrank back after she did so, eyes wide with horror even as Tyrion stared at her in muted surprise.

And then, he chuckled, low in his throat while he didn't quite dare to meet her gaze, reaching up and rubbing at his cheek. "That is...quite the hand you've got there, Lady Sansa."

She was tempted to slap him again at that, and found that she didn't quite dare. Instead, she turned on her heels and fled.

Sansa was not certain of where she was running until she opened her eyes and found that she was down the hall from Joffrey's quarters, in the king's wing of the Keep.

She passed one of the Kingsguard, who stared at her like he was wondering whether he ought to send her away or send her in for Joffrey to play with, and Sansa spun away, around a corner where he couldn't see her.

She knew she shouldn't be here, not so soon after the night before, not when the mental scars of what had almost happened to her by that point had not quite faded. Not when Joffrey was no doubt still there.

She stopped, stopped before she had quite made her way to that hall, leaned against the wall and lowered herself to her rump.

Swallowed hard, bit hard into the soft flesh of her wrist.

Too soft.

She wondered if Joffrey was in there fucking Margaery right now, so soon after they had...

The lemon cakes Margaery had sent her turned to stones in Sansa's stomach at the thought.

She didn't quite know when she had started crying, only knew that when she lifted her hand to her cheek, it was wet with tears.


	89. SANSA LIII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Smut, smut, and more...angst!

"Ser Boros," Sansa said, curtseying to the man to cover her own shock.

When Margaery had sent the missive letting Sansa know, in curved, flowery letters, that she would like to...have tea in her rooms in the Maidenvault, Sansa had jumped at the opportunity.

And usually, when said opportunity arose, Ser Loras was the one keeping guard over Westeros' queen, or she had found some way of eluding her Kingsguard.

And while Sansa certainly didn't want to think overly hard about who was standing outside the door when they were together, the thought that it might be someone who would hear them and do something to put a stop to their...activities was never far from her mind.

She did not think it far from Margaery's, either, although a part of her wondered if the other girl enjoyed that thought. Enjoyed it far more than she should, in fact.

Still, Ser Boros was Tywin's man, allowed to remain in the Kingsguard at Tywin Lannister's volition after Cersei accused him of endangering Prince Tommen's life, and while Tywin Lannister had kept Sansa safe from Joffrey, she doubted he would keep her safe from this.

"Lady Sansa," Ser Boros bowed curtly to her, and she tried not to think of the few times Joffrey had ordered him to beat her. He was a taciturn man, and Joffrey had not enjoyed the lack of expression on his face as he had obeyed the orders of his king the few times he had done so, Sansa thought.

"The Queen is expecting me," she informed him prettily, waiting.

Ser Boros gave her a long look, and for a moment she wondered if he suspected. But...no. No doubt the Kingsguard thought she and Margaery to be plotting some dastardly deeds, Tyrell plots against the Lannisters, but certainly not this.

He opened the door to Margaery's chambers, and she smiled at him again, stepped nimbly past him into the room.

The door slipped shut behind her.

Margaery was lying on her bed, dressed only in the sheer green robe she'd worn the other day, when Sansa had come here and they had finally reached an understanding.

Sansa had not realized how much she appreciated the view at the time, but she did now, watching Margaery leaf through a book with the title of Dance of Dragons written so prettily down the spine.

She stayed like that for a moment, admiring the view, before Margaery glanced up, a small smile moving across his face.

"Sansa," she said, the book spilling haphazardly into the sheets as she leapt to her feet and moved to join Sansa where she stood, clasping her hands as if they were a thousand times more valuable.

"A new book?" she asked, head tilting toward it.

Margaery glanced back, shrugged. "A gift from Joffrey," she said. "He does so enjoy his history." Her lips quirked in amusement.

Sansa bit her lip, didn't want to think about Joffrey, or his strange gifts. She had been no stranger to them herself, when she had been Joffrey's betrothed. Only, the gifts had been different, then. A necklace. A head.

She wrapped her arm around Margaery's back then, tangled her fingers in the smooth material of her robe and pulled the other girl closer.

Margaery seemed to get the hint, smirking for another reason now as she bent down and pressed her lips to Sansa's neck.

Sansa parted her lips and moaned at the sensation, having expected a kiss and finding this suddenly far superior, her eyes closing as she tilted her neck back to give the other girl more access.

And then she felt the heat from Margaery's body as she stepped closer into Sansa, as her fingers trailed down the material of Sansa's gown before reaching expertly for the ties, making short work of them as quickly as she could.

Sansa's eyes opened wide as Margaery's lips sucked more deeply, as she thought she might lose all sense as her veins beat out a hard rhythm under Margaery's tender ministrations.

"Margaery..." she whispered, lost focus as Margaery's lips trailed down from Sansa's neck to her now bared collar bone, as her fingers deftly pulled away the last ties of Sansa's gown and pushed it down to her waist.

Sansa's hands moved of their own accord, tangling in Margaery's robe once more before slipping it off of the other girl's shoulders, watching it tumble to the ground and pool there for a long moment before Margaery's lips reminded her that she couldn't quite think straight.

"Marg..." she gasped out, as one of Margaery's fingers lowered to the small of her back, pinching the skin there, "Bed."

Their feet tangled together as Sansa awkwardly marched Margaery backward to the bed, as Margaery's lips wrapped around her left nipple and sucked with all of the deftness of a newborn babe, and Sansa threw her head back and gasped even as she gently pushed Margaery down onto the sheets.

"Quieter, Sansa," she heard Margaery murmur beneath her, in between licking and sucking alternately at her breasts, until Sansa's nipples had both become hardened nubs that stung. "We don't want Ser Boros to hear."

The wetness that had been gathering between Sansa's thighs felt abruptly too dry, and the heat gathering in her stomach diminshed at the reminder of the man standing right outside their door.

At the remider that the man guarding Margaery was doing so because she was Joffrey's wife.

Margaery paused in her ministrations, glancing up at Sansa with wide, clear eyes. "Is something wrong?"

Sansa shook her head, leaned down and kissed Margaery once more. By the low noise Margaery made in the back of her throat, she certainly enjoyed it.

Sansa lifted her knees up haphazardly onto the bed, allowed Margaery to pull her down onto the sheets as she trailed kisses down the other girl's throat, not quite as skilled as Margaery had done for her, but by the look on Margaery's face, she did not think the other girl minded overmuch.

She didn't quite know when they had fallen evenly onto the bed, but then Margaery's lips were finding their way down Sansa's chest again, tongue jutting out to lick a small stripe under Sansa's breast.

Sansa bit into one of the sheets to keep from crying out and attracting Ser Boros' attentions, as they would hardly be able to disguise what they were doing should he walk into the room now, the both of them completely nude and Margaery destroying her on the queen's bed.

Margaery's tongue licked at her again, and Sansa's teeth clicked together uncomfortably in her attempt to stay silent, before she moaned, "Oh gods, Margaery..."

"What do you want, Sansa?" Margaery whispered into the shell of her ear, and Sansa shivered.

"I...I want..." She couldn't think. Couldn't understand what Margaery was saying to her in this moment, wondered if she might black out again from the pleasure as she had last time.

A lick. "What do you want?" A pant.

Sansa suddenly very much knew what she wanted, and she let her fingers tangle in the smooth tresses of Margaery's hair, guiding the other girl's head downward, as Sansa pretended to ignore Margaery's impish grin.

Margaery's mouth trailed kissed down Sansa's stomach, her thighs, teeth grazing against Sansa's inner left thigh before Sansa had finally pulled Margaery's head to where she wanted it, and then Margaery glanced up at her, eyes hooded.

Sansa swallowed hard, one hand reaching out to brush at Margaery's pull, almost pouting lips.

"I want your mouth," Sansa panted. "Please."

Margaery did not need further encouragement, and a moment later, Sana felt the sweet, almost gentle kiss of Margaery's lips against her womanhood, and she threw her head back as Margaery pushed closer, as her hands forced Sansa's thighs apart in a move that was almost startling in its quickness.

Sansa's head fell against the sheets beneath her and for a moment she thought she would black out again, that Margaery would destroy her once more, but she somehow managed to regain he grasp on reality just in time to feel Margaery's lips part and her tongue press more deeply into Sansa's wet heat.

"Gods..." Sansa whispered again, fingers digging into the sheets for something to grab onto, and then finding this insufficient and reaching for Margaery's hair once more.

The thickness of it, the softness of it, was strangely alluring in this moment, in a way it had never been before, and Sansa closed her eyes, lost herself to the sensations in a way she had never allowed herself to do before Margaery had entered her life like this.

Margaery's fingers, where they dug into Sansa's thighs, squeezed her suddenly, and Sansa stuttered out a groan, wondered if the gods had sought to simply torture her for the rest of her life.

If she did not cry out soon, she thought she might burst into Margaery's mouth without ever giving the other girl so much as a warning.

And then Margaery's teeth brushed deeply within her, and Sansa had to choke on the sheets to keep herself from screaming.

Margaery lifted her head, smirked at Sansa, and Sansa groaned, reached out and pushed the other girl back down out of sheer desperation.

She heard Margaery chuckling again, before the other woman's lips sealed around her once more.

It was almost like a game, Sansa thought idly, attempting to stay quiet with the knowledge that Ser Boros was on the other side of that door.

The Queen would never have privacy. She would never be able to be alone with Sansa, to do the sort of things that they wanted to do in the sure knowledge that someone would not walk in on them at any moment and see them killed for it.

And while a part of Sansa rebelled strongly against that thought, a part of her couldn't be compelled to care, as she muffled her cries into the bed sheets and jerked her hips up into Margaery's mouth, bit down hard on the flesh of her wrist when she thought the noises that might erupt from her might be more telling.

She thought Margaery might enjoy it, the sight of her, so close to losing all control but maintaining it nonetheless, and so it didn't seem quite so like the hardship Sansa was sure it would be when Ser Boros had let her into the room.

And, as Margaery's tongue fucked in and out of her as Sansa's fingers tangled in the other girl's hair, Sansa's gaze flicked over to the cover of the book still sitting on its spine on the corner of Margaery's bed.

Sansa came minutes later with a muffled cry, face blooming with embarrassment as Ser Boros knocked on the door and asked his queen if everything was all right.

Margaery lifted her head, mouth still wet with Sansa's essence, even as she called out with a lightly amused voice, "We're just fine in here, Ser Boros. Lady Sansa merely stabbed herself on a needle."

She glanced back at Sansa, who snorted and turned on her side, buried her face in the sheets.

Margaery was there again in a moment, kissing her way down Sansa's cheek until the other girl turned and gave her more access, let Margaery kiss her nose and then her lips and chin with a reverence Sansa couldn't help but wonder if she had ever bothered to show Joffrey.

This wasn't a competition, she reminded herself, kissing Margaery back, sweet, slow kisses unlike what they had just done, the act still causing her to blush.

Joffrey didn't even know about her, and Margaery cared for Sansa much more than she would ever care for her monster of a husband, as she had made very clear.

And Sansa could not care less about Joffrey, if it meant seeing Margaery like this.

And then Sansa glanced between them with a blush, because she knew that Margaery cared about her but she wished that such things could be good for Margaery, as well.

"I don't know what to..." she shook her head, gestured between them.

Margaery smiled rather widely, took Sansa's face in her hands and kissed her once more. "You needn't worry about that, my sweet girl," she said, the words sounding like a promise. "I was...quite affected by you."

Sansa was sure she was blushing crimson now, but Margaery merely chuckled again and kissed her once more.

And later, when they were lying in the bed, tangled in the sheets and one another, Ser Boros still standing outside, Sansa sighed delightedly, having almost forgotten Joffrey altogether.

Almost.

There was a knock to the door again, Ser Boros informing them that he was taking his leave and that Ser Loras was replacing him, Margaery calling out that that was fine.

Sansa sighed, burrowed a bit more deeply into the other girl in an effort to keep Margaery from pulling away, if she was tempted by the thought of her brother outside.

"I wish we could go away somewhere," Sansa whispered, wrapping her legs around Margaery's own as she nestled into Margaery's side, tracing the little mark on Margaery's back that she had found that afternoon, another symbol of Joffrey's undying love for his beloved wife.

Sometimes, seeing them made Sansa want to scream, though she knew that the marks on her own back were even more prominent and must frustrate Margaery, as well.

She didn't ask, though, why Margaery had not brought them up since the day she had helped to clean Sansa's back of the strokes Margaery herself had given her. Perhaps she thought Sansa wouldn't want to hear them mentioned.

Margaery chuckled, turned onto her back to face Sansa, smiling prettily. "And where might we go?" she asked.

Sansa shrugged, tried not to think of the warm summer breezes and soft sand of a place she had never even been. She knew that there was bad blood between the Tyrells and the Martells, even if she did not know the full story.

Knew that, not days after the Martell party had arrived in King's Landing, Lady Olenna had outright called Ellaria Sand a whore.

She knew that Margaery Tyrell would never go to Dorne, not with her, not if it meant giving up her crown.

And that thought stung, reminded Sansa of the other day, when she had found herself outside Joffrey's chambers, her mind's eye providing all too vivid images of what he was no doubt doing to his bride.

Margaery sat up then, peppered Sansa's nose with kisses. "I hate it when you look so sad," the other girl whispered. "I hated it when I first arrived in King's Landing, and I hate it now." She swallowed. "We'll figure something out. Perhaps Highgarden, like I suggested so long ago."

Sansa remembered what Tyrion had told her about that idea. "You don't have an heir. Tywin Lannister will never let you go."

And Sansa did not know if she would quite be able to forgive Margaery for leaving any heir to Joffrey's tender mercies, even if it meant the two of them could escape to Highgarden together.

Margaery sighed, flopping back down onto the bed. "I know," she said softly. "And I hate this sneaking about as much you do, I think," she said softly, hand reaching out and squeezing Sansa's. "But it's all we've got, and I wouldn't give it up." She glanced askance at Sansa. "Would you?"

Sansa swallowed hard, bent down to kiss her again, thought of the warmth of the Dornish, the fabled warmth and freedom of Dorne.

"Of course not," she lied, and wondered what it was about lying, that doing so was far easier when one did not have to look their victim in the face.


	90. TYRION V

"A few more documents for the King to sign," Lord Mace said, presenting them with a soft thud on the table of the Small Council, and Lord Tywin nodded, picking them up and sifting through them with a detached expression.

"He will see them," Tywin promised.

Tyrion could not quite contain himself, then. He had been waiting for several days, after all, to see what it was Tywin had planned as a punishment for Joffrey, in lieu of asking his father.

"And where is the king today, my lord father?" Tyrion asked, withholding a smirk.

Their good Queen Margaery was usually very good about making sure Joffrey came to every meeting these days, and he didn't know if it was because she found her own father's information insufficient in manipulating Joffrey or because she genuinely thought she might reform Joffrey into a king who knew anything about his realm.

He wished her luck in both endeavors.

But neither one of them were here today, and Lord Mace did not look especially angry about anything, leaving Tyrion to wonder.

Tywin gave him a long look, and then spoke to the table at large. "The King will not be joining the meetings of the Small Council."

Tyrion raised a brow. "Permanently?"

Tywin's eyes now turned to him, cold as ever. "The King has proven himself unable to deal with the responsibilities allotted to him here, and has gladly handed them over to the jurisdiction of his Hand for the immediate future."

Oberyn cleared his throat, looked rather amused. "And will the King have any responsibilities, or will the Hand be...handling all of them, for the...immediate future?"

Tyrion snorted.

Tywin gave his son a hard look, and then glanced at Oberyn. "The King and his queen have yet to have an heir, and his focus must, of course, be on that, for the good of the realm."

Lord Mace looked less than pleased at the reminder, but the conversation topic was soon dropped for the more important matter of where exactly Stannis Baratheon was currently.

Tyrion barely paid attention to that, though, as he usually did. His thoughts were only on why his lord father had done this, so openly punished Joffrey, and what else he had done, not only to punish his grandson, but to confirm Joffrey's compliance in going along with it.

Everyone knew that Joffrey was scared shitless of Tywin Lannister, and with good reason, Tyrion couldn't help but think, but this was quite a different matter entirely.

The moment the King let on that his Hand had the power over him to take over his judicial duties as king, he no longer was one, as Tyrion's maester had once pounded into his head.

He wondered if Joffrey would even be allowed to preside over his little court or sit on the Iron Throne, before he remembered that that had been where Sansa had been beaten the most, before their marriage.

He suddenly very much doubted it, though he had to admit his father's sudden concern over Sansa Stark was...confusing.

He had to have known the shit she had gone through before their marriage, and certainly had not acted as though he cared a whit about Sansa when he married her off to his dwarf son, and yet here he was now, defending her honor before the King.

Even if he was not defending it as well as he might have, sending Jaime away to deal with the Iron Islands alongside the Tyrells when he was their man in the Kingsguard.

But then, perhaps Tywin wanted no reminder of his son's influence in the Kingsguard, while Jaime remained in the Kingsguard.

A stray memory, one he couldn't quite place, leapt to the forefront of his mind, his aunt Genna Lannister talking about his lady mother, clamping up when she mentioned Joanna Lannister's time as a lady to Queen Rhaella before moving on to the much safer topic of how she was the love of his father's life, and he glanced at his father again, frowning.

He wondered if Lord Tywin was getting more enjoyment out of this transition of all of the King's power more directly to himself than Tyrion had originally thought he was. And everyone knew how Tywin enjoyed taking power for himself.

"And you, Master of Coin?" Prince Oberyn's voice spoke up suddenly, and Tyrion blinked, flushed when he realized he hadn't been paying attention to the conversation at all, feeling very much like a child before his maester. "Do you have an opinion on how to sway the Iron Bank away from Stannis Baratheon?"

Tyrion glanced up, saw the amused slant of Prince Oberyn's lips and the disapproving look in his father's eyes, though he supposed the latter could be there for any number of reasons.

"Stannis Baratheon has managed to sway the Iron Bank, as you put it, because King Joffrey has not paid his debts," Tyrion said lightly, landing on his feet as he always did, "But I don't think even they want to live in a world where Stannis Baratheon succeeds at taking the Iron Throne."

His father raised an imperious brow. "You think they are baiting us." It was not quite a question.

Tyrion shrugged. "I think they know we can be expected to pay our debts," he said, smirking as he incorporated their house's motto into his words.

For once, Tywin looked less than pleased to hear it. "While Stannis Baratheon wanders the wastelands of the North," he muttered, and Tyrion nodded. "I see."

The conversation of the Small Council veered toward other matters after that, how to roust Stannis out of the North and defeat him, as they all knew the Battle of Blackwater was a bit of a fluke victory that might not be repeated another time, and Tyrion breathed a sigh of relief.

At the end of it, however, he found himself the last to go, and Oberyn Martell was waiting outside the doors of the Small Council with a smirk on his face, arms crossed over his broad chest.

"I was wondering if you might permit me to take Lady Sansa into the city again soon," Prince Oberyn told him, leaning against the wall in an almost languid pose. "Her gowns seem woefully Northern, for having remained in the South so long."

He should have known, and Tyrion confessed himself suddenly very glad indeed that Sansa had, however angrily, informed him that she would be spending the entire day with her friend, Queen Margaery, sewing and having tea, the moment that Margaery was available.

He knew she'd said the words to spite him, and he'd winced at the time, but he couldn't quite bring himself to care now, for no doubt that was exactly where she was, considering that Queen Margaery had not been here.

But that was...an almost diplomatic way of putting things, Tyrion decided, squinting at Prince Oberyn. He was well aware of the tragic state of his wife's attire, owing to the fact that Cersei had never bothered to add to it since Joffrey had cut off Ned Stark's head.

He had attempted to broach the topic with Sansa himself, but she regarded him as if he was merely taking the clothes he might buy her off of her in his mind already, and she was already wearing far too many Tyrell colors for his comfort.

"You have been spending rather a lot of time around my lady wife recently," Tyrion pointed out, unable to hold the words back.

Oberyn gave him a roguish grin. "I have done nothing which she has not wanted, Lord Tyrion."

And that was the last straw, for the words reminded Tyrion of what Sansa had said to him, of how she had slapped him even after he had told her he would never take from her that which she was unwilling to give, wife or no.

He turned around, gave Oberyn a long, hard look. The roguish smile faded.

"I will thank you to remember that I am a Lannister, Your Highness," Tyrion said coldly. "And that that is my wife you are speaking of."

Oberyn took a step forward, pushing off the wall to stare at Tyrion like he was something Oberyn Martell had never seen before, was fascinated by.

"And do you hate your family as much as she does, Tyrion Lannister?"

Tyrion blinked at him in surprise, even as Oberyn's expression crinkled into one of amusement.

"Do I hate my..." he cleared his throat. "I suspect that there is no one who could hate the Lannisters as much Sansa Stark, my lord, though you are welcome to try."

The amusement was gone as quickly as it had come, and Oberyn's arms recrossed over his chest once more. "I suspect that is true, Lord Tyrion," he said quietly, dark eyes searching for something Tyrion couldn't quite know. "But I do not think you love them as much as you claim, or they you."

Tyrion shrugged. "They are my family," he said lightly, but Oberyn shook his head.

"Jaime Lannister, perhaps, who does not possess enough guile to be as his twin, the Dowager Queen, or as cold as Tywin Lannister, or as mad as...Joffrey Lannister."

Tyrion stiffened, all worries for Sansa's virtue in this moment shattered.

He had thought that Oberyn was here to court Lady Sansa, to drag the daughter of Winterfell to King's Landing to be used against the Lannisters.

It had not occurred to him that Oberyn had grown close to her to get to him.

He wondered what the man's strategy was. Alienating Tyrion from the rest of the Lannisters with the knowledge that he was being cuckold by the Prince of Dorne, that he was risking the North. He would humiliate House Lannister and, if Prince Oberyn happened to...abscond with Lady Sansa, lose them the North.

But the snakes in the South did not care about the North, far removed from them as it was, when all they had ever wanted was the ability to rule themselves, as anyone who opened a history book, and Tyrion had opened many in his lonely childhood, knew.

They did not care about the petty disputes about who could claim a barren, snow-covered rock, nor about who could get a young girl with child.

They cared about their own. They cared about Elia Martell, brutally murdered on what Tyrion knew had been Tywin's orders.

And Tyrion should never have forgotten that.

Oberyn Martell simply hadn't realized that Tywin Lannister cared very little about whether or not Sansa Stark was full of child, as indeed Tyrion himself had not understood.

Tyrion could only wonder why Oberyn Martell had given away the game so quickly. Wonder what Sansa had told him, about her lord husband, to make him believe he could get away with it.

"I believe you are mistaken, my lord," Tyrion said, voice firm and light as he could manage, "Our king's name is Joffrey Baratheon."

Oberyn snorted. "Indeed."

Tyrion stepped nimbly backwards. "I do believe the Crown my father made some decisions concerning the issue of money in there today, and that I should probably get back to it..."

Oberyn stepped forward. "The Crown your father," he repeated, and Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek at the turn of phrase he should not have used. "How conveniently things have turned out for him. I remember a previous king who would not give him the time of day when he wanted to claw his way to power."

Tyrion swallowed, remembered plots to marry Cersei to Prince Rhaegar, and remembered his Aunt Genna's cryptic words.

"My father is very....stubborn," he said, flashed a quick smile. "Like most of his children."

Oberyn raised a brow. "Well, if he enjoys the role so much, perhaps there are still some ways in which he might bend," he said quietly. "Tell your father that if he gives Dorne the Mountain for justice, House Martell will be satisfied with the debt House Lannister owes us. He has refused me thus far, but I will have what I desire one way or another. A stronger alliance will simply help the Crown, seeing as Princess Myrcella still makes her home in Dorne."

And Tyrion knew that threat was true, just as he knew that his father would never hand Gregor Clegane over to Oberyn, not while the man still breathed.

Not when it was clearly Oberyn's aim to know who had given Gregor Clegane the orders to kill Princess Elia and her children.

And while he knew that the Dornish would not dare to harm Princess Myrcella, the threat had been clear enough.

He had arranged for that marriage, after all. And while Cersei had called him a heatless monster for sending away her daughter, he did care about Myrcella.

"And will they be?" he asked.

Oberyn cocked his head. "Will they be, what?"

"Satisfied," Tyrion asked. "Will House Martell be satisfied with that?"

Oberyn gave him a long look, and then shrugged. "That depends on how much you hate your father, Lord Tyrion."

Tyrion swallowed thickly. "I will...I will pass that along, Prince Oberyn."

For all that it would matter. The real message, that he did not want her to spend time around Prince Oberyn now either, would likely not go over well with his stubborn wife.

Stubborn as any lion, at any rate.

He gulped, and wondered if, even if he explained to her why Prince Oberyn was no longer allowed in her company, she would care.

As he had told Oberyn, there was no one in Westeros whom he believed had greater cause to watch House Lannister burn.


	91. MARGAERY XXVIII

"Margaery!" Sansa cried out, her body spasming beautifully beneath Margaery's hands, but Margaery could barely withhold a groan of frustration.

She loved this, loved the feel of Sansa Stark under her fingers, beautiful and wanton, loved listening to the other girl's harsh pants and pleased cries and knowing that Margaery and Margaery alone had brought them on, that they were finally together here after so many months of playing a game of push and pull with one another.

But she wanted so much more, wanted to be able to do the sort of things with Sansa that she'd done with so many other girls before her, the things that progressed beyond Margaery's fingers and tongues and sweet kisses, much as she enjoyed watching Sansa come undone beneath her tender ministrations.

Elinor kept warning her that it doubtless wasn't safe, that they wouldn't know for sure unless they had a maester examine her again, and those words were said rather stiffly, because they both remembered how that had gone the last time.

It annoyed Margaery that neither of them knew how far she could go, although Elinor had told her that perhaps she could experiment with herself, find out if it hurt to do so, and use that as her answer.

After all, as Elinor had put it, she was far too stubborn to confide in Sansa about what had happened, and it would not do to stop halfway through relations with the other girl if she did not want to speak of it.

Sansa might take it as a rejection, and Margaery never wanted to give her that impression.

She sighed as Sansa came onto her fingers, knew that Sansa would not hear it over her own strangled cry of ecstasy, and focused on Sansa once more, watched as her eyes closed and her mouth opened wide, and lost herself in Sansa, bent down to kiss her again, to tangle her fingers in Sansa's thick hair and pull her up until they were both sitting on Margaery's bed, the one Joffrey never fucked his queen in.

Margaery loved that, just as she loved watching Sansa come undone and knowing that only she would be so fortunate as to have the honor to see it. Not Lord Tyrion, not Joffrey, not anyone else.

As she understood it, Sansa had told Lord Tyrion that they would be having tea together and would be sewing as well, and Margaery had laughed when Sansa told her as much.

She still wasn't certain about Sansa's maid, and where her loyalties lay, but Sansa had assured her that Shae had promised she would tell no one, and that she believed the other woman.

And while many of the court seemed to believe Sansa to be a naive little girl, Margaery had found that she had little reason to trust anyone, and would likely not do so without good reason.

Still, the thought of some maid who slept with a Lannister lord and even Elinor knowing about their secret made Margaery uneasy.

She knew what this was. Knew that if anyone learned that the wife of the King was sleeping with his aunt...

"Oh, Seven, Margaery..."

Margaery swallowed, glanced down at Sansa once more, smiled as Sansa came completely undone before her.

And then Sansa reached up and pulled Margaery down for another kiss, and she promptly forgot her frustrations, lost in the sensation of Sansa's soft lips against her own.

Kissing Sansa felt different than kissing anyone else had ever felt for Margaery, and she did not think that she would ever tire of it. It was not just that Sansa's lips were soft and tasted forever of lemon cakes, nor that Sansa was always so...eager, for a girl whom, when Margaery had first met her, she had thought already half-dead.

It was something else, something that made Sansa's lips sweeter than Elinor's, something that made Margaery want to devour them, and something which Margaery did not dare to give name to.

And when they both came, moments later, when Margaery had sucked her way along Sana's lips and down to the base of her throat, and Sansa was gasping so beautifully beneath her, Margaery forgot that she'd even a moment ago wanted for more than she now had.

Because now, in this moment, it was enough.

They fell panting onto the bed a moment later, Margaery staring at Sansa's enflamed nipples and wanting nothing more than to wrap her lips around them in turn, to stick her fingers back into the warm red folds of Sansa's womanhood and-

"You're sure Joffrey won't need you for the rest of the day?" Sansa asked anxiously, having clearly recovered her wits.

Margaery groaned, flopping her face down into one of the pillows. "It certainly ruins the mood, when you bring up Joffrey, Sansa," she complained, and Sansa laughed lightly, but still waited, crossing her arms now over her naked chest.

Margaery sighed. "I meant it. Joffrey will not be bothering us anytime soon."

Sansa raised a brow. "I don't understand. Surely he would not approve of this."

Margaery scoffed. "Are you planning on telling him?" Her expression softened, and she leaned forward, kissed Sansa on the nose. "He doesn't have to."

Sansa blinked at her. "Margaery."

Margaery sighed, reached out to squeeze her hand. "Joffrey and I...haven't shared a bed since the night he almost..." she glanced away.

She didn't want to remind Sansa of that night, just as she never wished to be reminded of the day Ser Osmund Kettleblack had found his way into her chambers. The duvet that had been on her bed that day had been burned. The same had happened to the sheets and duvet which had been there the day of the...

Sansa sat up abruptly. "I don't want you getting into trouble on my account, Margaery. That was the whole point of why we-" she gestured around helplessly.

Margaery gave her a suddenly intense look. "It wasn't my doing," she said, shrugging one shoulder, and watched as the expression on Sansa's face changed, from worry to surprise.

Sansa gaped at her, no doubt realizing why they'd had so much...time together recently, uninhibited as it had been, and then her mouth abruptly clicked shut before she swallowed.

"I had no idea my comfort was worth so much to Tywin Lannister," she said quietly, and Margaery snorted.

"Public embarrassment is worth a lot to Tywin Lannister, and I think he has finally reached the end of his patience, where Joffrey is concerned."

Sansa gave her a long look. "Is it true?" she asked quietly. "Could we...finally be safe from Joffrey's vindictiveness, at least for a while?"

Margaery swallowed hard, remembering Joffrey’s anger earlier when he had returned to her after his meeting with Lord Tywin, how he had thrown several chairs against the wall while Margaery calmly sipped her wine, reminding herself that to react would be to show herself a prey for the wicked boy.

She had still wondered, though, if he might turn his anger upon her when he was done. If he might hurt her for the sake of it, and in a way that she would not be able to bring herself to enjoy.

Was it wrong of her, that her first thought was to whether or not it would frighten Sansa away, to see those marks on her as Margaery had seen them on Sansa, not so long ago? Old now, but still too frighteningly there.

She didn't want anything to frighten Sansa away, and she was willing to do whatever it took to ensure that it did not.

She had worried, at first that his anger might be because he had somehow found out about what she and Sansa had done, that Tyrion Lannister’s maid had passed along the information, impossible though it would have been for her to have done so so quickly.

Margaery had not liked to admit that she was panicking, in that moment.

It was impossible, of course; she knew that the sweetsleep she had poured into his wine the night before had done its job, and he should not have woken until after she had already left Sansa's chambers and gone to sew with some of the Lannister women, for an alibi.

She was fortunate that the gods had not seen fit to present her with a smarter husband.

Renly hadn't been very smart, either, but he'd been a full maester compared to Joffrey, and sometimes Margaery found herself missing the simplicity of being Renly's wife, who never wanted to fuck her because he was fucking her brother and who didn't know the first thing about being a king beyond looking fine while he pretended.

But that wasn’t what Joffrey had been angry about, as it had turned out.

Tywin had forbidden the King from being alone with his wife, among other things.

She was almost touched, and grateful for the relief, even if she could not help but think that the great game master had not quite thought this through. She was the only one who could keep a handle on Joffrey, as had been so clearly shown before her arrival here.

If they pulled her away now, there was no telling what he might do, and surely Tywin was not so prideful that he did not realize that.

Her lord father already asked her once a week about her moon's blood, growing desperate now, it seemed, for his daughter to be filled with the king's son.

She smiled down at Sansa, wondered if her expression looked forced. “For now,” she whispered, and kissed Sansa again.

Although Jaime Lannister was gone now, no longer the protector for Sansa that Margaery had been depending upon, at the very least Tywin had ensured that he had taken Joffrey’s favorite Kingsguard with him.

Margaery remembered one of her ladies mentioning that when they'd gotten her ready for supper, relieved, but had not realized it was a punishment against Joffrey.

Ser Jaime had left King's Landing just that morning, to meet with the men of the Reach under her brother who were setting off to deal with the Iron Islands. It had been a rather abrupt departure, but she understood that Brienne of Tarth had gone with him, along with half a dozen gold cloaks and Ser Meryn Trant.

She was not unhappy to see Ser Meryn go, even if she was rather infuriated that her new ally in protecting Sansa was gone, for the gods knew how long.

She just wondered how long it would last, this fragile peace that Tywin Lannister had bought for them by disciplining his grandson.

As she glanced down at Sansa once more, staring up at her with wide, doe-like eyes, cheeks flushed, mouth parted sensuously, Margaery decided that it didn’t matter.

So long as she took advantage of that peace for as much as she could, now.

She moved her hips down to brush against Sansa’s thighs as her mouth traced its way down Sansa’s beautiful, pale body.

And Margaery wondered if this time, she might make Sansa scream into the pillows, where only Margaery could hear her.


	92. SANSA LIV

It was another day for the king's subjects to come before him with their grievances, an activity which Joffrey took most seriously out of all of his duties, or perhaps the only duty which he took seriously.

Sansa had been avoiding them for a long time now, ever since she had seen how Margaery playacted here, pretended to be so pleased every time Joffrey pronounced his cruelties on some poor soul.

But her lord husband had hinted that perhaps this one was one Sansa would want to see, though he said nothing further on the matter and still seemed quite certain that she wanted nothing more than to stab him in his sleep.

He had returned to the sofa again, as uncomfortable as it must have been for him to sleep on, and left her to the bed last night.

In truth, Sansa did not overmuch mind. Those first few nights of their marriage when they had shared a bed, she had been terrified that he would roll over and take his want of her, but she knew he would not, now, however much he was annoyed by her friendship with Margaery.

And besides, the last few days that she had spent in Margaery's bed had...certainly cooled her anger toward her lord husband, even if it had also reminded her that he was essentially as powerless here as she had suspected, not even able to keep his wife from what she wanted, much less Joffrey.

For the first time in a long time, she was glad of Tywin Lannister's protection.

Still, Tyrion's words to her, that whatever it was happening in the throne room, it was something she would want to see, had caused her heart to leap into her throat as she worried over what that might mean.

Arya had been found. Jon's head had been brought from the Wall. Winterfell had been burned to the ground because she had yet to give the Lannisters a son to claim it.

And so she was not at all prepared for the sight which greeted her when her lord husband escorted her into the throne room.

Was not at all prepared to see Lord Tywin taking his seat on the Iron Throne, and hearing the peoples' grievances.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat, and she glanced over at her lord husband incredulously, only to find him smirking at her. Clearly, he had known that this was what they were going to find.

She was almost tempted to be angry with him, for raising what were clearly her unfounded fears, but she found that she was too amused to do so.

Much as she hated the Lannisters for everything they had done to her, had done to her family, it was amusing indeed to watch them turn against Joffrey for her sake, though she had no doubt Lord Tywin had done it for more than that.

After all, there were very few people allowed to sit in the king's chair, uncomfortable though it looked.

"Is the king sick?" Sansa asked rather loudly, turning back to Tyrion.

He snorted at her inelegance, as he always did. She was glad he was finding this as amusing as she. "No, my lady. The King is not sick."

Sansa hummed in the back of her throat. "Then where is he?"

Her husband shrugged. "I do believe he is nearby, my lady. The Hand has forbidden him from leaving the Keep for his own protection, so I doubt there shall be any more hunting excursions for some time."

Sansa snorted, wandered away from her lord husband and the almost boring issues being brought to Lord Tywin's attention, when they did not have the dramatic ends that Joffrey's decisions always met.

Wandered past nobles who looked at her as they always had; something beneath their shoes that they should not acknowledge, for fear or bringing the wrath of the Lannisters for daring to befriend her.

Margaery and Lord Baelish had been the only two, besides Tyrion and Shae out of necessity, who had ever bothered to look past that, who had ever disregarded the whispering words of those who would disapprove of their offers of friendship.

Lord Baelish was in the Eyrie now, with her lady aunt, and Margaery...well, Sansa did not think what now occurred between the two of them could be called 'friendship' in anything but the loosest sense.

And she could not find Margaery anywhere, but Sansa did find Joffrey, in one of the outer audience halls, two of his Kingsguard flanking him, and looking rather annoyed at the world.

Margaery was not with her lord husband, though Sansa did not have to wonder at why, after what Margaery had told her. If Lord Tywin had engineered a way for king and queen to stay apart without it looking like the queen's doing, Sansa did not think she would have passed up such an opportunity, either.

There were, however, a few dozen courtiers in this room, those who had sought out their king the moment they realized Lord Tywin was not taking over his duties because he was in any way ill, at least not any more so than he ever was, and Sansa found herself heavily aware of all of their eyes as she moved forward to make her required greetings to the king.

"Your Grace," Sansa curtseyed, and Joffrey eyed her, a look of malice there that Sansa did not like, though, to her surprise, he said only,

"My lady aunt," and nodded to her, once, curtly. Docile as a kitten, for all that the smouldering in his eyes promised more.

Sansa blinked at him, swallowed rather nervously, even as her lord husband reached up and took her arm, appearing out of nowhere and securing it rather firmly in her own.

"Your Grace," Tyrion said coldly, and then started to turn away, dragging Sansa along with her.

But Sansa's brow furrowed, as she thought about what Margaery had told her, that Joffrey would not be bothering them again for the foreseeable future. What Tyrion had told her, that Tywin Lannister would not allow it.

And she carefully extricated her arm from Tyrion's reach, turned around to smile waspishly at her king.

"Your Grace," she said, ignoring Tyrion's hissed, "Sansa," from behind her.

Joffrey glanced up, eyebrows raising. "Lady Aunt," he repeated, sounding rather annoyed at her continued presence, this time.

Sansa smiled too sweetly, curtseyed, glanced around. "Your Grace," she repeated, "You are not sitting on the Iron Throne."

Joffrey blinked at her. "No," he said, eyes narrowing. "I do not have to sit on it every day for it to remain mine, Lady Aunt."

That got laughter from the courtiers now crowding about them, and Sansa's smile grew, even as she felt Lord Tyrion's large hand close around her own behind her.

"But I understand that today is the day when the smallfolk and others bring their issues before the King," Sansa continued innocently. "And yet you are here, and the Lord Hand sits on the Iron Throne."

"Sansa," she heard Tyrion hiss behind her, worry coloring his voice.

Joffrey gaped at her for a moment, eyes wide enough to see the whites of them, and Sansa found herself wondering when had been the last time she had seen Joffrey close enough to see the whites of his eyes.

And then he raised his arm, and Tyrion fell silent behind her as it lifted to backhand her, as Sansa lifted her chin and waited for the blow to strike.

But it never did.

Sansa waited, forcing herself not to flinch, not to give him the satisfaction, watched as Tyrion came astride with her with a murderous look in his mismatched eyes, and Joffrey lowered his arm, swallowing hard.

Sansa released a breath she hadn't known she was holding as Joffrey stepped back, arm lowered to his side now, held there as if he was afraid he might lose it if he lifted it altogether.

There was still anger in Joffrey's cold eyes now, but he was tempering it now, much to Sansa's delight.

"You are mistaken, Lady Sansa," Joffrey said stiffly.

Sansa knew she should keep quiet. Instead, she raised one brow, as delicately as Cersei, and asked primly, "Oh?"

Beside her, she thought she heard Tyrion make a strangled noise.

"Lord Tywin is continuing the interests of the Crown, so that his king may deal with...matters he deems more important," Joffrey wheedled, and Sansa bit the inside of her cheek.

"And what matters would those be, my lord?" she asked, because Sansa Stark felt heady in this moment. Joffrey could not even hit her. Not here, in front of so many people who were loyal to the Lannisters.

She bit back a hysterical laugh.

Joffrey glared at her.

And that was when Tyrion took Sansa's arm again. "Your Grace, my wife is very tired after the night of...pleasure we had last night," he said, rather loudly.

Joffrey eyed the two of them, glanced around at the many people watching.

Those people would not soon forget this, Sansa knew. And nor would Joffrey, for she knew how he hated to be made to look weak, hated to mocked.

And, King of Westeros or not, in this moment, he could do nothing about it, and Sansa was the one holding that power over him.

And while Sansa knew that she should be more careful, knew that she should not engage in this when it would only ever cost her, she was not above claiming her victory, in this moment.

She could not remember the last time she had been granted one, and she would claim it with both hands, if she had to.

Knowing that, while Joffrey would no doubt storm off in a huff, angered but incapable of doing anything about it, Sansa would leave this audience chamber to find Margaery in the Maidenvault, would let Margaery fuck her, firm in the knowledge that Tywin Lannister was not allowing his grandson to do so.

And while a part of her felt guilty to even be thinking about Margaery in terms of a trophy to be won, to be fought over between her and Joffrey in a war Joffrey did not even know he was fighting, it was a very small part, in this moment.

Because Sansa had known Joffrey's cruelties long before she had ever laid eyes on Margaery, and now she had finally could do something about them, even if it was only a small thing, bourne of a lady's courtesies and wit, ever so important.

"Of course," Joffrey muttered, sounding petulant. "But you should teach your wife her place, all the same."

Tyrion nodded. "She will learn it," he agreed, and it sounded like more of a threat than a promise, though Sansa could not say whether the threat was for her, or Joffrey.

And then Tyrion was leading her from the room, arm wrapped in hers and eying her like he wasn't quite sure if he should reprimand her or congratulate her, and Sansa felt very much like a queen.

And she could not deny that she enjoyed the feeling very much, whatever it might eventually cost her.


	93. SANSA LV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SMUT. SHORT AND SWEET.

"My gods, Sansa, I heard what you said to Joffrey from half a dozen different courtiers," Margaery said, in lieu of a greeting, when Sansa answered her summons to share supper together, yanking her into the room and glancing about into the empty corridor behind Sansa nervously.

Sansa was still feeling rather heady from the memory herself, and she could not withhold a small grin at the reminder.

Margaery frowned at her, gripping Sansa by the elbows and looking very near to shaking her. "You came dangerously close to setting him off, I heard."

Sansa shrugged, rather more moved by the fact that Margaery was so clearly worried. "He couldn't do anything about it," she told Margaery. "And I..." she shivered. "I couldn't help myself."

Margaery looked at her for a long moment, and then smiled sadly. "Oh, Sansa," she murmured, pulling Sansa into a soft, delicate kiss, quite unlike anything they had done recently.

Sansa moaned into the touch, into the soft, warm, safe feeling of Margaery and wondered if she could avoid a lecture by seeing the other girl come undone before her.

With gentle fingers, she turned Margaery around when they had both pulled back, reached for the delicate white ties of the other girl's evening gown, a plain, golden and white gown that covered her far more fully than most of the gowns Margaery wore.

It made Sansa feel claustrophobic, just looking at it, and her fingers moved faster, ignoring the amused sounds coming from Margaery as Sansa's lips moved to her shoulders, gently sucking.

"You mustn't do it again," Margaery was saying, through the haze that Sansa felt. "Tywin Lannister may be able to stave Joffrey off for now, but there's no telling how long that will last."

Sansa hummed.

She didn't intend to do it again. While the feeling she'd gotten, mocking Joffrey like a small child, had been heady, she also knew how dangerous it had been. Knew that she had done nothing like this since she had been betrothed to Joffrey, and he'd been forced to keep her face pretty out of sheer necessity, as his future wife.

No, it was not something she would dare to do again, but she would not regret it, in this moment.

She bit down on Margaery's shoulder, and the other girl let out a cry that started its life as pained surprise and morphed slowly into something else as Sansa lapped at the firm, slowly beating veins of Margaery's neck with her tongue.

Gods, Sansa wanted to hear Margaery make that sound a dozen times over. She didn't think she would ever grow tired of it.

"Sansa," Margaery moaned, turning around to face her, gaze insistent.

Sansa sighed, nodded. "I won't," she promised, meeting Margaery's eyes, and, after a moment, Margaery nodded, bent forward and kissed her.

Kissing Margaery would never be a sensation that Sansa would tire of. Her thick, puffy lips, gentle as always when they maneuvered open Sansa's, her tongue as it licked the inner walls of Sansa's mouth and made her imagine Margaery licking the inner walls of another part of her, ever single time since the first, the feel of her pointy teeth as they dragged along Sansa's lower lip.

She wrapped her arms around Margaery's back, pulled the other girl closer and sank her claws into Margaery's warm, naked skin, clutching as if letting go might kill her.

For a moment, she thought of Dorne, and wondered if it might.

And then Margaery was dragging her backwards, onto the bed, with sure, quick steps, before they both collapses onto it, Margaery pawing at the rest of Sansa's clothes until they were nothing but a small, uncomfortable heap below her, and Sansa kept kissing her, kissing every part of her that she could reach.

She remembered her mother telling her once that one did not need passion in a marriage, after she had informed Catelyn rather primly that Theon had told her otherwise. Theon had gotten rather a sound tongue-lashing, for whatever it was he had said, which hadn't been for Sansa's young ears at the time, but it had been Sansa notice things, after that.

While she knew her mother and father loved each other, there wasn't passion in their marriage, not like what Theon had described to her, and not like how she felt for Margaery, just now.

She didn't think she could bear standing beside Tyrion as his passionless wife for the rest of her life, not after tasting this.

When Margaery released her and Sansa came up for air once more, she was panting, her face flushed, thighs soaked.

Gods, she wanted.

"It's strange though," Sansa said quietly, to distract herself from a want her septa had once warned could consume young girls to their detriment, and Margaery blinked languidly up at her.

"What is?"

"Lord Tywin. He seems...too invested in protecting me now, where he never cared before."

Margaery's expression softened. "Perhaps he has finally seen sense, though I hesitate to ascribe such a power to Joffrey, of all people."

Seen sense, because Joffrey had nearly raped her.

Sansa swallowed. "Lord Tywin said something strange to me, when Ser Jaime took me to his offices," she told Margaery. "Something I still don't understand. He all but implied that once there had been 'another woman of a noble house'," Sansa said quietly. "But I don't think Joffrey-"

Margaery shook her head. "He's only ever wanted you besides me, Sansa," she said softly. "There've been whores, but...he doesn't use them for that, anyway."

A haunted look entered her eyes, and Sansa wondered what he did use the whores for, decided she didn't want to know, if it caused Margaery to look like that.

Sansa nodded, for that was what she had thought. "Then what was he referring to-"

"I don't want to talk about Tywin Lannister," Margaery said petulantly, leaning up to lick a stripe down her cheek. "I'd much rather talk about you."

Sansa wondered if that was an avoidance, or if Margaery really didn't know and didn't care, but she allowed the distraction, allowed Margaery to reach out and pull Sansa down into her lap, allowed Margaery to manipulate her body until they were straddling one another, thighs pressing tight together.

Sansa swallowed hard, reached out to caress one of Margaery's breasts, rubbed her thumb over Margaery's nipple until it grew hard beneath her, bent down and pulled it into her mouth.

It was the first time she had done so, and it was a strange sensation, her tongue pressing against Margaery's nipple in much the same way a young child sucked at their mother, but then Margaery threw her head back and moaned, and Sansa thought the sensation worth it.

She lapped at Margaery's left nipple, then her right, enjoyed the sounds Margaery made underneath her, the squirming and the need in her eyes as she finally grabbed Sansa and pulled her into another kiss.


	94. MARGAERY XXIX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of this dialogue of this chapter stolen directly from 5x3. However, in this story, the Sparrows did not drag the High Septon through the city naked for going to one of Littlefinger's brothels, and he is merely reacting to their popularity amongst the smallfolk.

"If anyone touches my lady, Ser Loras, I want them killed in the most painful way you can imagine," Joffrey told her brother, laying a hand on the man's arm.

Margaery watched as her brother went rather stiff, nodded. Wondered if Joffrey was truly such a fool as not to see the irony in such a statement. "I will not hesitate, Your Grace."

Joffrey smirked. "Good." He glanced between the two of them. "Good."

She wondered if he was thinking that perhaps Margaery and Loras were similar in their bloodlust. Margaery glanced at her brother's stony expression. Perhaps they were.

Margaery smiled. "I'm sure I shall be quite safe, my love. These are...deeply religious people."

She knew that Lord Tywin had forbidden Joffrey from leaving the Keep, while she was free to roam the city to her heart's content, and that this restriction annoyed him, even as she knew he would likely not have gone with her, even if he could.

For all Joffrey's boasting, he was hardly more than a coward when things came down to it, as he had proved with Lord Tywin.

Margaery only needed to pretend Lord Tywin had not drawn blood when he proved Joffrey's cowardice, only needed to pretend she was not scenting it even now.

But she had made this promise to see to this strange religious fanatic some time ago, and apparently, all of the arrangements for a meeting had finally been finished; she wondered what had taken so long, especially when they were supposedly taking this Sparrow by surprise, with her arrival.

And she had brought along her purse, as well as instruct her ladies to bring theirs', for charity to the smallkfolk they would no doubt come across, though she wished that Sansa could have been among them. She knew Lord Tywin would have forbidden that before she'd even asked, however.

As much as he did not want sympathy getting to the girl at the idea of the King raping her, he also didn't want the smallfolk remembering the Northern girl whom Joffrey had thrust aside.

Margaery sighed, turning to Elinor who stood beside her, then to Megga and Alla.

"Ready?" she asked them, and they nodded, though she noticed that Megga looked a bit nervous.

Margaery abruptly remembered the day they had set out from Highgarden together, a group of gaggling girls escorting Margaery to the war camps after her hasty but beautiful marriage ceremony with the handsome Renly Baratheon.

There had been no time for a bedding ceremony, Renly had claimed, and Margaery hadn't much minded even when Alla caught Loras sneaking into Renly's chambers on the very same night. They had giggled about it for hours, these girls, until Margaery's mother had found them, in the early hours of the morning, and sent them away with a tongue-lashing that was hardly up to Olenna Tyrell's standards, and which had hardly had the same affect.

Her ladies seemed so much older now, for all that most of them were still very much children. The days of giggling and running through Highgarden to sneak a glance at Margaery's husband and Margaery's brother before the septas caught them were long behind them.

Margaery had explained to them that this was something the Crown was worried about, that they were likely in no danger but did not need to come if they were afraid.

Her cousins had not liked to hear that, as she had suspected, and were all of course here with her. Her ladies were good, like that.

They walked out surrounded by Ser Loras and Ser Boros and half a dozen green cloaks, and Margaery did her best to smile and wave at everyone she came across, as she always did, as she had done when the Tyrells had paraded through the city after the victory of Blackwater.

And as the smallfolk screamed out her name, called out to "Good Queen Margaery," she almost forgot that there was a king at all, who had given her this position and who, with his madness, could take it away again at a moment's notice.

They loved her.

"Alla," Margaery called, reaching out and taking her lady's hand, "Go and pass out some coin, over there."

Alla did not need to be told twice, pulling out her silken purse and gliding past the Tyrell guards, smiling brightly at the people before her as they clamored for her coin, pressing a single golden piece into each waiting hand and murmuring of Queen Margaery's sympathies.

Beside Margaery, Elinor moved forward to do the same, Ser Alyn materializing so suddenly at her arm that Margaery had to hide a smile behind her next wave to the smallfolk.

"Thank you, thank you!"

The steps of the Red Keep disappeared swiftly as they moved through the crowd, through the wealthier streets of King's Landing that visiting nobles saw and further, to where the cobblestones became more uneven and the people's faces more drawn, further still to that fetid place known as Flea Bottom.

Margaery had been here before, of course. Had come here often since arriving in King's Landing, for she had taken on a patronage of the first orphanage she had come here to, so long ago when Joffrey had seemed so surprised by her interest in charitable works.

Margaery knew that Sansa had never shared that interest as she had, did not see the true purpose in it, and also that the Lannisters would never allow the other girl to go to Flea Bottom again, but Margaery wished she could have brought her here.

Today, she passed that orphanage, the street cluttered with smallfolk come out to see their young queen as she walked passed, reminding herself to ask after the orphanage as soon as she had returned to the Keep.

Well, perhaps not as soon as.

But the smallfolk knew where she was going as well as Margaery, for this meeting had been one the Lannisters had carefully arranged, wanting to ensure it was on a cooler day to keep the streets from roiling in chaos, and on a day of rest, where the sparrows would no doubt be helping the poor.

Margaery wondered what it was about charity that so frightened the Lannisters, frightened the Faith.

She had almost given up on the prospect of being sent out to speak with these Sparrows, as it had been so long ago and she'd admittedly been...distracted, with other things.

And then the High Septon had blustered into the throne room yesterday, ripping at his ceremonial robes in his rage, claiming that the very pillar of the Faith was being desecrated by the crown's inaction against these "terror-inducing practitioners of sedition," even if he could no more describe why than Joffrey could give him an answer for this without looking to Lord Tywin.

Joffrey did always hate to be accused of things, Margaery had noticed, and so Margaery had been sent out on her mission of mercy, her guard duty doubled to account for the High Septon's words.

"My lady," Alla was suddenly at Margaery's side once more. Margaery glanced at the other girl; saw her discreet nod toward the small knob of people blocking their way along this particular road.

It did not look necessarily violent, this group, but Margaery noticed her guards standing on edge, all the same.

"The Sparrows?" she asked Alla, and the other girl nodded, lips tightening. Her walking alongside the crowd had helped in that regard, after all.

"Yes, my lady," she murmured, and Margaery nodded.

"Right." She gestured to Ser Boros. "Take us through the crowd, please," she told him, and, after giving her a narrow look, Ser Boros turned to do just that.

It did not take long to move through this growing crowd, for most of the bulk of it appeared to be people sitting down, clutching at bowls full of soup or injured body parts that it made Margaery wince to see, out in the cold light of day.

And, in the middle of this strange group, stood a few young men with those strange insignias carved into their foreheads, circled protectively around an old man who knelt before a young boy, holding a bowl out to him.

Margaery's brow furrowed, for these were no doubt the Sparrows she had been warned of, but they hardly looked threatening to her, for all of the High Septon's blustering.

"Thank you for the soup," the boy now holding the bowl whispered, and the old man kneeling before him touched him on the head, as if bestowing a blessing.

Margaery waited until he stood to achy feet and moved away before approaching the blind young boy, smiling at him before realizing that her smile was rather pointless.

His too white, sightless eyes stared up at her as she knelt where the old man had just a moment ago stood, his young protectors and himself gone on.

"Excuse me," she said to the blind boy, ignoring Megga's gasps of dismay at the fact that Margaery had gone and ruined another gown, "I understand that this is the domain of the Sparrows. I wonder if you could tell me where I might find the High Sparrow?"

The little boy blinked at her, gaze unnerving for all that it wasn't there, before he took a sip of his soup and pointed after the old man who had just been attending him.

Margaery frowned. "Thank you," she murmured, and then accepted Megga's hand to pull her to her feet, following after this strange old man with renewed curiosity.

And she did not have to go far to find him, for he had stopped by the side of an old crone sitting in the middle of the square not several paces away.

"Your Grace," the old man said, staring at her in surprise when he noticed her, his young guards doing the noticing first, but he motioned to his guard of young men as if telling them to stand down, and that was Margaery's first warning, she supposed.

That they would attack a queen or not do so on the say-so of this odd old man.

Margaery smiled sweetly. "The young man back there," she nodded to the blind boy still slurping his soup behind them, "Said that I might find the High Sparrow back here. Would you mind telling me where he is?"

The old man chuckled. "High Sparrow. Sounds a bit ridiculous, doesn't it? Like Lord Duckling, or King Turtle." He shrugged. "So it's meant to. We're often stuck with the names our enemies give us."

Margaery's face blanched. "My apologies, I did not realize that the name was not of your own choosing."

He waved a hand. "It is no matter. The notion that we are all equal in the eyes of the Seven doesn't sit well with some so they belittle me."

A woman stepped forward, pressing a cloth into the Sparrow's hands. "Seven blessings to you," she whispered gratefully, and he sent her a smile.

"Seven blessings to you, my dear." He smiled up at Margaery as the woman walked away. "It's only a name, and quite an easy burden to bear. Far easier than hers."

Margaery swallowed. "The poor and downtrodden are never far from my heart," she told him quietly. "If there is anything you need, I am sure that the Crown can help you to provide it."

The High Sparrow blinked at her, and Margaery found her eyes traveling to his feet. "Perhaps, some shoes."

He smiled thinly. "I gave them away to someone who needed them more. We all do that. It stops us from forgetting who we really are."

Margaery raised a brow, fishing, for she realized that he had as yet told her nothing. "Is that why you came to King's Landing? To remind everyone?"

He chuckled. "Everyone? I have a hard time reminding myself." Margaery laughed lightly at those words, and he seemed encouraged to continue. "Well, I tell them no one's special. They think I'm special for telling them so. Perhaps they're right."

She smiled. "I would very much like to believe that, as the gods intended. Did they send you here to tell all of King's Landing that?"

He smiled. "I did not come here to tempt you from your sacred duties as Queen, Your Grace. I'd assumed you'd only come here to arrest me. Is that not the case? I understand that the High Septon finds me...seditious." He chuckled, on that last word, and Margaery almost chuckled with him, before she remembered herself.

She swallowed. "It was a rather horrid thing for the Court to hear of, I'm afraid, that someone has been inciting questions in the town, doing charity. The High Septon all but convinced them that you are a traitor, plotting to bring down the realm and drag the people from the Faith of the Seven. But I look around and see only a kind man doing charitable works. You can imagine my confusion."

He snorted. "Hypocrisy is a boil. Lancing a boil is never pleasant, and I have found those members of the Faith who reside in the Sept of Baelor to be the highest of hypocrites. But I assure you, I seek only to help those in need, like I once was."

Margaery hummed in response. She was not fooled by his fool old man's perception; this could man spar words with her grandmother, she was sure.

"The High Septon came to speak with my husband today. He wanted the King to execute you for, as he said it, leading the people astray. Joffrey laughed and sent him back to his Sept, for we heard no real charge against you save that you have managed to pacify the smallfolk."

The High Sparrow squinted at her. "I wouldn't presume to know your thoughts on the matter."

Margaery blinked, wondered when had been the last time a man had asked her that. "My thoughts on the matter align with your own. The High Septon's behavior is...corrosive, as is his attitude to the gods. Having a man like that residing in the Sept eats away at our Faith from the inside." She shook her head. "And is it not the Mother who asks us to give to those in need?"

"And yet, in the Sept he remains," the High Sparrow said quietly.

Margaery lifted her eyes to meet his, frowned to show her own displeasure. "The King was not convinced to call for your head because he was annoyed that the High Septon wasted his time, but I am afraid he will take little more interest in the matter, when so many important matters dealing with the safety of the kingdom must be addressed. And though you are not alone in your dislike of our High Septon's ways, he has done no wrong which can truly condemn him."

Joffrey had been annoyed, she knew. Annoyed because, even if he had wanted to, there would have been nothing Joffrey would have been able to do about these Sparrows. Tywin, on the other hand, did not seem to care one way or another, save that Margaery had the feeling he would gladly send in the gold cloaks to slaughter all of these sparrows, if he thought them a true threat, and not merely a threat to a wheedling, power-hungry old man.

Margaery would spare these sparrows from that, if she could, for all that she did not understand this old man's game.

He gave her a long, knowing look. "The Faith and the Crown are the two pillars that hold up this world. If one collapses, so does the other. We must do everything necessary to protect one another, Your Grace. The High Septon's corruption must be dealt with."

Margaery smiled, pretended that his referring to himself as the Faith itself did not give her chills, as well as his call for "dealing with" the High Septon.

"I could not agree more, but I fear that there is very little I can do, beyond providing any clothing and food that these people might need from the Keep," she said, gesturing to the people sitting around them. "I may be a queen, but you are right when you say that none of us is any more special than the other."

The High Sparrow smiled. "That is most gracious, Your Grace. It is always good to see that not all of those for whom the gods have smiled so brightly truly believe themselves above the rest of us."

Margaery raised a brow, but never got the chance to respond.

Never got a chance to respond, because the blind boy who not moments ago had smiled at her voice leapt through the gathering crowd suddenly, pushing past her guards, who let him go for all that he was still of a tender age and blind, and threw himself at her.

Margaery gasped, had no moment's warning before she found herself on her back on the cobblestones, wincing at the sensation of her bones grinding against them, of her head smacking against stone and mud, as the little boy's hands found her throat and squeezed with a strength that she would not have thought him capable of.

The world blurred around the edges, black spots peppering at her vision, and Margaery gasped for air that wouldn't come as a thumb jerked into the front of her throat and made her gag.

The sensation of choking did not last long; for all that it brought tears to her throat and made her ears ring.

"Your Grace!" she heard Alla cry, and then Alla was at her side, pulling Margaery against her. Margaery could taste the salt from Alla's frightened tears.

She pulled away, gave Alla and her other ladies and the people watching - so many people - a weak smile.

"I am well," she whispered, glancing down at the attacker that Loras had pinned to the cobblestones on his back, Loras' hand holding his head down as the boy thrashed and panted beneath him.

"Loras!" she cried, but her brother did not seem to hear her, did not seem to care if he had, as he gave the boy a hard shake that set his bones rattling until the boy cried out in pain, reached up to cover his head.

"Loras, stop. He's just a boy."

Loras glanced up at her, expression hard in a way Margaery had never seen it. In a way that frightened her. His knife grip on the boy did not loosen.

Beneath him, the boy had stopped making noise, merely breathed wheezily through his nose.

"He tried to kill you," he told her, and Margaery glanced around, saw the darkening eyes of the smallfolk, the Tyrell guards closing in a semi circle around them.

"He did not truly hurt me." She paused, glanced at the High Sparrow, and continued, "Thanks be to the Seven."

The High Sparrow's eyes were wide, and he glanced between Margaery and the young man currently under Loras' knife point with an almost helpless look.

The boy looked hardly older than Megga, face smeared with dirt, eyes wide as he panted and struggled under Loras' blade, but his glare was all for Margaery.

"Why did he attack me?" Margaery gasped out, as the sparrow writhed and twisted in Loras' grip, for all that her brother did not sacrifice him an inch, knife coming out of his belt to press into the groove of the man's chest.

The boy glared at her again, fire in his eyes, and then spat a glob of spit and blood in her direction, sneering.

Margaery leapt back to avoid it landing on her dress, squeezed Alla's hand when the other girl cried out.

"Ah, you must forgive him, Your Grace, Ser Loras," the High Sparrow said, stepping forward in that moment, hands folded neatly in front of him as he watched Loras' knife tremble where it lay against the sparrow's throat.

Margaery was quite certain she must do nothing of the sort.

"His father was killed in the Battle of Blackwater. He has prayed to the gods since to remove the burden of grief he feels before it consumes him. But we all struggle. The Mother must give him her mercy, that his grief can be put to a use for the Seven."

Pretty words, Margaery thought idly, but they would not appease her brother, who had no love of men who dared lay a hand on his sister and less love for the Seven who declared that the way he felt for Renly was wrong.

"We did not orchestrate that battle," Loras hissed at the writhing man, knife digging deeply enough to draw blood, and Margaery tried not to wince and suspected she failed. "Had we not been there, you might have died alongside your father."

The would-be assassin twisted in his arms, swore at him most foully, but his eyes, cold and angry, did not leave Margaery, and she shivered at the look he was giving her, all too familiar to her eyes.

Felt a phantom spurt of blood dripping down between her thighs, and she clasped her hands together before anyone saw them shaking.

"Wise words, Ser Loras," the High Sparrow agreed. "So you can see that this boy is merely confused."

Loras grunted, and Margaery saw the darkness return to his eyes, the darkness that had been there for too long, now.

"He attacked his queen," Loras said lowly. "The Father would not forgive him for that, would he, priest?"

The High Sparrow sighed. "I am not a priest, Ser Loras, but I urge you to consider-"

Margaery did not hear the rest of what he said, saw only the smallfolk gathered around them, inching closer with the tension filling the air, saw Loras' fellow Kingsguard, their hands on the pommels of their swords.

"Loras," she murmured, in as diplomatic a voice as she might manage without her brother thinking she was patronizing him.

Her brother glanced up at her, met her eyes, and then his pretty eyes roved down to her neck, and Margaery closed hers.

He was looking at the mark Sansa had given Margaery just that morning, the one burning into her throat that looked like it might have been done with something more than the gentle touch of a lover's mouth, and she knew he was remembering the days when Joffrey had paraded her before his people, wounded by the flat of his sword.

The knife plunged into the assassin’s chest, pushing through skin and bone like butter, and the boy managed only a gurgling scream before Loras pushed it further and Margaery watched the pointy end emerge from behind the blind boy's back, shivered at the sight of him, shaking out his last in Loras' arms.

Margaery glanced away at the last moment, as the boy's gurgled breaths slowed, grimacing.

And then Loras dropped her attacker to the ground, the knife sliding out as quickly as it had gone in, watched dispassionately as the sparrow convulsed on the cobblestones, blood dripping out of the corner of his mouth.

Loras wiped his blade on his Kingsguard cloak, and tucked it back into its sheath, reached out his gloved hand for Margaery's a moment later.

Margaery stepped forward nimbly, took it, conscious of the eyes of everyone around them watching her movements.

She had been the charitable queen whom everyone loved a moment before. Now, they feared her as they feared Cersei, knew that she valued their lives below her own.

Margaery swallowed, saw several of the smallfolk's expressions, anger and fear and injustice radiating across their faces, smelled the blood of the man who attacked her, and knew that if she did not act precipitously, there would be more where it came from.

Her Kingsguard were close enough that if a fight broke out, a riot like what had happened to Joffrey and Cersei in Flea Bottom, she could be reasonably sure of their protection in a return journey to the Keep, but, while the smallfolk were not allowed to carry weapons, she doubted that would stop them.

One of their own, a grieving boy, had just been killed, after all.

She looked at them, and saw the smiling faces from moments ago, when Margaery had passed out the coin from her purse and been the "good queen."

She saw their salivating faces, their angry eyes, and swallowed hard, squeezed the crook of his elbow. He glanced down at her, stormy eyes meeting her fearful ones for a moment, before he dipped his head.

"I think perhaps we ought to return to the Keep," Margaery told the High Sparrow, turning to him with an apologetic smile. "We have only caused further discord here and pain where I meant to cause help to those so desperately in need of it, and I apologize for it. As recompense, I will ensure that the Crown sends your people bread and meats."

The High Sparrow blinked at her, raised a hand as if to quell the rising tempers of their observers. "Your Kingsguard was correct, in his need to protect you," he told her, eyes gentle, too kind to be trusted. "We must understand - you are the Queen, and his duty to you was admirable."

Margaery swallowed, dipped into a shallow curtsey as her white fingers dug into Loras' arm so sharply she thought she saw him wince.

Perhaps she had been wrong, to wonder why the Lannisters feared charity so.

It only worked for the purpose it was put to, after all, if one controlled where it was coming from, and Margaery had lost this crowd so easily to an old man without shoes who had promised soup.


	95. SANSA LVI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Margaery gets her damn orgasm, too.

Joffrey was incensed with the knowledge that some child had attempted to kill his lady, had thrown a fit of particularly great proportions before Lord Tywin had asked the King to spend some time with him behind the closed doors of the King's chambers.

Margaery had not five minutes later appeared outside of Sansa's door, apparently cognizant that Tyrion had gone off to deal with Prince Oberyn Martell on some matter or another, and Shae, as she seemed to be doing quite often these days, was nowhere to be found, and having gotten rid of a self-reproaching Ser Loras in the mean time.

The door slid shut behind her, and Sansa did not waste another moment, reaching out and pulling Margaery into her arms.

"Oh gods, Margaery, I was so worried when I heard what happened," Sansa said, kissing up and down her neck, and Margaery chuckled lowly.

"I'm fine, Sansa," she murmured, not that she didn't appreciate the treatment.

Sansa pouted beautifully. "They said Ser Loras...killed a man trying to attack you."

Margaery shrugged, tried to sound flippant and not think of the child's gurgling breaths when Loras had plunged his knife through the boy's chest. "I wasn't in any real danger then, was I?"

Sansa swatted at her arm. "You could have been killed," she whispered, and watched as Margaery's throat spasmed in a way that looked almost nervous.

"I wasn't," she said, and it sounded like a promise. And Sansa could contain herself no longer.

She moved forward, pressed her lips to Margaery's in a kiss that was softer than any it seemed they had shared in some time, and then she reached out, pulling on Margaery's shoulders, guiding her toward the bed.

Sansa turned, slipped down onto the bed beside Margaery, kissed her again as she reached up to slip Margaery's sleeve down her arm.

Margaery pulled away for a moment, letting out an exaggerated sigh as she divested herself of the top half of her gown, pushing it down around her waist and letting her pert nipples touch the air.

Sansa sucked in a breath at the sight of them, unsure if she would ever get used to seeing how beautiful Margaery was without her clothes. She glanced up, kissed Margaery again as she reached out to rub a nipple between thumb and forefinger.

Margaery gasped into Sansa's mouth at the sensation, and then her own hands were roving down Sansa's form, clutching her through the thin pink, threadbare gown Sansa wore.

Sansa for a moment felt self-conscious, at the knowledge that Margaery was touching such an old, ugly gown, that Sansa had nothing better to offer her because the Lannisters cared so little about what she wore.

She hugged herself, but then Margaery was batting her hands away, reaching for the ties of Sansa's gown and working at them with a methodical slowness that had Sansa squirming with need.

"Margaery-"

And then Margaery's lips were sucking gently on one of Sansa's breasts, that sensation that sent sparks all of the way down Sansa's spine and into her groin, made her claw at the bed sheets with need, and then at Margaery when that brought her no satisfaction.

She pushed Margaery gently back onto the bed, watched the other girl fall into the bed sheets for a moment, the sheets rippling around her like water, and then followed, her fingers tracing down Margaery's stomach, beneath her gown to brush at her milky thighs, then lower.

Margaery jolted suddenly, met her eyes and whispered, "Sansa..."

Sansa lifted her head, nervous now with the sudden desire pumping through her, as her legs grew wet. "I don't know..."

Margaery smiled, though for a moment she looked as nervous as Sansa. "Fingers," she gasped out, pulling the rest of her gown up until it pooled around her waist. "That's easier, first."

Sansa nodded, knelt down between Margaery's open legs as she reached out with almost trembling right hand to tangle in the delicate bush at the apex of Margaery's thighs, glanced up at her again.

Margaery grinned, leaned up to kiss Sansa on the lips, the movement hurried, demanding.

Sansa almost forgot what she had resolved to do with the feel of those plush lips against her own, was reminded for a moment of the first time she had kissed Margaery, in Joffrey's chambers-

Sansa's fingers rubbed against Margaery's womanhood, and they both gasped at the sensation, before Margaery was kissing her again, their teeth clacking together painfully before Margaery's tongue breached inside of Sansa's mouth.

Sansa's fingers pushed in slightly, and she winced involuntarily at the sensation, attempted to pull back from Margaery, but the other girl merely pushed forward harder, one hand reaching out to claw at Sansa's shoulder, to pull her closer.

When Sansa's index finger breached Margaery's cunny, pushing deeply enough into that tightness that she felt slightly nervous, worried that she would hurt the other girl somehow, it was the strangest sensation she had ever felt, and not necessarily a good one, at first.

For a moment, she thought she might have hurt Margaery, thought the almost grainy feel of Margaery's pubic hair against her palm too rough, thought her finger in Margaery's body too slimy.

And then Margaery gasped and bucked up into Sansa's finger, pushing it deeper, and Sansa forgot her reservations as she watched Margaery's face twist in pleasure, watched Margaery's body spasm beneath her touch, watched Margaery moan her name.

"Sansa..." she whispered, and then she was moving, kissing Sansa again, kissing her with the hard passion Sansa had grown used to from the other girl without quite knowing when this had happened. “Yes. Sansa."

Margaery pushed herself up into Sansa's hand again, and Sansa's fingers tangled further in the other girl's hair for a moment before she glanced down between them, watched Margaery's quivering thighs push against Sansa's wrist, gently placed another finger inside of Margaery.

Margaery let out a shout, her wet heat tightening suddenly around Sansa's two fingers, and Sansa froze, glanced down at the other girl nervously, for the shout had not sounded all pleasure to her ears.

"Are you all right?" Sansa gasped out. "Do...do you want me to stop?"

Margaery let out a growl of frustration, reached out and hooked her arm around Sansa's neck, pulling her close until they were almost nose to nose, and Sansa's fingers, a third accompanying them now, slipped further inside of her.

"You had better not stop," Margaery snapped out, looking startled despite herself at the order, and Sansa blinked, before chuckling.

"Then I won't," she whispered, and pushed a fourth finger in, watched Margaery's face twist before she let out another panting gasp and breathed in hard through her nose.

"Gods, Sansa..." She threw her head back, pulling away from Sansa's kiss, and Sansa stared at her for a long moment, stared at the free expression on her face, free for perhaps the first time that Sansa had ever seen it, and vowed to memorize that look.

Margaery, her head thrown back, eyes closed and lips only slighted parted; cheeks flushed as, beneath where Sansa sat on top of her, Margaery's legs trembled.

Sansa hadn't really understood how Margaery could get so much enjoyment from what she had done to Sansa earlier, giving rather than taking, as Sansa had been, but she thought she did now, even from the scant amount she had done yet.

To feel Margaery's wet heat against her fingers, to hear Margaery's gasps and know that she had drawn them-

And though she could by no means know if her own unpracticed hand was enough to bring Margaery the sort of enjoyment that she'd had just moments before, she thought that by the loud pants Margaery was now eliciting, it might have done enough.

"Am I doing this right?" Sansa asked quietly, and Margaery leapt up from the bed, captured the words with a kiss.

"Gods, Sansa, stop talking," she whispered, and then her tongue was inside of Sansa, working at the same slow, steady rhythm Sansa's fingers were working inside of her, and Sansa forgot to breathe until the other girl pulled back.

When Margaery came into Sansa's hand, when her body jerked just before the sensation of thick, warm liquid spurted out onto Sansa's fingers, Sansa heard the small cry the other girl made, a cry of ecstasy that was also pain, and it sounded beautiful.

Sansa stared down at the fluids on her fingers, had the errant thought that she would like to know what Margaery tasted like in the same way Margaery knew what she tasted like, and lifted her fingers to her mouth, sucked on them idly.

It wasn't so amazing as she had expected it to be, from how Margaery had reacted to first tasting Sansa, but it was all the better, she supposed for being another part of Margaery that Sansa could consume.

She lifted her face as a bit of Margaery's essence dribbled down her chin, to find the other girl's already lustful eyes watching her.

"That was..." Margaery whispered at the end of this, planting heavily, her pretty cheeks flushed as she looked up at Sansa, reached up to brush the hair from Sansa's eyes.

Sansa nodded, breathless. "My gods," she whispered. "I..."

She didn't get the chance to finish, for in the next moment Margaery tossed Sansa onto her back, ripped at Sansa's gown where it still clung to her legs-

"My lady?" Lady Alla's voice called, from outside the room. "Lord Mace is looking for you."

Margaery let out another groan of frustration as Sansa's hips bucked up in dismay at the news, before Sansa's chuckle startled her.

"You'd better go," she murmured, and Margaery blinked down at her, looking adorably bemused.

"Sansa-"

"I'll be fine," Sansa promised her, and somehow knew it would be true, even if she could not say why. "I'll leave just after you do."

Margaery hesitated, and then nodded. "Just a moment, Alla!" she called out, and then hurriedly reached down to arrange her clothing in some semblance of modesty.

Sansa snorted again, reached out and placed a hand over Margaery's.

"Meet in my chambers, later?" she asked, hated that her voice sounded almost pleading. "Lord Tyrion is hardly there, these days." She didn't bother to ask why, when she did see him in the dark of night.

Margaery bent down and kissed Sansa on the nose, rolled off the bed and slipped into the shoes sitting on the floor in front of it.


	96. MARGAERY XXX

"What's this, then?" Margaery asked with a bemused smile.

Alla smiled widely at her. "We thought that, since you've become Queen and all, we've not all had some time together in a while, and we thought the perfect way to rectify that would be a picnic."

She beamed at the end of this speech, and Margaery could not stop herself from smiling back as she was pushed into her seat at the table by her ladies, all surrounding her in a gaggle, having sprung upon her the moment she had left her lord father's company. She could use some time with her ladies, not needing to think, after such a conversation.

"That sounds wonderful," she agreed, for she had not done something like this in some time, it felt like, and her ladies looked terribly triumphant, at that knowledge.

Margaery sat, allowed the other girls to pour her tea and place heaps of cakes and fruits onto the plate before her with a small smile.

Beside her, Elinor looked almost contrite, and Margaery had the sudden thought that this had no doubt been her idea, to get Margaery away from Joffrey, for a time.

If only she knew that Joffrey was as harmless to her as a kitten, in his current state, but Margaery could appreciate the effort all the same.

“And have you another suitor this week, Megga?” Margaery asked the other girl, with a small grin.

It was quite the joke amongst the girls that, ever since they had first arrived in King’s Landing after the Battle of Blackwater was over, Megga had been approached by a suitor every week, much to the girl’s amusement, for she had not been so wildly popular in Highgarden.

Megga snorted. “Some Bulwer, I think," she said, casting an amused glance in Alysanne's direction.

Alysanne blushed, stuffed another pie into her mouth to keep from answering, and the girls descended into giggles.

Margaery's eyes flicked between them all, rather amused. She'd missed this, she realized. Missed these girls, since marrying Joffrey and finding her time swept up in matters of state and in...

"Alysanne," she said suddenly, eyes narrowing on the young girl, "I promised Lady Sansa that I would join her for tea when you lot ambushed me. I don't suppose you could go and find her?"

Alysanne brightened at the prospect of doing some service for her lady, jumped to her feet and promised to do as she was bid, her stalwart knight following without a moment's hesitation and with merely a nod to his queen.

Margaery smiled behind her hand as she watched them go.

That girl inspired adoration wherever she went, even if she did not seem to and likely never would realize it. She would make a fine lady of

Alysanne was the only one of them an heiress of her own right, but too young for suitors, much to Margaery's relief. The same age as young Prince Tommen.

Of course, Alla was only slightly older.

"So," Margaery said, turning back to the other girls, "What is this I hear of a Bulwer suit, Megga?"

Megga snorted, but it was Janna who spoke before she could, revealing the story as if she might burst if she could not tell it. Margaery rather suspected that might be the case.

Janna leaned forward, lowering her voice as she did so. "Alysanne's sweet young brother proposed a suit to 'Sweet Lady Megga' just this fortnight," she said, and Margaery snorted.

"But he's only a child," she murmured, glancing at Megga in amusement, only to find that Megga did not appear as amused as she had been expecting.

"He's a year older than he was when we last saw him," she said, almost defensively, before covering her face with her tea cup as the other girls laughed.

"If you are so bored of your suitors, Megga, by all means, send them my way," Merry teased her, and the girls laughed again.

Megga threw a piece of pie at her, and soon the girls had collapsed into giggles once more, and Margaery stared at the lot of them and wondered how she had managed to grow so old so quickly.

She could remember a time when all of this would not have seemed so foreign to her. When she would have sat with these girls and enjoyed it as she always had, her grandmother looking disapprovingly on.

Margaery was saved from having to contemplate the matter further when she glanced up to the sight of a bemused Sansa, dragged along by Alysanne as Sansa's maid walked calmly behind them, looking amused at the spectacle they made as they raced through the gardens.

"Lady Sansa!" Merry called out, delightedly upon spotting where Margaery's attention had gone. "We were just talking about you." She grinned. "I don't suppose you'd care to know what?"

Sansa went rather pale, her eyes flicking to Margaery, who sighed inwardly before putting a hand on Merry's.

"Well, don't worry the girl Merry," she chided, and Merry lowered her eyes, pretended to be properly chastened.

"Oh, it's nothing to worry about," Merry said, turning to Sansa once more as she and her maid came closer to the table. "Just a bit of fun. Did you know, soon enough you won't be the only married woman amongst us ladies. Megga's going to be wed soon enough."

Sansa blinked, as if she did not quite understand what such a topic had to do with her, before turning a shy smile to Lady Megga. "Congratulations, my lady. Do I know the suitor?"

Alla was the first to snort, where she stood pouring herself more summer wine, an amount which Margaery was quite sure her mother would have had something to say about, had she been here, giving the game away.

Sansa stared in confusion as the girls burst into laughter once again.

But once Merry let Sansa in on the joke, she didn't seem quite as amused as the other girls, only smiled slightly before her eyes flicked to Margaery's, met and held them for a breathless moment.

"Do take a seat, Sansa," Lady Megga told her suddenly, reaching across Alysanne as the girl sat for another piece of lemon cakes, and thrusting them in the direction of the empty seat now awaiting Sansa.

Margaery watched as Sansa stepped nimbly forward, wondered why she had thought this a good idea, for, as important as Margaery realized it was for Sansa to make friends here, the girl looked terribly uncomfortable in a way that made Margaery want to chase all of the other girls away, until it was only the two of them once more.

"There is something you ought to know," Lady Alla whispered quietly to her, and Margaery's gaze flicked to the other girl even as she kept her smile and pretended to enjoy the feeling of Alla's fingers as they suddenly reached out and began playing with her hair.

"About Sansa Stark's lady's maid."

Margaery blinked at her, attention caught even as Sansa and Lady Shae took their seats at the table.

Alla smiled thinly, bent down so that she was whispering directly into Margaery's ear. "I saw her sneaking out of Lord Tywin's chambers just this morning."

Margaery stiffened, eyes going to Shae despite herself. Shae glanced up, meeting her eyes, glancing between her and Lady Alla before turning back to Sansa, pushing in the girl's chair for her.

"Lady Sansa and I were together last night," she murmured through clenched teeth to Lady Alla. "Oughtn't she to have been with Lord Tyrion, as we have heard about their...relationship?"

It had caught Margaery's attention, that the maid seemed in no mind to betray what she had clearly put together of Sansa and Margaery's relationship. She could not allow a Lannister maid to endanger them without further information, after all.

And while she had suspected as much just from seeing the dwarf and the maid interact in public, Margaery found that the evidence of their feelings for each other was...strangely sweet.

Alla sank into the chair beside her, reached for the tea cup there with dainty pink fingers. "One would think," she whispered back, and Margaery bit back a sigh.

"Lady Sansa," she smiled widely at Sansa, getting to her feet and moving to greet the other girl. "So good of you to join us." She turned to Sansa's lady's maid. "Lady Shae."

Lady Shae's eyes narrowed at her, as if she were somehow aware of what Lady Alla had just said, but then she smiled tightly, and stood behind Sansa as the other girl sat.

Margaery watched her go, and wondered what the...lady friend of the hated son of Tywin Lannister had to do in his offices.


	97. SANSA LVII

"Gods, Sansa," Margaery murmured, grinding her hips down onto Sansa's gently. "Seven, I..."

Her face contorted, and the grip Margaery held around Sansa's wrists, splayed out to her sides and held down on the bed, tightened almost to the point of pain.

Sansa closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation far more than she felt she should have, twisted her arms up into Margaery's grip just so that she could enjoy the grinding the sensation of her bones.

Margaery, atop her once more when Sansa opened her eyes, didn't appear to notice, lost in her own pleasure at the moment, and Sansa released a silent breath she hadn't realized she was holding, closing her eyes, basking in the feel of the other woman against her.

They'd been at it for some time now, so long now that Sansa was rather surprised no one had come looking for them, wondered how Margaery had orchestrated that.

"Sansa, I want to..." and then Margaery was moving, lowering her body down onto the bed so that she was straddling Sansa's thighs, her mouth going to the thin shock of red hair covering Sansa's womanhood, and she glanced up between hooded lashes, glancing at Sansa for permission Sansa was rather annoyed she was wasting the time to ask for.

Margaery snorted at the expression on Sansa's face, lowered her mouth and, instead of kissing as she had always started out with before, immediately sucking at Sansa's folds with an almost feverish intensity.

Sansa gasped, throwing her head back into the blankets, closing her eyes again, no longer realizing the way that Margaery's hands held down her wrists, lost.

They were in Winterfell. Margaery was holding her down against the large bed of the master bedchamber, Margaery holding her down, both of them tangled in furs where they lay, the bite of Margaery's hands on her wrists echoing the biting cold outside of their chambers.

Outside, Sansa could hear the twisting winds of winter, the beginnings of a storm which she had always found annoying when she had lived there, wishing for the warmth of a South she had never seen and thus could not appreciate as she ought to have done.

When they were done here, and they would not be done for hours, because there was no one to hide from, no one to tell them when they ought to stop, they would go down to the dining rooms and eat salted stew and bread, the cool beer Robb and Theon had always favored, things that were considered paltry and plain, here. And lemon cakes for dessert, shipped in from the South in this fantasy, for such things as relations between the kingdoms little mattered here, just as the thought of how little likely it was that Margaery would like the coldness of the North didn't matter, either.

In a little while, no doubt they would be called down to eat, would ignore the warning, and the food would grow as cold as the weather outside. Yet it was something Sansa couldn't bring herself to regret, as she lay under Margaery and let the other girl have her wicked way with Margaery, as she pushed her hands further inside of Sansa, made Sansa feel so good.

And Sansa suddenly wanted nothing more than for this fantasy to be true, wanted nothing more than to find herself tangled up in Margaery in her homeland, far from King's Landing and the horrid people there.

Wanted nothing more than to be laying beneath Margaery in the safety of her home, after having done so for years, together in a way that could not be pulled apart by kings or soldiers or anyone.

Where they could indulge in every fantasy she'd yet thought of, in the deep recesses of her mind, but had yet to put a voice to.

"Please, mistress..." Sansa whispered, and Margaery's forehead abruptly banged into Sansa's chin, the two girls pulling apart with an oof of pain.

They stared at each for a long moment, before Sansa flushed crimson and looked away first, and then flopped down onto the bed with an embarrassed cry.

Margaery stared after her, eyes terribly wide in a way that Sansa had never seen from her before, and if she were not so embarrassed, she would have found herself proud to have brought that expression to Margaery's face, one not brought about by one of Joffrey's ill deeds.

"I can't believe I just..." Sansa started, becoming tongue-tied as she glanced up at Margaery again, the heat flaring down her neck. "I didn't mean..."

Margaery, Seven damn her, looked like she was trying very hard not to smile, and failing.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of," Margaery assured the other girl, even as Sansa grabbed one of the pillows to cover her head and groaned. "In fact, I'm rather flattered."

"I'd rather not talk about it," she murmured, voice muffled from under the pillow, and then Margaery was reaching down and pulling it off of her, wishing to bury herself forever, if need be.

"Sansa," she murmured, tone exasperatedly fond. "I'm not offended."

Sansa flushed. "I just..." She could hardly bring herself to say the words.

"I act out my fantasies when I am with Joffrey," Margaery said, shrugging, as if the fact that Sansa had called her such a thing did not bother her at all. "It is not so strange a thing."

Sansa sat up a little, suddenly very interested. "What fantasies?"

Margaery turned on her side, reached out to brush some of Sansa's hair off of her chest.

"I don't like being...well, I don't like the feel of a man's cock inside me," she said softly, staring at Sansa's breasts in lieu of her face, but Sansa didn't seem to mind. "It isn't...it's not that it's painful, or anything like that, I just...don't enjoy it." She glanced up at Sansa. "So, while I'm with him, I imagine that I'm with someone else." She swallowed. "Most of the time, I imagine I'm with you."

Sansa guffawed. "You minx!"

Margaery smirked. "And why should I not? I get twice the level of time with you than you ever get with me, that way."

Sansa swallowed. "I was pretending we were in Winterfell," she whispered finally, looking down at their entwined fingers. "And you were my lady, there. It..." she flushed again.

Margaery's smirk dimmed, and she reached out, petting at Sansa's hair. "Don't tell me we were...ah, copulating on some wolf pelts."

Sansa flushed. "I..." She glanced away, and Margaery giggled, reached out and traced the other girl's chin until Sansa looked back at her.

"That's very...exciting," she murmured, and then took Sansa's hand, guided it down between Margaery's legs to let her know just how excited Margaery was by the prospect.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat, and she glanced up, met Margaery's clouded eyes and slipped her fingers inside the other girl, gulped a little at the sensation that never ceased to shock her.

Sansa worked her fingers in and out of Margaery until she had the other gasping atop her, whimpering out noises that Sansa had never thought she would hear from the so controlled Margaery Tyrell.

And then a thought occurred to her, about what Margaery had just confided in her.

"But...how do you keep Joffrey from finding out?" Sansa asked curiously.

Margaery smirked, that part of her firmly back in control as she reached down and helped Sansa's fingers at their work.

"I like to think I have a good enough grasp of my own self-control. And, in any case, Joffrey's ministrations are hardly...terribly distracting."

Sansa found herself collapsing into giggles again, at the other woman's words. "Margaery! What a thing to say."

Margaery shrugged. "I do not think I need to be generous and say anything otherwise," she told the other girl. "Do you?"

Sansa shook her head, amazed despite herself. "Do you truly never slip up?" she asked, and Margaery raised her eyebrows.

"Sometimes. When I'm very lucky not to catch his notice doing so." Margaery's smirk suddenly turned wicked. "But if you'd like to call me mistress here in the bedchamber, I shan't mind..."

Sansa threw her pillow at her with her free hand.


	98. SANSA LVIII

Sansa had been spending so much time with Margaery lately, so much wonderful, awe-inspiring time with the other girl, that she had quite neglected the Martells.

And so, when they invited her for a turn around the city and Tywin Lannister actually allowed her to go, Sansa had leapt at the chance.

Perhaps it was because Sansa did not want to think about what they were offering her, did not want to think about the fact that, some day, maybe, one of these days, they were going to steal her away from the woman she was coming to...care so deeply about, for her own protection.

Sansa shook her head, swallowed rather hard, and forced that thought from her mind.

She realized that this was the first time since the riot of Flea Bottom that she had been allowed into the city, save for that time with Margaery, but that time had been allowed because Margaery was the Queen.

Tywin Lannister was giving her more freedoms, along with her safety from Joffrey, and Sansa did not know what to think of that.

They had guards, of course, Lannister guards alongside the Dornish men who had followed Oberyn to King's Landing, save for Oberyn himself, but Sansa allowed herself to forget that, for the moment.

The Blackmont women were with them, kindly Jynessa who was older than Sansa but seemed younger in some ways, and her mother, and Myria Jordane.

All lovely women, and Sansa found herself feeling quite at home amongst them, in a way she was rather ashamed to admit she did not feel around Margaery's ladies.

These Dornish women spoke their minds, rather than veiling their words until they could be picked apart a thousand times over, and it was refreshing in a way that was so different from when Sansa had been exposed to the same back in Winterfell.

Unbidden, the memory of Arya, giggling and telling Sansa what she had just overheard Jon saying to Theon, rushed to the forefront of Sansa's mind, Sansa shushing her in turn and telling her that it wasn't proper for ladies to speak of such things, that she was going to tell the septa, and that a lady should be more courteous than to speak of improprieties.

And suddenly, these women and their refreshing openness made bile rise in Sansa's throat.

"What is Oberyn's business in King's Landing?" she blurted, and Ellaria glanced at her, eyes widening as they moved to a vendor.

The other woman eventually composed herself, however, smiling and nodding at the woman selling fabrics, if lamenting that they were not so fine as the ones of Sunspear, and would have little use there, when she returned.

"He was invited for the wedding," Ellaria told her. "The position on the Small Council is a lucrative one, however."

Sansa attempted to parse out a meaning there, wondering if 'lucrative' went deeper than she thought, before shaking her head.

"I understand why you will not tell me," Sansa murmured, as she bent over a piece of fabric and smiled, and pretended the Lannisters would ever let her buy it. The gold cloaks behind her were just far enough away that she dared to say the words.

But in a boisterous crowd of smallfolk, Sansa figured that her whispered words were at least safe.

In Dorne, she doubted she would be forced to wear the same gowns again and again, but that was just the thing.

In Dorne, she would be the same penniless little girl, dependent on others for her happiness, others who she thought were better than the Lannisters, but how should she know?

Ellaria glanced at her sideways.

"And I understand that you cannot tell me when we are leaving, because whatever it is Prince Oberyn is planning, it is dangerous and time sensitive."

Ellaria lowered her head in a nod, but Sansa shook her own.

"But I do not appreciate this," she said, and thought of how Margaery spoke around Joffrey, gently frustrating. "I do not wish to be left in the dark, knowing that at any moment, I could be taken from this place, but with the days dragging on in between." She took a deep breath, glanced at Ellaria and tried not to think about the surprised and reluctantly impressed expression on the other woman's face. "So tell me, please, what does soon mean?"

Ellaria sighed, took Sansa's arm and led her away from the fabric vendor, back into the street, the Dornish ladies walking a good distance behind them, now, distracting the Lannister guards with talk of tourneys and prowess that Sansa only half-heard.

But when Ellaria spoke once more, it was not to answer Sansa's question, just as she had expected, and Sansa barely withheld a sigh.

"You seem happier than I have yet seen you," Ellaria murmured, brushing a strand of hair behind Sansa's ear. "There is an almost...glow about you, these days."

Sansa flushed, tried desperately not to think of why that might be. "Oh?"

Ellaria smirked. "I recognize that glow," she said coyly. "Oberyn Martell was far from my first, but he had a similar effect."

Sansa was full on blushing now, struggling not to think of Margaery, of what they did together in the privacy of their rooms.

"I..."

Ellaria tutted, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "It's nothing to be ashamed of, in Dorne," she reassured. "Much as those of King's Landing may say otherwise."

Sansa blinked at her. "You're not..." Angry? She still half-expected that the Martells were being so kind to her because they wanted her marriage prospects, much as they had assured her otherwise half a dozen times.

"Of course not," Ellaria said gently, lowering her hand from Sansa's hair. "But I find myself wondering...with this new beau...is this still what you want?"

Sansa blinked again. "Pardon?" she didn't understand what the other woman was asking.

Ellaria sighed. "Do you still wish to come with us, when we leave here?" she asked, and Sansa's eyes widened.

She had been asking herself the same question half a dozen times each day, each time she kissed Margaery, when she had felt Margaery's wetness on her fingers.

"We will not force you to leave, Sansa," Ellaria said suddenly, urgently, "If that is no longer what you wish. But remember that even the strongest bonds can fade, especially in a climate as merciless as King's Landing."

Sansa swallowed. She knew that. Of course she knew that.

And yet.

As much as she cared about Margaery, as much as she...cherished the things they did together, even if she was not yet able to put a name to them, she knew this was only the calm before the storm.

That this would not last forever, and that when it all came crumbling down, Joffrey would still be there, smirking and ordering her stripped and beaten by his loyal dogs. Her Imp husband would still be there, gently consoling even as he asked her yet again for an heir to the North.

Margaery was beautiful, and kind, and Sansa had been right when she first thought that the other girl's presence in King's Landing had changed everything for Sansa here, in more ways now than then, but being with Margaery, as wonderful as she had found it, was not worth Sansa's life.

She knew that, she only wished the words would articulate themselves.

Ellaria did not seem willing to pressure her, and instead merely said gently, "Soon, Sansa. We do not like holding you to our whims like this any more than you do, but you misunderstand. We will leave this place, when my Oberyn is ready. And it will be soon, now. He...underestimated how long before, but he has not, now. However, until we do, many things could go wrong. The Lannisters could notice the friends he has made here. They could notice the time he has not spent in the brothels. They could realize that our friendship with you is more than it appears. And so, for your own sake, you cannot know when we are leaving until we do, or how, and, for that, I apologize."

Sansa swallowed hard, hope flaring within her despite herself. "But we are leaving?" she repeated, and Ellaria smiled gently, brushed at Sansa's hair again.

"Yes, my sweet girl," she promised, "We are leaving. And you are coming with us."


	99. MARGAERY XXXI

Loras had once told her that when the sun had set, no candle could replace it.

Margaery hadn't understood his conviction at the time, hadn't realized that it was possible to feel so strongly about someone else, but she thought she understood it a little now, with Sansa.

Still, Margaery Tyrell would be damned if she let her brother wilt now.

She watched Olyvar slink out of her brother's rooms as she passed him, as they made eye contact for a moment before the young man went back to his other clients, and she pushed open the door to her brother's chambers, foul mood sinking lower.

Her brother was turned away from her when she entered, and she didn't bother to announce her presence as she watched him pull his shirt over his head.

"You shouldn't creep like that, Margy," he said suddenly, and she sighed. "They might start accusing us of what they accuse your royal ass of a husband's parents of."

She sighed again, stepped further into the room, glad she had thought to close to the door before she had let Loras speak.

After all, the conversation ahead was not one that should be had with an open door.

"I'm worried about you, brother," Margaery said honestly, and Loras groaned, turning away from her.

"Must you be?" he asked, pulling on his shirt.

"This isn't like you," Margaery insisted, not one to be put off.

If she could manage Joffrey's tantrums and mercurial moods, she could certainly manage Loras', which she had been doing for far longer, as he should have realized if he was anywhere near in his right mind at the moment.

"Sleeping with whores who work for one of the most dangerous men in Westeros."

"Your husband owns the brothels now?" Loras quipped, and Margaery sighed.

"I'm trying to have a serious conversation with my brother," she said.

"About who I fuck?" he laced up his shirt and reached for his Kingsguard cloak.

"Yes," she deadpanned. Then, carefully, for his look when he had murdered that boy in the square had not quite left her mind of late, "You loved Renly, I know you did."

That got her brother's attention. He turned to her, a pinched smile on his face, eyes sparking. "Margaery, I'm sorry I was late to my guarding duties." He swallowed, looking genuinely contrite, then. "It won’t happen again.”

"Loras." She reached out, placed her hand over his before pulling it back, unsure these days if it was wanted.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I...I don't want to talk about this."

"I know," she said gently, "And I've been trying to avoid it, for you, but I think you need to talk about it with someone. And not one of Littlefinger's workers."

"We don't do much talking," Loras admitted, lips curling into an almost impish smile, which was certainly more than Margaery had needed to know.

Margaery shrugged, not about to be baited out of having this conversation. "Then talk about it with me. Please."

Loras gave her a long, searching look, and then said quietly, "What would you know of any of it? You've never been in love, never known someone so fully as I did Renly." He spun away from her with a growl. "What use is speaking of it?"

Margaery let out a long sigh, leaning her back against the wall by his bed as she felt all of the energy sap from her at his words.

"Because it is the only thing I can think of, seeing you bottle it away. Because I look at you sometimes," she said quietly, "And I see a shadow of what you once were. A man who might at any moment become something far worse than I know you to be."

The boy, bleeding out on the cobblestones, staring up at Margaery with already sightless eyes as his body jerked, the knife slipping free.

Loras' eyes in the next moment, as dead as the child's he had just killed.

"Oh?" he lifted a brow, a closed expression on his face. "And what is that?"

"A living dead man," she said softly, meeting his eyes.

Loras flinched violently, did not deny her words, and something in Margaery's heart clenched at the knowledge that she had been right.

"I miss him," he said quietly, leaning forward and lowering his voice. "I miss him so much that it hurts me, Margaery, physically, so much that sometimes I want to..."

Margaery's hand reached out, clenched around his wrist and didn’t let go this time. "Don't say that," she said fiercely, leaning forward until they were nose to nose. "Do you hear me? Never say that again."

Her brother swallowed hard. "He was stupid," he said suddenly, voice harsh, even as she watched his eyes fill with tears. "Stupid to think that he could be King, stupid to think that Stannis wouldn't kill him before he killed Stannis. He was too damn...delicate for that sort of job."

Margaery felt her throat clog suddenly, despite herself. "He didn't know that, with the greatest amount of soldiers in Westeros and the greatest amount of supplies, as well as a queen, he'd be taken out by a woman in ill-fitting armor, by chance, Loras. No one could have predicted that."

"Well, he should have!" Loras snapped, spinning away from her, surprising her by not grudgingly protesting Brienne of Tarth’s innocence, this time.

She paused, bit her lip. "He loved you, Loras. Loved you so much, as much as you loved him. It's okay to mourn him. Just...don’t destroy yourself doing so."

Loras turned on her, lip curled into a sneer. "And why not? I loved him, and that love was an abomination according to everyone in this city. Do you think the High Septon would agree with that, Marg? That your husband and the rest of King's Landing would agree with that?"

Her face transformed then, into one of fierce anger and emotion as she pulled him into her arms, making him blink in surprise as he saw the tears pooling there.

“Margaery-"

She pulled him close, until they were bare inches apart, and whispered in his ear.

"It doesn't matter. Don't you see? What they think, what they whisper behind the safety of their hands and their walls about you, about me, it means nothing." She pulled back, forced him to look her in the eyes. "All that matters is us. Our family, our feelings, our wants. If it weren't for us, for our family, King's Landing and the High Septon and the rest ofthese bloody sycophants would have fallen under Stannis Baratheon months ago. And it _is_ okay. It's the most right thing in the world, and no one has any right to say otherwise. So mourn him, do you hear me?"

Loras, wide-eyed, nodded, and she reached out, wiping at the tear that stumbled down his cheek.

"Mourn him, Loras, and do whatever it is you must to live on," Margaery whispered, as their foreheads touched. "Whatever it is. But you can't avenge him from the grave, and I fear that a grave is what you will find if you continue on like this." She swallowed hard. “And you can’t go there, because I need you here with me. I need my brother.”

Loras swallowed hard, breaths ragged as he met her eyes. “I won’t,” he promised throatily, and Margaery smiled, leaned her forehead against his and closed her eyes. “Gods, Margaery, I swear I won’t.”

She glanced up, pressed a delicate kiss to his forehead.

"I believe you,” she whispered, and forced herself to do just that, in this moment, even as her mind whirred with a way to make it so that she might do so without trying, next time her brother lied to her.

Loras leaned into her touch like a drowning man, and Margaery closed her eyes, kept her lips pressed to his forehead in the fear that, the moment she pulled back, he would return to the lost soul he had been just moments before.

"Margaery," her brother whispered finally, when the silence had grown too long and she knew he would pull away once more, as he always did. "There's something you should know. About Sansa Stark."


	100. SANSA LIX

Sansa gasped, arching upward on the bed, her legs spread apart as she reached out and pulled at Margaery's hair, one hand grasping at Margaery's shoulder just to keep herself from succumbing to the strange weightlessness she felt as the other girl's tongue worked expertly inside of her.

For a moment, Sansa could feel nothing but the sensation of Margaery's tongue rolling against her insides, pushing further than it yet had. Margaery's fingers, digging into Sansa's thighs so hard that Sansa was sure they would leave crescent shaped marks that would not fade for hours.

Not that she would want them to.

"Margaery," Sansa gasped again, pushing her womanhood down experimentally onto Margaery's wet, parted lips and enjoying the small moan that escaped them when she did so, before Margaery hurried back to her task once more, her lips pressing short, hard kisses into the folds of Sansa's womanhood.

"Gods, Margaery, _please_ ," she vaguely heard herself begging, feeling as though some stranger were saying those words for her, for she hardly felt capable of moving her own lips.

In this moment, Sansa could forget everything. Could forget that the Martells were taking her soon from this place, could forget that Tywin Lannister, fierce as he was, was the only thing standing between her and another beating from Joffrey.

Could forget that Margaery would never be hers.

Margaery's tongue pushed against a part of her that it had never touched before, and Sansa shouted at the sensation it caused, forgetting her worries in that moment completely and closing her eyes, biting down hard enough on her lower lip to draw blood.

Strangely, it didn't hurt to do so, even as Sansa felt blood trickling down her chin.

Sansa's whole body flinched again when Margaery's tongue roved deeper, still touching that spot, that wonderful spot that Sansa suddenly with Margaery had found long ago, Margaery's hands grasping at Sansa's thighs more tightly, fingers twitching with the strength of her hold on them.

"Margaery," Sansa whispered, moving her fingers to tangle in the other girl's hair until she was certain she had ripped some of it, and Margaery groaned beneath her but did not pull away.

And then Sansa came, came with blackness encircling the edges of her vision and a shattered cry that she tried to cover up but didn't quite think she had succeeded at, and when she opened her eyes again, Margaery was sitting before her on the edge of the bed, grinning as she licked at her own lips with her tongue.

Sansa watched the motion for a long moment, strangely reminded of one of Tommen's cats by the sight, before she fell back onto Margaery's bed, boneless, her whole body feeling made of liquid.

It did not take long before Margaery collapsed down beside her on the bed, tangling their legs together and laying on her side so that she might lean against Sansa, looking entirely comfortable and sated.

Margaery reached out, fingers brushing at the blood drying on Sansa's chin, wiping it away with a gentle swipe, before brushing the blood off against the sheets.

Sansa watched the motion, strangely entranced by the sight of Margaery with blood on her fingers, oddly reminded of a dream she'd had, what felt like a lifetime ago, of Margaery, covered in Joffrey's blood, kissing her.

The blood disappeared on Margaery's sheets as if it had never been, and Margaery lay back down, kissing up Sansa's arm, to the crook of her shoulder, down her neck with all of the patience of an artist memorizing their figure.

Sansa sighed, wishing this moment could last longer, even while she knew it could not.

"I have to go soon," Sansa murmured, even as she hated herself for speaking and bothering the contented silence. "Ellaria Sand wished to speak with me about the gowns she bought in the city the other day."

Beside her, Margaery's fingers stilled in their gentle tracing of Sansa's nipple with her thumb, but only for a moment, so small a time that Sansa almost didn't notice it.

"Oh?" Margaery asked, her expression suddenly much more closed off than it had been a moment before.

Sansa sighed. "She insisted," she murmured, for even though Sansa had bought no clothes, she was quite sure some of the fabrics Ellaria had purchased had not been for herself or her legendary Sand Snake daughters.

And, much as she disliked the need for it, Sansa would not refuse the charity, much as it made her uncomfortable to accept it, even knowing that when she reached Dorne she would be reliant upon it.

And Sansa did enjoy the Dornish style, much as it made her blush to think about the gown Prince Oberyn had gifted her and which she had never worn yet in any public place.

“Prince Oberyn and his people seem very interested in you,” Margaery said quietly, when she did speak again.

Sansa froze for a moment, and then glanced over at her lover, forced a smile that she hoped looked mischievous rather than guilty.

“Does he?” she asked, hoping her voice sounded less suspicious to Margaery's ears than it did to Sansa's own.

Margaery smiled knowingly, bent down to kiss Sansa's nipple, rolling it between her lips until Sansa gasped, surprised at her body's own ability to react so quickly after being sated.

"Yes, I rather think so." Her tone turned teasing as she lifted her head, and Sansa immediately mourned the loss of her lips on Sansa's now hardened nipple. "Tell me, Sansa, is he falling for you?”

Sansa sat up abruptly. “What? No. He...He has Ellaria," she said, flushing as she could not quite find a title for the Dornishwoman who had been so kind to her recently.

Margaery rolled her eyes, though her expression remained fond. "The one hardly forbids the other."

Sansa cleared her throat. "He is much older than me. He has daughters my age."

Margaery snorted. "I have noticed that neither does that matter to a man, my dear," she murmured, reaching out and brushing her finger in a small circle around Sansa's dusky nipple.

Sansa sucked in a breath. "I don't think he..." she shook her head. "Whatever it is he's interested in us for, I think it has more to do with my husband than me," she lied, and hated herself for the lie.

Remembered how Lord Baelish had told her that she was the worst liar in King's Landing, and wondered if Margaery, who was sometimes disturbingly good at it, believed the lie, in this moment.

Margaery eyed her for a moment, and then smiled in amusement, her eyes going wide. "You think he's in love with Tyrion?" she asked, and Sansa giggled.

"Of course not, I..." she trailed off, cast an accusing glance in Margaery's direction. "You're teasing me."

Margaery's lips twitched. "Am I? I told you, Sansa, your husband is quite...infamous for his dalliances. Perhaps not quite as much as Prince Oberyn, and perhaps not quite with the same...proclivities, but-"

Sansa threw another pillow at her, watched it bounce off Margaery's head and disrupt her already mussed hair. "By the gods, Margaery, I don't need to think of such things."

Margaery giggled, then, too, bent down and kissed her. "And why ever not?" she continued teasing, reaching out and brushing Sansa's hair behind her ears. "That's quite the...poignant image."

"Margaery!" Sansa gasped, flushing. "What a thing to say." She shook her head. "You're not even..."

Margaery grinned. "So? And why should I not say it? You've not given me any reason to think otherwise, have you?"

Sansa sighed. "I should probably go," she said, a tad resentfully toward Ellaria Sand, much as she knew she could not refuse the woman's help.

Margaery's lips closed around Sansa's nipple again before she could quite sit up straight. "How about one more round?" she asked, waggling her eyebrows suggestively, and Sansa groaned, utterly helpless to refuse that.


	101. SANSA LX

Sansa had been correct about the gown, and after the Martells had finished having Sansa fitted for it by their own seamstresses, rather than any Lannister seamstress who would go and tell tales to Lord Tywin, Sansa had felt a little more comfortable in accepting the gift.

After all, as Ellaria had assured her, she would look the height of fashion wearing it, in Dorne, and the gown had not been so scandalous as the last one, much to Sansa's modest relief.

Sansa had stared at herself as she was fitted for a gown she would never wear in King's Landing, and had thought that Sansa of the South would be someone very different from Sansa Lannister.

The gown was not yet finished, and already Sansa found herself worrying about it. Shae could find it at any moment, relay her concerns to Tyrion.

Sansa knew that, while Margaery often came to the chambers Sansa shared with Lord Tyrion, she would have no reason to go through Sansa's wardrobe, and yet Sansa had an irrational fear that Margaery would do just that, would find the gown and know exactly what Sansa and the Martells were planning.

She did not know why she had not told Margaery about these plans. Knew, on some level, that the other girl could at least be trusted not to tell Joffrey, that while Margaery would miss her and likely be angry that she was leaving with enemies of the Reach, she would not betray Sansa's trust like that.

And still, Sansa had kept her silence, and she liked to tell herself that it was because she did not know if she could completely trust Margaery to choose Sansa over her loyalty to her family, which would surely wish to use such information. Did not wish to put Margaery into a position where she would have to.

But the truth of it was, this was not why Sansa had kept her silence, either.

She supposed it could be bravery, to embrace what could very well be her last days with Margaery in a way that would only bring one of them pain.

But Sansa rather thought it was cowardice, to refuse to tell the woman she cared about that she was leaving, because Sansa did not want to face Margaery's reaction to hearing it. Did not want to say goodbye.

She sent a slanted glance Margaery's way, where the girl walked beside her in the gardens. Margaery had been talking up a storm for some time now, her pretty smile that Sansa so loved in place.

Apparently, Margaery was worried that some of the Kingsguard might have been growing suspicious, about their extended time in the bedchamber, and wanted to do more things with Sansa outside of the bedchamber.

Not that Sansa minded. As much as she loved the things Margaery did to her, she simply loved being in the other woman's company, as well.

And the gardens were a nice enough backdrop, for that. They were where Margaery seemed most comfortable, and Sansa was most assured they would not be overheard, even if they were not whispering treason in the dark.

"And then Alla said that Alysanne's little brother has been proposing to Megga on and off since he met her last summer at the tourney at House Bulwer, and Megga didn't deny it," Margaery said, with a little laugh. "I can't believe she, of all people, managed to keep that from the rest of us. Megga is a horrible liar."

 _And we're all of us better liars than you_ , Lord Baelish whispered in her mind, and Sansa shook her head, forced herself to smile at Margaery's words.

"Well, is she going to accept him?" she asked, laughing lightly.

Margaery snorted. "In a few years, maybe. He doesn't come with a title, or the household Alysanne will, when she comes of age, and he's younger than her, of course."

Sansa blinked, wondered what this would have felt like in another life, one where her family had survived. Would she now be as flippant and amused as Margaery about Bran, if he had fallen head over heels for some girl, Jeyne, perhaps?

She swallowed. There was no use thinking of such things. Bran was dead, after all, and Jeyne was probably dead, too.

"But I doubt it," Margaery continued, smirking. "You know Megga gets a proposal every week, from a new suitor?"

"Every week?" Sansa repeated incredulously.

Margaery nodded, smirk growing. "That's more than I ever got, before I married Renly. Most of them have never even met her, but they send such pretty letters." She snorted. "She feeds them to her pet parrot, the one her father sent her from Braavos."

Sansa snorted, and then colored at the unladylike noise, but Margaery seemed as amused as she.

"Do they know? That she's putting their pretty words to such good use?" Sansa asked, and thought that if she ever got such proposals, she would never feed them to birds.

Margaery laughed. "Probably. It won't stop them, though, even if they do find out about it. They're quite determined." She shrugged one shoulder. "They would do better to wait until Alysanne comes of age, though. Megga hardly has a profitably dowry in comparison."

Sansa swallowed at that, humor abruptly gone as she remembered why she was considered such a bargaining chip. Not because of her own beauty or humor, but because she was the heir to Winterfell, now that Robb was dead.

"Lady Sansa," a familiar voice called at that moment, and Sansa glanced up, glad for the reprieve from such thoughts, only to see another reminder of them.

Oberyn Martell was walking through the rose gardens to reach them, glancing down at the thorned bushes as though they had personally offended him in some way, before he smiled at the sight of Sansa.

"I have been looking for you," he continued, that smile not dimming for a moment as he took in the sight of Sansa and Margaery walking together. "There is something Ellaria wishes to discuss. A dress, I think?"

Sansa swallowed, gave him a little curtsey because it was the proper thing to do, and she would not forget that in Dorne. "Prince Oberyn."

Margaery cleared her throat then, rather pointedly.

"Queen Margaery," Prince Oberyn said, voice rather stiff as he turned and gave her a rather per functionary bow.

Margaery eyed him with a coldness that Sansa had never seen in her eyes before, not even reserved for Cersei.

"Prince Oberyn. I see that the reports are true, and you pleasure us with your continued stay in King's Landing, after all."

She hardly sounded pleased at the inane observation. Instead, she made it sound like all but a declaration of war.

Prince Oberyn dipped his head, looking faintly bemused. "Indeed. I have found the climate here rather...pleasing."

Margaery stiffened, glanced between the two of them for a moment before letting go of Sansa's arm, where she held it. "Lady Sansa, I will leave you now. I am sure that my lord husband wants for me."

And with that, she was gone, turning on her heel and swanning away with all of the airs of a born princess.

Sansa stared after her in confusion, for Margaery had gone without even a smile goodbye, or a squeeze of Sansa's arm as she so often did, and Sansa wondered what had so bothered the other girl, with the arrival of Prince Oberyn.

"Sansa?" she heard Prince Oberyn call, and she turned to him, blinking. "Something on your mind?" he asked, and Sansa saw that he was also looking after Margaery.

Sansa shook her head. "Of course not. Pardon, I just...Lady Ellaria wished to speak about the dress?"

He smirked. "No, not really. I think it is coming along quite well, but then, I am told I know very little about these things."

Sansa stared at him. "Then what it is you wished to speak about?" she asked in confusion.

He smiled, reaching out to take the very same arm Margaery had just been holding onto, motioned for Sansa to continue walking down the rose path, and Sansa looked around, realized they had no observers, once again.

"Prince Oberyn-"

"There is a rumor, about King's Landing," Oberyn interrupted her, voice absurdly gentle, though in the next moment Sansa realized why, "That your lord father wrote down King Robert's intention for him to become the Lord Regent of Robert's children, and that your lord father looked in a book, and proclaimed for Stannis Baratheon, instead. The Grandmaester knew the name of this book alone, but Cersei wished to have it destroyed only to be convinced not to. She must have spoken of it, given her predilection for wine."

Sansa felt her throat grow rather tight. "Prince Oberyn, I don't think-"

"What book was that, Sansa?" he continued, stopping on the rose path and turning to look at her with an intense gaze.

She swallowed, thought of the book that had started her renewed friendship with Margaery after the other girl had become queen, that day in the library.

"I..."

"You must know," Oberyn continued, and there was something almost frantic in his gaze, something that brought Sansa up short.

She had the strangest feeling that she shouldn't say. She knew, of course; Cersei had spoken of it to her once, while deep in her cups. She had grabbed Sansa by the chin, tilted her head one way and then another, and remarked idly that she looked more a Tully then a Stark, and perhaps that meant her father ought to be more concerned about his own line than someone else’s.

That had been hint enough, but then Sansa had found the proof, in the book Margaery had found her reading, that one day in the library.

" _The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses_ ," she whispered, not quite able to meet Prince Oberyn's eyes as she spoke, though she couldn't say why.

Instead, Sansa's eyes were drawn to a yellow rose on the bush behind him, still a bud, but blooming, even as she watched it, covered in tiny, red thorns.

Oberyn made a noise in the back of his throat.

"I see," was all he said, finally, and Sansa believed that he did see, just as Margaery had seen.

They all saw, they just didn't care enough to do anything about it. And she didn’t understand what Oberyn thought he might do about it; she had heard of the letters Stannis Baratheon had sent throughout the realm, proclaiming the Lannister children bastards. That had done nothing, just as her father’s words had done nothing.

"Why?" she asked suddenly, gaze flicking back to Prince Oberyn. "What does it matter, what my father read in a book once?"

He shook his head. "Lady Sansa..."

Sansa saw a gold cloak moving towards them out of the corner of her eye, swept desperately away from Prince Oberyn and began walking down the path, away from him, before their interaction could become suspicious.

She did not dare utter a curse when she heard him walking behind her, moving closer, then passing her.

"Be ready," Prince Oberyn whispered to her as he walked on. "Be ready very soon, Lady Sansa."

She blinked after him, and wondered what it was that Prince Oberyn was waiting for, what it was she waited for now, too.

For it was painfully clear that, whatever his business here still was, it was time sensitive, or he would have left with her long ago. Whatever danger it was, she resented that he would risk her for it, even if she had no choice but to allow him just that.


	102. SANSA LXI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angsty smut, per usual.

Finding Margaery after that little interlude with Oberyn proved more difficult than Sansa had thought, and Sansa found herself aimlessly wandering the halls of the Red Keep for some time, searching for the other girl.

She eventually found a crowd outside the throne room, a group of gaggling roses who would no doubt know of their queen's location if no one else did, and Sansa found herself moving closer, the words on the tip of her tongue.

Apparently, something had just happened within the throne room, even if most of these girls had not been there to see it, but Sansa had found that most of the Tyrells were dreadful gossips, and so she waited with them.

"A tournament, isn't it grand?" one of the ladies, Sansa thought it might be a Redwyne, whispered to her. "Oh, I shall love to see it!"

Sansa wondered if the girl thought it would be something out of the songs, as she once had, before she saw Gregor Clegane unhorse and kill a man.

“Whatever for?” she asked. It was not Joffrey’s nameday, after all, nor Margaery’s.

“The King has ordered a celebration,” the girl explained. “Because we have not been openly fighting in months, and he believes that there ought to be more knights pledging themselves to the Kingsguard.”

Sansa raised a brow, wondered why Lord Tywin had thought that necessary. It was true that there were few enough of them now, and she supposed that Lord Tywin could always do with some soldiers knights explicitly to him, for all that they served the King, but it was a rather strange time to go about it.

"Oh," Sansa murmured, and the girl's face fell, clearly affected by Sansa's lack of enthusiasm.

But then she brightened. "Oh, I shall have to have more gowns made," the Redwyne girl went on. "And I do so hope that one of the knights gives me their favor..."

She had spun away at this point, on to the next poor soul who would be forced to hear her ramblings, and Sansa sighed, for if the King was in there making plans for a tournament, no doubt Margaery was beside him.

She left then, the dreary thought on her mind that, unlike the Redwyne girl, there was no chance of Sansa having a new gown made for the tourney, for all that the Lannisters were no longer allowing Joffrey to torment her.

Sansa could hardly remember when she herself had been just like that Redwyne girl, once. Things had changed so much since then for her, and she found the little girl she had once been foolish and flighty, and yet, Sansa found it rather comforting to know that such people still existed in the world.

It meant, perhaps, that all was not completely lost, if little girls could still dream of songs, even if Sansa no longer could.

She didn't know if she believed that, but it was nice to think it, if only for a moment.

"Lady Sansa," a voice called from the gaggle behind her, and Sansa bit back a sigh as she turned, only to find the Lady Alla hurrying toward her, eyes blown rather wide and lips twitching. Sansa could not tell if it was from amusement or something else.

"Lady Alla," she said. "Is something the matter?"

The other girl shook her head, reached out and took Sansa's hand. "I'm supposed to take you somewhere," she whispered, feather soft, into Sansa's ear.

Sansa raised a brow, had a pretty good idea of where this place was even as she asked, "Oh?"

Lady Alla nodded, a pretty blush creeping up her thin neck. "The Queen will join you once she is finished in there." She jerked her thumb back toward the audience chamber.

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek in amusement. "Is she worried that I'll disappear?" she asked playfully, and Alla's eyes widened.

"I'm sure that's not it, my lady, I can-"

Sansa took pity on her, giving the younger girl's hand a squeeze. Gods, she was hardly older than Arya had been when they had first arrived in King's Landing, though the two girls were as different as night and day.

"That was a jape, Lady Alla," she said, and Alla sagged in relief.

"Oh," she murmured, and Sansa giggled and could not quite remember the last time she had done so while not in Margaery's presence.

Then, Alla said brightly, "I suppose this tourney will bring many handsome knights to King's Landing."

Sansa withheld a sigh, supposed that she would not escape the musings of little girls wanting to find their songs, after all.

Sansa supposed she should not be so rough on the girls. She did not know when it had become abhorrent to her, after all, but she had certainly been older than Alla, in any case.

"Tell me, Alla," she said suddenly, determined to change the subject and it striking her that she very much could find something else to speak of with this girl, "How long have you been one of Margaery's ladies?"

Alla accepted the change in topic quickly enough, still smiling as she dragged Sansa along. Sansa was beginning to wonder if she ever stopped.

"Not long," she said, shrugging. "Margaery...er, the Queen requested me as one of her ladies when we left for King's Landing." Her smile, if possible, grew. "I've been to Highgarden loads of times before, though."

They had gotten away from the others now, were winding through corridors Sansa had found far more familiar these days, but she followed Alla along nonetheless.

"I hear it is beautiful there," Sansa said, for she had lost track of the many times when Alla had told her so.

Alla nodded enthusiastically. "It's the most beautiful place I've ever seen," she said, clapping her hands together. "My papa and mama live just outside of Highgarden, in the Reach, but I went there often to play with Margaery or with Lady Leonnette's children, before the war."

Sansa smiled. "Lady Leonette is a very kind woman," she remembered. "She taught me to play the harp."

Alla nodded again. "I tried to learn the harp as well, only, I was never any good at it." She giggled. "Margaery called me a lost cause."

Sansa thought of the last time she had attempted to play the harp, of how Margaery had caught her by surprise and stirred feelings in Sansa that she hadn't wanted to admit she felt for the other girl, and found herself blushing fiercely.

"Of course," Alla continued, with a sly look in her eyes now, "Margaery was never any good when she was younger, either. Cousin Garlan and Loras used to tease her mercilessly about it."

Sansa gaped at her. "She had me to believe that she was perfection itself," she said, mock-scandalized. Of course, Margaery had never said precisely that, but still.

Alla giggled. "She was horrible when she was younger. Oh, she was accomplished at the needle and horseback riding, but music was never her strength. Until she sat down for one whole week with poor Leonette at the beginning of Garlan's marriage and forced the poor lady to teach her to play the thing out of pure stubbornness."

Sansa smiled, partially from amusement and partially because she could quite imagine a young, stubborn Margaery sitting down to a task until she had perfected it.

The smile faded, however, as the odd image of a young Margaery, understanding that she would one day need to charm her way into her husband's bed, "practiced" at that as well.

The thought came from nowhere, and yet, the moment it had arrived, Sansa found that she could not get it from her mind, could only walk beside Alla as the young girl chattered away so amiably to her captive audience, thoughts irrationally consumed with the number of times Margaery would have had to practice this particular art, to so enchant even Joffrey Baratheon.

With the irrational fear that Sansa Stark was just another form of practice.

Her thoughts turned to her septa, to how the woman had once told Sansa that when the time came for a man and a woman to understand that they wanted to be with each other, they would confess this to one another in the form of their holy vows, bound together for the rest of their lives.

There were many things about that situation that were contradicted by Sansa's own, not the least of which that Margaery was already bound to a man for whom she held no love at all, but Sansa still found their own situation confusing, all the same.

She knew that she enjoyed Margaery in a way she should not, knew that she wanted something more from the other girl than stolen moments in their respective bedchambers, but Sansa could no more name that feeling than she could promise Margaery to be with her forever when she knew the Martells were planning to take her from this place soon enough.

How long could it last, what lay between them?

"-And when Leonette gifted Margaery with a harp for her nameday, and I was there so I know, Loras fell over laughing, because everyone knew that Margaery wasn't any good, until she sat down and played it." Alla shrugged. "She's quite good now, but not as good as Leonette. I'm sure it's eating away at her."

Sansa flinched, and then tried to hide the expression underneath a grin. "I'm sure," she murmured with just enough teasing in her voice, and Alla giggled again.

Sansa was rather relieved when they managed to find Margaery's chambers, despite their meandering pace and Alla's gossip mongering, innocent though it was, and Sansa moved toward one of the divans to collapse into it before she realized that to Alla, it might seem strange to see Sansa so at comfort in Margaery's private rooms.

Alla was moving toward the bookshelf Margaery had had installed in her chambers the other day in any case, where Dance of Dragons stood beside half a dozen other well-leafed through stories, some of which Sansa remembered from the songs of her own childhood, and some of which had been clearly borrowed from the Keep's library.

And among them, standing as tall and proud as any of the others, _The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses_.

Sansa flinched when she saw it, racked her mind for any reason that Margaery should possess that book when the last time Sansa had come across it had been when both of them had confessed their true feelings about Joffrey.

And now Prince Oberyn had taken an interest in the very same book, had outright asked Sansa about her father's experience with it. Sansa shivered and glanced back at Alla again, watched as the young girl plucked some sweet song about a kindly and brave knight from Margaery's shelf and tucked it under her arm.

"That seems an awfully young book for Margaery to still have," Sansa said teasingly, focusing on that book in lieu of another, and Alla's gaze swept towards her own almost guiltily.

"She had a copy, a long time ago, in Highgarden," Alla said, with a little shrug. "It was my favorite, but then one day when they were younger Ser Loras and she got in an argument, and she threw his favorite hunting knife over the library's balcony, and he ripped her favorite passages out of the book. Lady Alerie made them apologize and then be separate from each for a whole week, and after that they never had a serious argument again."

Sansa jerked, tried to equate the boy and girl in that story to the patient Margaery and chivalric Ser Loras, and couldn't quite do so, no matter how young they might have been at the time.

The story reminded her uncomfortably of herself and Arya.

"So when we got to King's Landing and Margaery found this book in the library," Alla continued, almost petting the spine of the book under her arm, "She stole it for me to read."

Sansa giggled. "You've painted quite a picture of her," she said.

Alla grinned, leaned forward to whisper in a conspiratorial tone, "And I have loads more."

"Thank you, Alla," Margaery's voice said from the door, and Sansa jerked, having not even noticed the other girl's presence. Margaery was smiling impishly at Alla when Sansa turned, though her hazel eyes flicked to Sansa in amusement. "That will be all, I think."

Alla blinked, staring at a place somewhere between the two of them, before nodding. "Right," she said, teeth clicking together as she ended the last word.

Margaery rolled her eyes, though her expression was fond. "Alla?" she said.

Alla glanced toward her queen.

If anything, Margaery's fond exasperation only seemed to grow, with this. "That means you can go," she told the other girl, a smile in her voice if not on her lips.

Alla blinked between the two of them, and then flushed crimson. "Oh! Right."

And then the younger girl was practically skipping from the room, shutting the door silently behind her, just so that the latch flipped shut upon her exist.

Sansa stared after her in amazement, wondered when she had learned that neat trick.

And then she found herself wondering how many others among Margaery's ladies knew of this great secret they were keeping, for Alla had clearly been able to infer why Margaery wanted some privacy, as young as she was.

How many other times had Alla latched that door for her lady?

"Are you quite all right?" Margaery asked her, suddenly standing directly in front of her where Sansa had not noticed her before, reaching out to caress Sansa's cheek, which had no doubt gone rather green.

"I...I'm fine," Sansa stuttered out, pulling Margaery back into her arms, pretending that the thought that the Martells would be dragging her from this place, and very soon, was farther from her mind.

It didn't matter, in this moment. Only Margaery mattered, she was certain.

"Sansa," Margaery said, her voice commanding that Sansa speak, tell her what it was she wanted to know.

And then, because she needed to distract herself somehow, Sansa forced herself to smile and say, "this is meant to be the Maidenvault, Your Grace," Sansa scolded playfully, for all that they had desecrated it many times before.

Margaery laughed. "Do you think that stopped Baelor the Blessed's sweet sisters?" she whispered against Sansa's chest, leaning down and taking one of her nipples into her mouth.

Sansa gasped, arching forward and barely withholding a low moan. "T-They were sisters, though, how could they-"

Margaery gave a low, rumbling laugh that...did things to Sansa, made her skin tremble where they touched.

"My sweet dove," she murmured. "You must know your history. The Targaryens married their sisters, and you and I and Loras and Renly are not the only ones in Westerosi history to have engaged in...carnal relations that the Seven frowns upon."

Sansa wanted to push her away and tell her that she was not a fool, that everyone knew about Cersei and Jaime, but then Margaery's teeth grazed against her nipple, and she could barely think, let alone speak enough to say such a thing.

Instead, little grunting moans that turned her skin crimson left her, and Margaery's hands snaked down her neck, rubbing against the tint as if she thought it might come off with her fingers.

And then she giggled. "Does that bother you?" Margaery asked sweetly. "That the Seven would frown upon us?"

Sansa bit her lip, noticed the look of almost disappointment in Margaery's eyes before Sansa even opened her mouth.

Sansa knew that, months ago, she might have said yes. Might have said that the thought of doing something which she had been taught by her septa and the rest of Westeros for the whole of her young life was wrong horrified her.

But Margaery had awoken feelings in Sansa that she had never felt before, and she knew that sounded like something out of the songs in itself, when she had just judged another girl for the same, but Sansa could not help how she felt.

Could not help clinging to the one person in her life who made sense to her, the one person disposed to be kind to her.

And if the gods thought that was wrong, there was nothing Sansa could do about it.

The gods, after all, had not thought it was wrong to kill all that remained of her family, to toss the Stark name to the wind.

Sansa flipped the other girl onto her back, and Margaery gasped, stared up at her with wide blown eyes.

"My people follow the Old Gods," Sansa whispered, trailing kisses down Margaery's neck as the other girl exposed it further. Even as she knew the words rang emptily, for she had never been more than prey since she had arrived in King's Landing, hardly a wolf at all. "They don't care about such things."

Margaery smirked, lifted her head to kiss Sansa once more, their lips brushing together in a way that sent a spark straight through Sansa.

"My wolf," Margaery murmured, voice breathy in a way Sansa had never heard it before, pulling away to reach out and brush at Sansa's hair, her fingers running through it and resting on Sansa's naked, heaving breast.

Sansa sucked in a breath, her thighs incredibly wet for how little they had done so far. Something of this must have shown in her eyes, for when she glanced down once more, Margaery's breaths had grown ragged with want.

Sansa bent down, kissing Margaery's heavy lips and tasting pleasure on them, kissing them again and again until she felt Margaery start to wilt beneath her, felt Margaery's hands lifting to fist in Sansa's hair.

And she allowed the scrape of Margaery's teeth against her delicate skin to scrub away the worries she'd had earlier, the later feel of Margaery's tongue inside of her to force out the thoughts that perhaps they were both lying to one another every time they took each other to bed.

And when Sansa came, whimpering Margaery's name, and saw the spark of lust and victory in Margaery's eyes as it always was there when she drove Sansa over the edge, Sansa absolutely was not wondering whether that spark of victory came from watching Sansa Stark come undone beneath her, or from watching her latest bit of practice do so.


	103. SANSA LXII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another short chappie

"When we get to Dorne," Ellaria said, her voice sweet in a way that Sansa had once found comforting, like that of a mother to her daughter, and now found cloying, with every secret it pretended to divulge and did not. "Oberyn will send you to the Water Gardens, where some of my younger daughters live even now. I think you shall be quite happy there."

She knew that Ellaria could see Sansa's hesitation in these recent days since she had outright confronted the other woman, an action which it still made her shiver to think that she had done, wondered idly if she could smell it as a wolf ought to have been able to, the indecision racing through Sansa's thoughts.

Still, Sansa nodded and smiled.

"I've heard that they are quite lovely," she agreed, going back to her sewing and pretending that she had not already pricked her fingers half a dozen times since Ellaria had requested her presence here to work on the gown which Ellaria had bought for her.

She did not doubt that it was lovely there, that the Water Gardens were a place of beauty that made King's Landing simply pale in comparison, for all that it wasn't in this wretched city, but Sansa was antsy.

Ellaria had promised her that they were leaving soon, that Sansa ought not to give up and that they were being deliberately vague for her own protection, but, far from reassure her, the words had only served to make Sansa more nervous, and she did not know why.

Did not know if it was because she hated not knowing when it would happen, or the thought of leaving Margaery behind when it did.

Which was ridiculous, of course. As much as she liked the time she spent with Margaery, sleeping with the King's wife was always a pertinent reminder of how endangered Sansa was here, how unsafe.

"Sansa," Ellaria said suddenly, a questioning tone in her voice that Sansa couldn't help but think boded ill, "I am sorry if Prince Oberyn's words the other day disturbed you."

Sansa swallowed, knowing immediately to what she referred. How could she not, after all?

Sansa licked dry lips. "I...I worry," she whispered, finally.

Ellaria nodded, tone sympathetic. "Because of your father."

Sansa's forehead wrinkled and she lifted her head. "What Prince Oberyn is doing..." she took a careful breath, folded her hands in her lap. "What I assume Prince Oberyn is doing, based on what he spoke of..." she shook her head. "The Lannisters will not allow him to do it."

Ellaria moved then, getting out of her chair and dropping to her knees in front of Sansa, the pose demanding that Sansa look down at her.

"Prince Oberyn will be quite as safe as he can, my love," Ellaria murmured. "I promise you."

Sansa hissed in a breath. "I..."

"Sansa," Ellaria said, voice careful, "Is there anything you know about that book? Anything...beyond what Lord Stannis released in those letters? Something that would make the Lannisters want to hide it even now."

Sansa swallowed. "I..."

_It is in the Queen's bedchambers, now._

"Oh, you needn't worry," Ellaria said, waving a hand at her companions. "Your words are safe here."

Sansa swallowed, didn't know if any words were ever safe in King's Landing. "I know nothing more than that," she murmured quietly. "I swear. My father...well, he did not have much time to speak with me."

She allowed some of the pain she felt to bleed into her expression, hoped that it would be enough to convince the woman to stop pressing where Sansa could not bear to be pressed.

_Why did Margaery have the book? What possible reason could she give for it, if Sansa would have asked her?_

Ellaria's face transformed into an expression of sympathy. "Poor child. I am sorry to have dredged up such painful memories."

But clearly, she and Oberyn had some purpose for doing so. A purpose which meant that, whatever it was they were searching for and would not tell her about, that something becoming painfully more clear to Sansa by the day, they had not yet found it.

Which meant that they were not yet ready to leave, and every minute that they dallied here was another in which Sansa found herself almost spilling her tale to Margaery.

"Stannis Baratheon already sent out letters to all of the realm that our King was not...legitimate," Sansa said, choosing her words carefully. "I don't understand what you attempt, here."

Ellaria sighed, patted Sansa's hand. "Your needlework is looking quite impressive, for a girl your age," she said, instead of answering, but this time, Sansa saw the quiet warning in her eyes, remembered her words on their journey into the town. "None of my girls have your proficiency." She paused, though her smile was rather forced. "Nor your patience."

Sansa merely hoped it would be worth it, in the end.


	104. MARGAERY XXXII

He'd called for her at a time when he was usually busy with matters of state, though Margaery supposed that was hardly the case now, and she should have seen that coming.

She only hoped that Sansa would understand, and would not think Margaery's absence some reflection on her. Sansa was terribly insecure about such things, sometimes.

"My love," Margaery murmured, stepping into the room and giving her husband a wide smile to make up for their time apart of late. Joffrey would expect her to be just as angry over it as he, just as willing to be with her husband at any opportunity.

Joffrey stepped forward, ignoring the threatening presence of Ser Boros in the corner as he pulled his wife into his arms and breathed shakily into her neck, hiding his expression from her.

Margaery hated it when he did that, when she could not read the expression on his face.

"I would have you," Joffrey gritted out a moment later, looking terribly frustrated, and for a moment Margaery wondered why before remembering his grandfather's edicts about what Joffrey could and could not do with his time.

Until you learn to appreciate your wife...

She wondered how long Tywin would force Joffrey to wait. He must understand that iposing so many rules on Joffrey was not safe for whomever Joffrey decided to turn his ire upon now that he could no longer touch Lady Sansa.

And Margaery knew that, given the choice, her family would always chose Margaery over the girl who had not given them the North, if she gave them even a hint that they needed to.

She gave her husband an impish smile. "Then why don't you, my love?" she whispered, leaning close, letting him inhale her and able to tell by the dilation of his eyes that he had done just that.

"Have me right here, before Lord Tywin can send any more of his cronies to spy on us," she murmured, and Joffrey's next breath came out in a needy pant.

"My queen..." he said, glancing toward the door, and...

Ah, that was right. Margaery had almost forgotten.

Her husband was a coward.

She bit back a sigh, for while she had no real wish to fuck her husband, she also had no wish to receive another lecture at the mouth of her father for her inability to as of yet provide him with a grandson to sit on the Iron Throne.

"Lord Tywin to see you, Your Grace," a servant said, opening the door to make the announcement, this one particular skittish as he stared at the floor in lieu of the King, and Joffrey groaned, clearly relieved for the excuse for all that he did not wish to admit it.

"I hate my grandfather," Joffrey hissed out, pulling back from Margaery as that very man pushed open the doors to her chambers and entered the room.

Still, Margaery giggled at her husband's words, letting her mouth curve up into an amused smile that she didn't feel.

Lord Tywin pretended not to hear, however, stepping further into the room as two Kingsguard flanked him, and Margaery blinked at that little subtle show of power.

They all knew who was running Westeros, she thought idly. There was no need to rub it in, especially when the subtly would no doubt be lost on something of Joffrey's caliber.

Margaery patted her husband's arm sympathetically, and stepped dutifully away from him.

"Your Grace," Lord Tywin said coolly, and Joffrey turned his annoyed gaze to his grandfather, not even bothering to show his ire.

"My lord," Joffrey said, motioning for him to speak about whatever it was he planned to, Joffrey clearly thinking it was beneath his interest.

Lord Tywin turned to Margaery, gave her what might have been considered a stiff bow in only the loosest of terms, before turning back to his grandson.

"There is something we need to discuss," he said, and Joffrey crossed his arms over his chest, lower lip jutting out in what was clearly about to become a pout.

"Oh? Am I to be allowed in on whatever it is, then?" he demanded, and Margaery let out a huff of laughter before remembering herself.

Tywin did not look nearly as amused. She wondered if he had asked his son, before sending him to fight the Greyjoys, who had placed him on the roster to guard the King's bedchambers, that night.

"I understand that Queen Margaery's visit to the Sparrows was not...helpful," he said, not looking at Margaery at all while she spoke, and Margaery suppressed the urge to tell him off for it.

For a fleeting moment, she felt a stab of pity for Cersei, having such a father. No doubt it explained much about her current...state.

Not that Margaery's own father was much different in at least his views about the making of decisions, in families, for all that he didn't realize how his own women plotted circles about him.

Joffrey sniffed, clearly annoyed. It took Margaery a moment to remember why, to remember that he'd raged about sending his Kingsguard out to butcher them all, only to be reminded, rather unsubtly, by his Hand that he could not do so.

Oh, Tywin had dressed it up in the reason of keeping the peace amongst the smallfolk whom they, after all, ruled, but Margaery knew as well as anyone that Lord Tywin was not the sort to leave any insubordination unpunished.

"Yes. And those abominations would know my thoughts on the matter if you would let me-" Joffrey broke off suddenly, glancing at Margaery, and she let out a little humming sound, face impassive.

Tywin glanced between them, and Margaery was frustrated that she was no closer to reading his emotionless face now than she had been when she first met him after the Battle of Blackwater, but she thought that might have been amusement, there and gone in an instant.

"Be that as it may," Tywin went on, "An example will be made of them. They cannot simply allow one of their own to attack the Queen without due retribution."

"An example was made," Margaery said sweetly, ignoring the flash of irritation on the face of the Lord of Casterly Rock. He may have thought himself a genius worthy of every respect from a child and a woman, but it had taken Margaery pushing the matter in his face before he had acknowledged the wrongs Sansa had suffered.

And that was unforgivable.

Frankly, she was surprised he had not asked her to leave the room, while he discussed with his son. Perhaps he hated Joffrey’s company as much as she.

"My brother killed the boy in question,” Margaery continued. “The Sparrows themselves have no designs against the Crown, I do not think. I found them to be a peaceful and charity-minded people."

"Before one of their own attempted to kill you, Your Grace," Tywin said, features tightening.

Margaery looked away, felt Joffrey squeeze her hand and glanced at her husband in what was almost alarm, until she tempered it to a relieved smile.

"The Sparrows will be dealt with," Lord Tywin repeated, and Margaery wondered if perhaps his narrowed eyes did not miss everything which happened beneath his roof, the way he was looking between the two of them. And then, he held out a piece of parchment to Joffrey. "You will read this at the tourney."

Joffrey's nose scrunched up at the order. "What is it?" he demanded, making no effort to open the thing while Margaery's fingers itched to do so herself.

Lord Tywin's jaw twitched. "An answer to their heretic ways. Evidently, these Sparrows marched into one of Baelish's brothels and dragged the High Septon out into the streets in shame." He shot Margaery a look. "But if the King still believes they have no design against the authority of their betters, he may choose not to read it."

Joffrey opened the parchment then, grinning despite his earlier ire with Tywin, and Margaery admitted to the privacy of her own mind, where this old lion would never hear it, that perhaps Lord Tywin was the genius he thought himself after all.

"Anyone seen receiving charities from the heretic group known as the Sparrows will be arrested in the name of the Faith and the Crown. The Sparrows themselves are ordered to disperse or face judgment from the Crown," Joffrey prattled off, before he frowned at what was clearly the end of the missive. "That's it?" he demanded, lifting his head.

Lord Tywin raised a brow. "Would you add something, Your Grace?"

"They nearly killed my wife!" he screeched, and Margaery allowed herself a small flinch at the sound, for Joffrey was paying her no mind. "They made a mockery of your stupid High Septon. They ought to be slaughtered, all of them."

"Hmm," Lord Tywin said, starting to pace then. "And when you have sent your guards out to slaughter these men, and the smallfolk riot, what will you do then?"

"I'll slaughter them, too!" Joffrey snapped.

Lord Tywin shook his head, looking faintly insulted that such a creature belonged to his lineage.

"And start yet another war, like you did when you cut off Ned Stark's head. No, Your Grace, I think that will be enough dramatics to last us all quite some time. These Sparrows will be ordered to disperse, and when they do not, we will see how long they retain the love of the people when they are no longer providing them with food."

Joffrey pouted. "And if they don't?"

Lord Tywin glanced at Margaery. "Then circumstances will be readdressed,” he said, and Joffrey looked like he hoped that would be the case.


	105. SANSA LXIII

"Marg..." Sansa rasped, arching her back as Margaery's fingers dipped between the cheeks of her arse, her thumbs drawing gentle circles into Sansa's flanks.

And then her fingers moved, down between Sansa's thighs until they scraped delicately against the lips of Sansa's womanhood.

Sansa bit her lip so hard she thought she tasted blood along with the saliva gathering on the insides of her mouth, closed her eyes and reveled in the sensations as Margaery's fingers brushed against Sansa's lips once more, before pushing inside of her womanhood.

Sansa gasped again, squirmed in arousal as Margaery's fingers curled gently inside of her, teeth scraping small circles over her lip in time with Margaery's fingers inside of her.

And then Margaery's fingers pushed further, into that spot they had discovered earlier, and Sansa gasped, unable to hold back the sound as a rush of arousal hit her, as she spilled into Margaery's awaiting hand unthinkingly.

When the world once more returned to focus, though Sansa's breaths still came in faint gasps, she found Margaery laying on her side on the bed beside Sansa, smiling wistfully down at her while she plaited her own hair.

Sansa swallowed hard, wondered if the hazy glow that surrounded Margaery after each time she had made Sansa come would ever leave her.

And then Margaery noticed Sansa's eyes on her, smiled softly as her hands brushed aside the sheer shift that came down to just her waist and dipped between her own thighs, brushing against her cunny tantalizingly.

Sansa swallowed hard, watched as the other girl fingered herself, the movements slow and sure. Sansa licked her lips.

She had touched Margaery like that, had watched Margaery touch her like that. But there was something erotic and mystifying about watching Margaery touch herself in the same manner, without Sansa's help.

Margaery glanced up, noticed that she had Sansa's attention, pushed her fingers in and out, fucking herself on her fingers, and Sansa bit back the gasp that wanted to spill forth from her lips.

She darted forward, kissing Margaery's opened mouth impulsively, enjoying the way Margaery's breath whooshed into her own, the other girl clearly surprised.

For a moment, Sansa felt Margaery's hand, where the arm brushed against Sansa's leg, still, before her moments became hurried, and Sansa almost felt Margaery's phantom fingers inside of herself as Margaery came with a quiet cry.

Sansa glanced down, looked at Margaery's fingers, covered in their sex, found herself wanting to lick those fingers clean even if she had not enjoyed the taste, before.

Margaery bent down, licking a stripe down Sansa's throat before the other girl could act on the impulse.

"Gods, if I have to stand between Lord Tywin and Joffrey one more time, I might just let them at each other," Margaery said, laughing lightly as her teeth grazed the outer shell of Sansa's ear.

Sansa gasped. "I understand now why the thought of Lord Tywin so put you off the one time I mentioned it," she reprimanded, and heard Margaery's tittering laugh above her, felt the girl's mouth move down to suck at the back of Sansa's neck.

"Margaery," she said suddenly, a horrifying thought occurring to her. "Am I boring you?"

Above her, Margaery paused, glanced down at Sansa with a stricken impression, before bending down to kiss her cheek.

"My apologies, darling. Never," she murmured, and Sansa let out a little moan, smiled up at the other girl as she grabbed at the apex between Margaery's shoulder and neck, pulled her lips down to meet Sansa's.

When they both pulled away, gasping, Sansa murmured, "Forgiven."

Always forgiven. Sansa had realized that recently, realized how difficult she found it to hold a grudge against this woman for anything, even if she knew she should.

"Your Grace," Lady Elinor called loudly from the outer chamber of Margaery's rooms, where Sansa remembered seeing her sitting down to sew earlier, however embarrassing knowing that had been, and Margaery and Sansa froze simultaneously where they lay entwined on the bed.

And then, a very familiar voice. "Is my wife here?"

Sansa closed her eyes, readied herself for the inevitable punishment when Joffrey walked in and found his wife having sex with Sansa Stark.

Sansa had always wondered when Joffrey would lose his patience and finally kill her, his grandfather's plans for her be damned.

"Seven," Margaery gasped, pushing Sansa out of the bed so quickly that the younger girl nearly overbalanced and fell to the floor. She glanced at Margaery incredulously, but Margaery did not have time to explain herself, merely grabbing Sansa by the arm and dragging her forward.

From behind them, Sansa could hear Elinor's rather high voice, explaining that the Queen had taken a nap this afternoon but she could readily wake her, if the King demanded it.

"Marg-"

Margaery hushed her with an open mouthed kiss, and Sansa was too startled to realize she was being bodily maneuvered until she found herself pushed into one of the opulent wardrobes kept in the Queen's chambers.

Margaery gave her a hurried, "Don't make a sound," and slammed the little doors to the wardrobe rather harshly, an ominous click coming a moment later and leaving Sansa in complete darkness, pressed in on all sides by Margaery's gowns.

"Margaery?" she whispered, before biting off the words, remembering the girl's admonishment to keep quiet.

Just in time, Sansa thought, for a moment later, Joffrey was sweeping into the Queen's bedchambers, telling Elinor, "I can do that myself."

Sansa heard hurried footsteps, and then Margaery's voice, sounding just as calm as if she had not a concern in the world.

"My love," she murmured, and Sansa heard the soft patter of her footsteps before a quiet oof from Joffrey.

"My queen," Joffrey sounded as if he were positively preening, and Sansa wondered if Margaery had gone into his arms, had kissed him immediately upon seeing him, Sansa's juices still on her lips.

"What are you doing here?" Margaery asked, her tone perhaps a bit too forced, for there was a long pause before Joffrey reacted, tone full of affront.

"And why should I not visit my wife in her chambers?" he asked, and Margaery let out what Sansa imagined could have been a forced laugh. Wished she knew for sure.

"Of course. Only...you usually prefer not to visit me in my chambers," she said, and Joffrey sniffed.

"My lord grandfather refuses to allow me to do anything there, always having one of my own damn dogs watching me," he muttered resentfully. "Here, your brother has the good sense to wait outside, when his king wishes to see the Queen."

Margaery giggled. "Is that an invitation to what it sounds like, my love?"

Joffrey made a sound that Sansa felt was somewhere between a growl and a hiss, and then all she could hear was the shuffle of clothes, the thump of them hitting the floor, the sound of Margaery's giggle once more.

Sansa pushed further into the wardrobe into which Margaery had so unceremoniously dumped her, reached up to cover her ears a moment later, when the sound of Margaery's exaggerated moans filled the air, the sound of Joffrey's grunts following a moment later, followed by a rhythmic slapping of skin against skin.

The wardrobe was much smaller on the inside, Sansa thought, than it seemed from the outside, and she pushed against the clothes holding her so tightly in place, finding it difficult to breathe.

"You're so brave, my love," Margaery gasped out, and Sansa heard a quiet thump that she thought might have been the both of them hitting the bed, "Coming here, where Lord Tywin cannot touch us, to have me."

If Joffrey caught the double meaning of her words, as Sansa did, stifling a chuckle despite her circumstances, it did not show in his own voice.

"Of course I am. Hand of the King or not, no man will keep me from my wife," Joffrey grunted, and then they didn't say anything for a while, and Sansa grimaced, for while they said nothing, the sounds of their activities were rather too loud for her ears.

Sansa winced, listened to the soft thumping noises with chagrin, knowing that Margaery had had no other choice but to hide her here without risking exposure, but still resenting that she was forced to listen to it, anyway.

The bed squeaked. Sansa buried her face in the suddenly very warm clothes surrounding her.

"I cannot wait until Lord Tywin realizes how foolish he is being, with his edicts," Margaery gasped out, still clearly panting though, from the sound of things, their activities were clearly done.

A moment later, Joffrey hummed. "He'll beg for my forgiveness when he realizes how he has angered his king," he agreed, and Sansa snorted.

A stillness seemed to enter the air, and Sansa went still with it, reaching up to cover her mouth with both hands and closing her eyes tightly, never mind that she could see nothing with them open anyway.

"My lady?" Joffrey questioned, tone dangerous.

There was a pause, and then Sansa's snort turned into Margaery's tittering laugh, the same one she had used moments before when the two of them had been in bed together.

It sounded hollow, now. Perhaps it had sounded hollow then, Sansa thought horribly.

"It is just..." Margaery giggled again. "I cannot wait to see that."

After a moment, during which Sansa couldn't imagine Joffrey believing his wife, Joffrey laughed, as well.

"Indeed. Perhaps I will let you watch, when he comes to me on bended knee. Just after I deliver Stannis Baratheon's head on a stick in a victorious battle."

There was a pause, and then the sounds of wet kissing, and Sansa grimaced.

"I will cherish the very day, my love. My brave lion," she murmured, voice cloyingly sweet, and Sansa closed her eyes, felt bile rising at the back of her throat.

"Hmm," Joffrey murmured. "Perhaps I will bring Stannis' head to you first, as a trophy. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Margaery hummed happily. "I would," she admitted. "We could hang it on the outer wall, where you keep all of your other trophies. Then none would dare question your authority, as king."

Sansa thought about the book in Margaery's chambers, the one that questioned that authority, the one Prince Oberyn was looking for, even if Sansa did not know what he would do with it.

The blood rushed in her ears, and in the next moment that she could hear, Sansa listened to Margaery confess her undying love for her "lion."

Sansa gagged, the nausea in her stomach filling her all of the way to her throat as she tried not to think of how Margaery had whispered some of those very same words to her minutes earlier.


	106. SANSA LXIV

"The Queen requires your presence in the gardens," the Tyrell guard who arrived in Tyrion's chambers just after the noon meal informed her, and Sansa bit back a smile as she jumped up, setting aside her needlework and avoiding Shae's rapidly growing more concerned eyes as Sansa scurried to the wardrobe at the edge of the room and reached for a shawl.

The other woman knew of Lord Tyrion's request that Sansa no longer speak with Margaery quite so much, knew that Sansa was determined not to heed her husband in this, but, while she had not openly said anything about her own feelings on the matter, Sansa had felt her disapproval since that day, as Sansa had continued to do as she wished.

Sansa forced herself to swallow down bile and pretend it didn't taste like guilt as she slipped out of the pair of slippers she wore around Tyrion's chambers and into a waiting pair of shoes by the door. They were small now, too small, and pinched around her toes, but they were her best walking shoes these days, a gift from when she had still been Joffrey's lady and he had still considered her worthy of such gifts.

She wasn't guilty. The Imp had no right to dictate whom she might spend her time with, after all, when his family had killed her parents, killed her brother.

"My lady," Shae said behind her, and Sansa bit back a sigh, turned and forced herself to smile to the other woman.

"Yes, Shae?" She wondered if the other woman could sense how pinched her expression was.

"Might I come with you?" Shae asked, her tone careful, worried, and Sansa took a deep breath, reminded herself that Shae really did care about her, had shown that emotion countless times. She did not deserve Sansa's ire.

"Shae..." she thought frantically for an appropriate answer that would give her and Margaery relative peace, finally found one. "I don't think Queen Margaery would like that. She...usually likes to be alone, for walks in the gardens."

Because she wanted to be able to kiss Sansa with the rush of knowing that anyone could see them, out in the gardens, but wouldn't.

Shae frowned, and Sansa flushed as she realized how that might be misconstrued, what Shae's mind had no doubt turned to.

"You...you could walk a distance behind us," Sansa said, with a defeated little sigh, and then felt enormously guilty when she saw the sheer relief on the older woman's face, as she dropped her sewing and moved to Sansa's side almost instantly.

The guilt did not leave until they had made their way to where Margaery was waiting in the gardens, flanked by one of her Kingsguard, but smiling brightly enough, nothing like the expression that had been on her face when she had pulled Sansa out of her closet while Joffrey dozed in her bed and shooed the other girl silently from her room.

The thought made Sansa's own smile dim, a bit.

"Lady Shae," Margaery said, greeting her first, and Sansa suppressed the strange surge of jealousy she felt at that. It vanished quickly enough with Margaery's next words, however. "I wonder if you might keep my Kingsguard company while Lady Sansa and I explore the new path I just found?"

Shae gave Sansa a knowing look, and then stepped toward Ser Boros. "Of course, Your Grace," she said dutifully, curtseying to her queen and watching with narrowed eyes as Margaery held out her arm to Sansa and Sansa took it.

Ser Boros glanced at Shae as if he found her to be a rather annoying pebble in his shoe, but did not protest as she held out her arm for him to take, and Sansa and Margaery hurried on ahead of them, Margaery poking Sansa and giggling at the expression on her Kingsguard's face, and Sansa attempting to find the amusement in it that Margaery seemed to.

They did not get far down this new path, though they did turn a corner to where they could no longer quite be seen by their two guards, before Sansa felt her arm squeezed, looked up to find Margaery winking at her.

"I have you all to myself now," Margaery said, with a little laugh as she threw an arm around Sansa's shoulders, pulling her further into the gardens, down this strange path that Sansa couldn't help but think didn't look new at all.

"Hopefully with no distractions, this time," Sansa teased, watching as the light glinted perfectly off of Margaery's hair, her silky white, sheer gown. She looked radiant.

"Oh, Sansa," Margaery tucked a piece of Sansa's hair behind her ears. "I am sorry about that. And the time that my ladies interrupted us before we could...get back to what we had been doing before."

Sansa tucked her hands behind her back. "It's all right," she promised the other girl, even if it wasn't, even if Sansa hated the thought that she could only have Margaery at Joffrey's beck and call.

Hated the thought that Joffrey touched Margaery in the same way that Sansa did.

"You always make it up to me," she murmured, and Margaery's eyes gleamed promisingly before she dipped down, parting Sansa's legs and moving between them in one move.

Sansa gasped, glancing around and grabbing the other girl by the hair, yanking her back up to her feet.

"Seven, Margaery, someone might have seen you," she hissed out, glancing over her shoulder to the other end of the gardens where they had left Shae behind with a member of the Kingsguard only to see that the other woman wasn't even looking in their direction, and Margaery chuckled.

"I only dropped my pin," she said innocently, picking up the golden lion pin that had been just a moment before attached to the shoulder of her gown.

Sansa snorted eloquently. "You are impossible," she told the other girl.

Margaery grinned. "I know that it was...quite terrifying, when Joffrey almost discovered us."

The smile vanished on Sansa's features. "More than that," she whispered. "I thought we truly were doomed."

Margaery sighed, reached out and squeezed Sansa's hand once more. "Oh, Sansa." She bit her lip. "I suppose now is hardly the time to confess that I found it...rather exciting?"

Sansa gaped at the other girl. "Exciting?" she repeated incredulously.

Margaery's smirk fell. "Sorry. I...That was tasteless."

Sansa slanted a look toward the other girl. "Yes. Still, though..." she giggled, thinking of her time in the wardrobe, listening to Margaery butter up the boy when she knew that Sansa was listening in.

She no longer felt resentment toward the other girl, as she had on that day. If she thought back to those words she had heard Margaery saying to Joffrey, she knew that the cadence in them, the exaggeration of the words themselves, told her all she needed to know about Margaery's feelings for her husband.

And Sansa had already resolved not to envy Joffrey for anything involving Margaery save the band around her finger.

And, with that thought in mind, what had happened had been rather amusing, even if it had involved a terrifying amount of adrenaline at the prospect of being caught for what they hadn't been trying hard enough to hide.

With that thought in mind, Sansa turned back to Margaery.

"It did teach us something important, though," she told the other girl. "We need to be more careful."

Margaery sighed. "I...I know," she murmured, a sadness dipping into her voice that Sansa had never heard there before. "I couldn't bear if something happened because of what we're doing. We'll just have to...be more careful. Lord Tywin obviously will not be able to keep his grandson at bay for long, already is failing at that."

Sansa nodded, shivering a little despite the cold, not wanting to give up what they had in the name of caution at all. They fell into a silence that, for the first time that Sansa could remember in a long time, was uncomfortable.

Margaery always had something to say.

"Are you excited for the tournament?" Margaery asked her suddenly, sounding just as at a loss as she, and Sansa blinked at the other girl, shrugged.

"I hear it is to be something quite magnificent," she said, instead of answering, which she had no doubt Margaery noticed. "Lord Tywin has borrowed even more money from the Iron Bank to pay for it."

Margaery shrugged. "Most of that money was from House Tyrell," she said, with an amused glint in her eye.

Ah.

"This tournament," Sansa said, "What is the real reason for it?" she asked, and Margaery shrugged.

"How should I know?" she murmured, sounding rather bitter. "It's not as if I am allowed to the meetings of the Small Council without my husband."

Sansa swallowed, knowing that was partially her own fault, even if Margaery would not see it that way. If not for Sansa's being caught in Joffrey's chambers, after all, Lord Tywin would not have implicated such restrictions on his grandson.

Margaery caught the guilt in her expression even when Sansa said nothing, however, turning and taking both of Sansa's hands in her own.

"I didn't mean it like that," Margaery said, voice quiet. "I'm glad that Lord Tywin figured out what was going on before anything could go further. The fate that Joffrey wanted for you is not something I would wish upon anyone."

Sansa blinked at her, the vehemence in Margaery's voice surprising her a little. While she of course agreed with the sentiment, Margaery spoke as if there was something even more personal in the thought than what any other young woman might have felt.

As if...

"Margaery," Sansa said, watched as the other girl turned away abruptly, leading Sansa by the hand further into the gardens. "Does Joffrey..."

Margaery spun back to her, eyes too wide for the reaction to have been a natural one. "No, no. Oh, Sansa, you needn't worry about such things between Joffrey and I. Remember, Lord Tywin won't even let us..."

Sansa snorted. "I remember," she said. As if she was likely to forget.

Margaery's amused smile was rather too wide. "Then you know there is nothing to worry about," she reminded the other girl, and Sansa's eyes narrowed even as she nodded and smiled, thought of her time spent in that wardrobe as she had listened to the two of them...

Margaery hadn’t meant it, not really, Sansa reminded herself. Of course she hadn’t.

"Right," Sansa agreed pleasantly. "I'm glad."


	107. SANSA LXV

"More bread, my lady?" Sansa's lord husband inquired, holding out the bread basket with an almost desperate expression.

Behind him, Shae was watching Sansa intently, and Sansa bit back a sigh as she took a loaf, smiled at her husband in thanks as she placed it on her own plate.

And then they lapsed into the same uncomfortable silence they had been indulging in for far too long now, and Sansa found the bread dry almost to the point of choking when she placed it in her mouth.

Things had been strained between Sansa and Tyrion ever since he had told her he wished she would spend less time with Queen Margaery, and Sansa had told him she had no intention of following this advice.

She knew such a thing was wrong, as a wife, for it was her duty to obey her husband, and yet, Sansa found that the thought of giving Margaery up, after everything else she had been steadily forced to give up since her arrival in King's Landing, was something she physically could not do.

She thought it might kill her, even if she knew that explaining such a thing to Lord Tyrion could either get her killed or would only make him frown like he was realizing his little wife was much younger than he'd thought.

But she knew that the tension between them was bothering Shae, caught between two people whom Sansa was only just beginning to understand she cared about, and Sansa had no wish to alienate the other woman, as well.

Besides Margaery, Shae was perhaps Sansa's only friend in King's Landing, and Sansa was loathe to lose either one of them.

"My lord?" Sansa murmured, and hated the way her voice came out in a squeak, the instant sympathy her lord turned upon her.

She hated seeing his sympathy, these days. It made her feel as if she were made of glass.

"Yes, my lady?" he asked, tone quieter even than hers, and somehow, that only made Sansa feel worse.

"I..." she took a deep breath. "I would like to apologize. For the words I said to you the other day."

Her husband seemed to instantly understand the source of her discomfort; he swallowed, glanced between her and Shae awkwardly.

Shae stood to her feet and left the room, no doubt to give them the privacy this conversation deserved. Sansa was rather grateful for that.

"I...That is, Lady Sansa, I understand that-" Tyrion began, the moment Shae was gone, but Sansa interrupted him.

"I know that my actions of late have been disrespectful," Sansa said carefully, "And I know that your words that day were said out of...worry for me."

Tyrion looked at her in something like surprise. "I...Yes. I...I truly didn't mean to cause you offense," he said finally, and Sansa nodded, for she had already known this, of course, even if she didn't want to admit it.

"But I also know that Margaery is a friend to me, that she is not using me," Sansa went on, and when Tyrion opened his mouth to speak, she started to rush out the rest of what she would say, before he could stop it. "I know you have no reason to believe that, my lord, but I ask that, as your lady wife, you trust me, as I will defer to your judgment in all other matters."

Tyrion sighed, reached up to pinch at his nose. "Can you not see that it is because you are my lady wife that I feel this concern for you?" he asked her, his tone almost desperate.

Sansa swallowed hard, looked away. "I can. You were kind to me before," she whispered, and Tyrion sucked in a breath, moved forward until he was on his knees before her.

"Sansa..." he whispered, his voice so broken that Sansa could not bring herself to meet his eyes, lowered her own to his knees where they scuffed against the carpet. "I promised you that I would not touch you again, did I not? And I have not. And I will not."

Sansa shifted uncomfortably, opened her mouth to speak, but her husband continued before she could.

"I did not tell you to be wary of Queen Margaery because I wish to make you unhappy, or because I am angry that you do not spend more time with me, my lady," Tyrion told her gently. "I did it because House Tyrell is one of the most powerful Houses in the Realm at the moment, and they befriended you before because they wished to steal the North, as well. I worry about what cause they might have to befriend you now."

Sansa almost snapped that they wouldn't have been _stealing_ the North when married Sansa, but she supposed that would be rather petty, considering the open concern in her husband's expression, and considering that he raised several good points in his words.

"I understand that," she said quietly, "And I promise to be on my guard, but House Tyrell has not befriended me this time, has made no move to. Margaery has, and she did it, I think, because she is just as alone and miserable as I am, here."

"Just as Prince Oberyn has?" Tyrion asked with a touch of bitterness in his tone, and Sansa flinched so violently her husband pulled back, nearly overbalancing and falling back onto the rug beneath his weight.

"I..." She swallowed hard. "My lord..."

"I know now that his intentions toward you are not amorous, Sansa," Tyrion interrupted her, voice short. "Just as I know he has no plots to seduce your young body, as I once feared."

Sansa's face flamed at her husband's words, but it appeared that he was not quite done.

"But I do know that he has some hold on you...just as you do on him."

Sansa's head jerked up. "My lord?"

Her husband gave her a grim smile. "I would be careful of what you say around him, my lady. I have seen the way he hangs on every word, hoping for a hook."

Sansa flushed. "I don't know what you're referring to, Lord Husband, as I told you once already."

Her husband's eyes narrowed. "Sansa," he said gently, and, despite herself, Sansa lifted her head.

"I know that I am the son of the enemy," he told her, voice slightly pinched, "And that I am therefore an enemy myself, but you have admitted yourself that I care for you. That you know I am trying to help you." He paused. "Whatever scheme Oberyn Martell has dragged you into, can you honestly say the same about him?"

Sansa opened her mouth, closed it. "You think that there is some scheme between us?"

Her husband groaned. "Just...If you will not keep your distance from him, then, at the very least, promise me you will tell me if you...If you feel there is reason to fear for your safety, my lady, in his presence." He grimaced. "At least, more than usual."

Sansa took a deep breath. "I promise," she lied, for she was beginning to fear that her removal from King's Landing was going to give her every reason to fear for her safety.


	108. SANSA LXVI

"I can't believe the Lannisters are letting you do this," Sansa murmured, glancing at herself in the mirror as Margaery helped her pin back the tall neckline of the gown that had been commissioned for her to wear to the tournament.

Golden, paper thin material that hugged her form in the style of the Reach, but for all that signified she was the wife of a Lannister as much as anything, and Sansa lamented that she could not wear the dark colors of House Stark which she had always found so bland, but it was better than wearing another one of her faded, too small gowns.

And it was a beautiful gown. The seamstresses in town had been elated at the prospect of making a gown for the Lady Lannister at Margaery's bidding, and Sansa knew that it was only because Margaery's purse had funded the gown that Lord Tywin had allowed it.

Still, it was a beautiful gown, and it felt nice to be wearing something new and shiny as this.

Margaery shrugged, seeming to give the hem up for good and stepping back, glancing at Sansa's reflection in the mirror and seeming to like what she saw; she licked her lips and placed her hands teasingly on Sansa's shoulders, rubbing at them.

"I happen to think that you would look beautiful in Tyrell green," Margaery commented, and Sansa's face fell, Cersei's half-remembered taunts coming to mind, then.

"Do you?" she asked coolly, and Margaery must have noticed the sudden change in her demeanor, for her hands on Sansa's shoulders tightened.

"Sansa," Margaery said presently, voice pained, and Sansa glanced up at her in the mirror, saw the confliction there, "I originally befriended you because you were the last Stark of Winterfell, and because my family wanted control of the North. It's all anyone craves in this dangerous game; power."

Sansa flinched.

"But, Sansa, you must believe that it wasn't all that, later. I..." she bit her pretty pink lip. "I came to care very greatly for you, even before the wedding. You are quite like a sister to me."

Sansa raised a brow. "A sister?" she repeated incredulously, turning to face the other woman. "Really?"

Margaery's lips quirked into a small, teasing smile.

"Well, perhaps not quite a sister." She leaned forward, licking Sansa's lips with her tongue. "Hmm. You don't taste like lemon cakes. I have grown to rather expect it. More like...want."

Sansa blushed prettily, and Margaery smirked as she pulled away. "You're so beautiful when you do that," she said, which, of course, only caused Sansa to blush all the more. "I love finding new ways to make you do it."

Sansa swallowed. "Margaery-"

"Sometimes," Margaery said conversationally, as she reached out and brushed at the fabric around Sansa's waistline, "I find myself thinking about it at the most inconvenient times."

Sansa's breath hitched as Margaery fingered her womanhood through the thin gown.

"I'll be hunting with Joffrey and suddenly I'll see you, gasping in front of me, blushing like such a beautiful maiden."

Her fingers pressed deeper into Sansa's skin, the fabric dipping around them, and Sansa gasped, in much the way Margaery no doubt imagined in the forest.

Margaery's smirk turned wicked then, her other hand reaching out to tug up Sansa's skirt, and now Sansa knew that the flush on her cheeks had moved its way down her neck.

"Marg...Margaery, someone might come..."

Margaery's fingers pressed into Sansa's cunt, massaging her dripping folds with the precision of one who had done so many times, and Sansa's words cut off with a low groan as she felt Margaery's fingers brush up inside of her.

"I'm rather counting on it, darling," she heard Margaery whisper in her ear, before her fingers curled, and Sansa's gasp turned into a cry of surprise, her body jerking forward into Margaery's, her mind going hazy and stupid.

"Margaery..." she whispered, but seemed unable to say anything more than that one word, like a prayer to the gods who had forsaken her so long ago.

Margaery kissed her way along Sansa's neck as her fingers worked, lips sucking a small trail of bruises down to Sansa's collarbone.

The stray thought hit Sansa, that she would need a higher collarbone, when this was over, lest anyone see the evidence of Margaery's affections.

And then she was hardly able to think of anything for a while, as Margaery pushed her back against the wall and sank to her knees before her, spread Sansa's legs apart with a gentle hand even as her fingers pushed further.

"Marg..." Sansa's knees were going weak; she doubted she would be able to stand for much longer, and yet, Margaery held her firm.

"I've got you," she murmured, before she pulled her fingers from Sansa's cunt.

Sansa let out a moan of displeasure that turned into something else completely as she watched Margaery lick her fingers clean, then smirk up at her. Sansa groaned.

"Would you like a taste?" Margaery whispered, her voice hoarse, and Sansa blinked at her.

"I..."

Margaery held up her hands, and Sansa stared at her own juices on them, blinked again and then opened her mouth when, with a smile, Margaery directed her to.

It was strange, tasting herself, and not just because the taste was bitter and warm in her mouth, but because she was licking it off of Margaery's fingers and seeing the effect it was having on Margaery in the spark of lust in the other girl's eyes.

That thought had her wrapping her lips around Margaery's fingers, and she felt her cunt growing wet at the moan that Margaery let out as Sansa licked the other girl's fingers clean.

Before she could protest, Margaery was on her knees again, had bent her head, was was gripping Sansa's hips in a bruising hold, licking a stray line along Sansa's cunt. Margaery glanced up at her with an impish expression before doing it again.

Sansa's legs shook and she reached behind her, clasped at the mirror they had been standing in front of mere moments before.

Margaery seemed to take that as a positive sign, and Sansa could feel her lips parting as they wrapped around Sansa's dripping folds, her tongue dipping between them to lap at Sansa's arousal, pushing further into Sansa than Margaery had gone before.

Sansa let out a small shout, and then reached up both hands to cover her mouth, glancing over Margaery's shoulder in worry, but no one came to see what the noise had been about.

She sagged in relief, but then Margaery was licking at her again, one hand reaching up to massage Sansa's left breast in her palm while the other moved behind her, gripped one of Sansa's naked buttocks to pull her closer.

Sansa whimpered, her body jutting forward on its own accord, pushing Margaery's tongue further into her warm core until Margaery gagged and pulled out a little, let out a sound of frustration and scissored her tongue in and out of Sansa's pulsing cunt.

"Marg..." she whimpered, her eyes starting to water with the exertion of holding herself off, because she wanted this moment to last forever, even if she knew she could hardly last much longer. "Please..."

Margaery didn't respond, merely licked her again, and the last sensation Sansa felt before she was seeing stars was an overwhelming pleasure, spreading out from Margaery's tongue and filling her whole body, making her limbs feel like wax and the rest of her go completely numb.

Just before she might have fallen on top of Margaery, her hands scrambled for purchase, one gripping the edge of the mirror while the other gripped Margaery's bare shoulder, hard enough to bruise.

Margaery seemed to understand the warning, pulling out to glance at Sansa in amusement before lowering her head once more, delivering a brutal nip at her folds that had Sansa shouting before she could remember why she shouldn't.

"Margaery!" Sansa cried out, and Margaery moved before she could quite finish the cry, capturing her lips in a deep kiss that stole the rest of her breath. She sagged forward, her knees giving out beneath her, and Margaery caught her, wrapping both arms around her and pulling her into a warm embrace on the floor of Margaery's fitting room.

Sansa's limbs were trembling, and she sagged against the embrace, closed her eyes and shivered like a newborn foal, leaned her forehead against Margaery's and wondered how Margaery could make it look so easy, could recover so quickly from such wonder.

Margaery chuckled lowly, almost as if she knew what Sansa was thinking, reaching between their legs to scoop up some of Sansa's fluids and bring them to her lips, licking at them with the same adoration she had reserved for Sansa's womanhood.

"Margaery..." Sansa murmured, wondered if she was reprimanding or adulating. Her mind still felt fuzzy, as if she no longer quite belonged to her body and was experiencing all of this from afar, as she had felt the last few times that they had done this.

"You're so beautiful like this," Margaery whispered, tracing the veins of Sansa's throat as she panted, her body wilting against the other girl. "I could see you like this every day and it wouldn't be enough to sate me."

Sansa sucked in a ragged breath, then another. She didn't quite know how to respond to that, didn't quite know what to respond with whenever Margaery made such sweeping statements.

When she could breathe again, she thought of something else.

"What...what about you?" Sansa managed, and Margaery smirked at her.

"No need to worry about that," she told the other girl, and Sansa's eyes widened as she glanced down Margaery's body, from her heaving breasts to the wetness staining her gown between her legs.

“I think you might have to wear Tyrell green to the tournament, after all,” Margaery said impishly, and Sansa bit back a laugh.

“You’re going to make us late,” she teased.

Margaery shook her head. “The Queen is never late, Sansa, darling.”


	109. SANSA LXVII

The tournament was quite the grand affair for something so hastily thrown together, and though the realm was at war, Sansa was rather surprised by the number of knights who had shown up to fight in it.

All of the Houses which were loyal to House Lannister and House Tyrell, at least, had managed to scrape together a few knights to send to King's Landing, and the Dornishmen who had arrived with Prince Oberyn, as well as Prince Oberyn himself, were also participating.

Sansa could not help but wonder at that, for all of the realm knew that Lord Tywin had prepared this tourney in the hopes of finding more members for the Kingsguard, and would have to have been out of his wits to name Prince Oberyn, but she supposed the man could already know that and simply be here for the melee.

A part of her wondered what it was like, as Arya once had and as Sansa had often scorned her for, to be a boy and be able to fight with them, to be rid of some of the anger and fear pressing down on her chest with a few punches and swings of the sword.

For the first time, the prospect was appealing, even if Sansa knew she would never be one to swing a sword.

"Nothing like a good tourney to watch good, old-fashioned violence when there's a war on," her lord husband grumbled beside her, reaching for his ever-full bottle of wine, Dornish red, she believed, and Sansa glanced sideways at him.

He raised a brow, took a sip of the stuff straight from the bottle, despite Shae's disapproving look, where she stood just behind and to the side of them.

Sansa sighed, turning away from her husband once more to glance toward the ring, where the contestants had lined up before the King and Queen on their horses, swords at the ready.

From what Tyrion had told her, it was to be swords, then lances, then a feast for the victor, and whomever had been crowned the Queen of Love and Beauty.

Sansa's eyes moved of their own accord to Margaery, where she sat next to the King, wearing Lannister red silks as soft as milk, and a gold leaflet crown in her elaborate hair. She clapped her hands with all of the excitement of a young woman who knew no violence as the contestants were named, as her husband wished that they would honor their King with their fighting.

The King and Queen were sitting in a raised podium that was some distance from Sansa and Tyrion's own seats, and she supposed that was because of what had occurred the last time they had sat near the King rather than because Tywin was so ashamed of his son.

Still, it meant that Sansa was not close enough to catch Margaery's eye during the melee, and she distracted herself by intertwining and releasing her fingers.

The contestants moved then, and Sansa found herself growing rather bored of the fighting almost as soon as it had begun, unlike the first time she had observed a tourney, sitting here next to Lord Baelish rather than Lord Tyrion.

Perhaps she was not meant for fighting swords, at all. It was terribly dull, watching the clash of steel and knowing that it was not meant to harm, only for honor.

Honor. Like in one of the songs.

She found herself laughing before she could contain the noise, ignored Tyrion and Shae's questioning looks. There was nothing amusing about it, after all, she reminded herself, and the laughter disappeared almost as quickly as it had begun.

In an effort to distract herself, after watching Ser Daemon Sand taken down by Ser Loras Tyrell, Sansa turned to Tyrion.

"Where is Lady Cersei?" she asked idly, and watched as Tyrion arched a brow and glanced at her.

"She...decided that it would be best for her to remain in Highgarden," he said, after a moment's hesitation, and Sansa took that to mean, out here in the open where anyone could hear, that Lord Tywin had not deemed it pertinent for the wife of a cripple to come and watch the tourney, when everyone knew that Lord Willas hardly left Highgarden on account of his injury.

She was almost darkly amused, at the indignation Cersei had no doubt felt, when she had learned of that.

Or perhaps, Sansa thought, as she watched a knight tossed into the sand, blood spurting from a wound in his thigh, Lord Willas simply didn't want to witness such things, and stayed locked away in his home as an escape from all of it. Sansa knew that, had she the choice, she would do the same. 

"And thus begins another war between houses," her husband muttered suddenly beside her, and Sansa glanced at him in confusion, rather embarrassed that she had not been paying attention to the tournament in some time.

He pointed to the two newest combatants; Ser Loras Tyrell and Prince Oberyn, and, at her confused look, elaborated, "The Martells and the Tyrells have hated each other since long before Prince Oberyn crippled Willas Tyrell in a tourney very much like this one, Sansa. All the Tyrells will need is a match to ignite the fire, and then I doubt that even their new alliance with the Crown will stop them from getting their revenge."

Sansa paled. She had known, of course, that Willas was crippled; Margaery had explained it to her early on in the marriage negotiations, when the Tyrells had still been plotting to marry Sansa to Willas, because she thought it might worry Sansa but, rather than disgust her, she had been relieved by the news.

Relieved that her future husband would not be able to chase her into the marriage bed if she did not want it, as indeed she had feared the Imp would do when it became decided that she would marry him, instead.

She hummed. "The Tyrells and Martells are not at war," she pointed out, and Tyrion snorted.

"Barely, and held together only by their alliances with the Crown. Their two Houses are terribly fickle though, and Lord Mace and his shrew of a mother have never forgiven Oberyn Martell for crippling the Heir of Highgarden. If Oberyn Martell downs that boy here, it may just push them over. And everyone knows Oberyn Martell is itching for a fight."

Sansa stiffened, watched as Ser Loras climbed upon his horse and his helm fell into place, as he rode out onto the green with Margaery's favor upon his lance where she had bestowed it earlier, during his fight with Ser Boros.

It fluttered awkwardly in the light breeze, a green and yellow ribbon Sansa had seen Margaery wearing in her hair earlier.

Every member of the Kingsguard had asked their Queen's favor before fighting today, with the intention of naming her the Queen of Love and Beauty, and Margaery had bestowed her favor upon all of them in turn, but something about the way she had given it to Loras seemed different than the others.

As if she were almost hesitant to do so.

"Can't something be done about it?" Sansa asked, for she knew little of fighting styles, but rather thought Oberyn might win simply on experience alone. She knew that he was experienced with a spear in ways that Loras was not, didn't know if that would help his situation or hurt it, here.

Tyrion sighed. "If something was going to be done about it, my lord father would have done so earlier. No doubt he means this as some sort of message, though I don't know to whom."

Sansa glanced back at Margaery, saw that the girl's mouth had gone white around the edges where she sat in the King's box, left hand squeezing Joffrey's as it had been throughout the tournament.

Sansa wondered if Margaery's knuckles were white as well. Wondered why she looked so concerned; while more war between the Houses was certainly not good, Margaery's reaction seemed worse than that, somehow.

Oberyn looked grim as his helm fell into place, didn't even wink at Ellaria as Sansa was somehow expecting him to, as the two horses moved down the ring from one another before turning, breaking out into a gallop at the same moment.

The first clash was straightforward enough. Prince Oberyn and Loras' lances moved at the same time, and Loras' clipped Prince Oberyn on the arm.

He wasn't wearing armor as Ser Loras was, for all that Prince Oberyn was wearing a helm as he was meant to. It seemed that, even here in King's Landing, the Dornish Prince would adhere to his standards of wearing only Dornish leather. The lance caught him in the upper arm, just below the armpit, and he let out a grunt of pain that Sansa somehow heard, from where she was sitting.

She grimaced, wondered what it was about men that so encouraged them to endanger their lives, before Oberyn shrugged the injured shoulder in a clear sign that he wished to keep going.

The next round was different, and Sansa was on the edge of her seat, watching with worry as every part of Ser Loras' body language radiated anger, even if Sansa found herself wondering why, what with the way he had won the last round.

He did not win this one. Prince Oberyn's lance caught Ser Loras in the side, and Sansa watched in horror as the young Kingsguard let out a loud shout of anger, turning his horse around and trotting her to the end of the line, before bringing her back into the melee too early.

Margaery's lips were pinched into a tight, angry line, Sansa saw, and she swallowed hard.

Prince Oberyn's steed seemed hesitant, as if it knew that its rider was no longer eager for this fight, and Sansa watched as the two horses collided together again, as the lance Ser Loras was holding hit Prince Oberyn again.

And again.

It was not until what Sansa thought might have been the fifth round of this tense fight or the tenth, that Sansa realized Prince Oberyn was allowing it. Was letting Ser Loras come at him, letting him attack.

And it was only making Ser Loras angrier, for he knew it.

The next attack, Sansa saw that Ser Loras' hands around the lance were shaking, that the lance might have gone directly into Prince Oberyn's helm if, at the last moment, Prince Oberyn had not swept his lance out in an upward arc, slamming it into Ser Loras' side with such strength that the younger man fell from his horse, his lance splitting against the rail keeping their horses apart.

The tourney seemed to come to a breathless halt.

"Loras!" Margaery cried, surging to her feet as her brother fell into the mud, his horse bucking its hind legs into the air in the confusion, before plodding on aimlessly toward the end of the track.

Elinor reached out and took her hand then, or Sansa was quite sure Margaery would have jumped down from the banister where she sat and run to her brother despite who was looking on.

As if she had forgotten how the scent of weakness so attracted her husband.

Prince Oberyn jumped down from his horse, moving to help Ser Loras to his feet, but Ser Loras stumbled away from the other man as soon as he was standing, throwing off his helm and favoring Prince Oberyn with such a snarl that Sansa flinched back in her seat.

 _These Tyrells are only Lannisters with flowers_ , she remembered Ser Dantos telling her, before he had disappeared after the wedding, and the words had never felt more real before this moment, as she stared at Ser Loras' expression and thought only of Ser Jaime Lannister.

Or, perhaps, of her Imp, or at least, what she had imagined him to be before they had been wed and he had started to prove her wrong.

Prince Oberyn had pulled off his own helm at this point, and the expression on his face wasn't angry, as Ser Loras' was. Rather, it seemed filled with pity, and Sansa could not bring herself to understand it.

And then Ser Loras was stalking off of the track, disappearing even as one of the Tyrell squires caught his horse and calmed it, and Margaery sat back down in her seat, favoring her husband with a reassuring smile.

Sansa did not pay much attention to the rest of the tourney, barely noticed when it was Prince Oberyn who placed the Crown of Love and Beauty upon Margaery's head, or the brittle smile Margaery favored the other man with, in his victory.

She could only find herself watching the Tyrells; Mace's furious expression, the boredom on Olenna Tyrell's face that no doubt hid her own anger.

Perhaps her husband had been right, and another war between the Houses was fast upon them. Sansa would not doubt it, with the expressions on the faces of the Martells and the Tyrells, though she could not, selfishly, help wondering what it would mean. For her.

And, when the tourney ended, Sansa merely watched idly as Joffrey stood to his feet and clapped, once, then twice, gaining the attention of everyone there.

"It pleases the Crown to name Ser Daemon Sand, and Lancel Lannister to the Kingsguard," Joffrey announced, glancing at his lord grandfather once more before doing so.

Sansa lifted a brow. She did not think Lancel had even fought in the tourney, so was rather confused as to why he was being named to the Kingsguard now, and everyone else present seemed to share in her confusion, including Lancel himself.

Everyone, that was, save for Lord Tywin, who looked rather smug as Joffrey sat back down beside his queen, frowning as he took Margaery's hand and kissed it.

Lancel had gone rather pale. Mace Tyrell, half-standing from where he sat below the King and Queen, looking even more thunderous at the exclusion of any Tyrells being named, when a Dornishman was.

Ser Daemon Sand was the first to step forward, after a cautionary look in the direction of Prince Oberyn, bowing before his King and swearing his protection, with sword and life, if need be.

Lancel was next, his words somewhat shakier, and Sansa might have found the whole thing pitiful, if she could not get the thought of Lancel Lannister standing before the throne, laughing as she was stripped and beaten after he announced her brother's victories to the King.

"Damn you," Sansa's lord husband muttered under his breath, and Sansa glanced at him in bemusement, watched as his eyes nearly bore into his father's.

"He means this to force Jaime to leave the Kingsguard," he whispered to her, leaning close. "By eliminating every other heir to Casterly Rock until Jaime is forced to take it to save the family from pure embarrassment."

Sansa didn't much care whether Jaime Lannister took Casterly Rock or not, but she could understand why Tyrion might, and so she affected a look of sympathy, and privately wondered if the Rock was so cursed, that no one wanted it.

She wondered for a moment, though, at Tyrion's wording. He seemed to be implying that he would also never inherit Casterly Rock, and, while she knew of the Hand of the Kong's hatred for his youngest son, she wondered if he would be so petty as to disinherit Tyrion in order to force Jaime into the position he wanted him in. Wondered if it even mattered, with Jaime Lannister leagues away from King's Landing and a member of the Kingsguard anyway.

She certainly thought Jaime Lannister was welcome to it, for, if she was ever forced to carry Tyrion Lannister's children, she would not see their legacy at the Lannister Rock.

And privately wondered who was more stubborn, Ser Jaime or his father, to see who might bend first, in such a battle of wills.

Given the way Joffrey now sat straight as an arrow and meek as a whipped young pup as he reached for the next scroll Tywin Lannister had prepared for him to read at this tourney, she would bet on the latter.


	110. MARGAERY XXXIII

"Loras," Margaery called, reaching out for her brother as she entered his chambers after the tourney, but Loras shrugged off her touch, his expression thunderous as he allowed the Tyrell maester to see to his wounds.

Hardly more than superficial wounds, Margaery knew, which would heal given time, but she still flinched to see them, to remember that the last of her brothers to fight Oberyn Martell had been Willas, whose wounds had been far more extensive.

Loras must have known the direction her thoughts had turned to, for he glanced up, sighing as he reached out and squeezed her arm.

"I'm fine, Margy," he told her, and then glanced at the maester. "Yes?"

The maester sighed. "He will be, Your Grace. Those ribs merely need to heal now that they have been set, and that bandage on his side must be cleaned twice a day," he assured the queen, and Margaery nodded, trying to look pleased.

"Then I wonder, maester, if you might permit my brother and I some time alone then, since his injuries are not fatal," Margaery said sweetly, and the maester glanced between them before bowing to his queen and hurrying from the room.

Loras watched him go and let out a little put upon sigh, before reaching out and pulling at the bindings the man had placed his arm in.

"What the hell was that?" she demanded, the moment the door had swung shut and they were alone.

"What was what?" he asked, glancing up at her in confusion.

Margaery shook her head, tired of these games played at court of a sudden; for all that she usually reveled in them.

"You nearly got yourself killed," she snapped. "I did not arrange it for you to fight Oberyn Martell in that tourney only to lose you, as well."

Her brother stared at her dully. "I didn't," he said finally, voice far too sullen for her tastes, considering the subject matter. “Nearly get myself killed. I was handling it just fine before he cheated.”

“He cheated to save your worthless hide,” Margaery snapped at her brother. “And I’m very grateful he did.”

"You were the one who said I should fight him!" Loras snapped. "You were the one who said I ought to get rid of the anger coiling up in me somehow!"

"Because I didn't think you were stupid enough to try to get him to kill you!" Margaery snapped right back at him, a spot of red flaring up her neck.

Loras snorted. "I see."

Margaery's eyes narrowed and she pulled back from her brother in the next moment, staring at him. "You see what?" she demanded, eyes filling with ire.

"What happened to _all that matters is us_?" Loras repeated her words, voice mocking, now.

Margaery spun on him. "Do you think I am not angry?" she demanded, voice low lest anyone overhear them. "You may have lost your Renly, but I am stuck with mine!"

Loras stared at her, eyes wide. "Margaery..."

She shook her head, not finished yet, and not able to stop herself now that the words were spilling out of her.

"Do you think that because I am his meek, happy little wife that I cannot feel fury?" she demanded hotly. "I know that you have lost your Renly, and my heart breaks for you a little more each day that I see you destroy yourself in his name, but you made me a promise when you joined the Kingsguard, brother, to always protect me. And how are you to do that if you throw yourself before each sword you find?"

Loras jerked, actually stumbled back a few steps as if struck, his face going hot and then paling as his eyes widened in a way that Margaery very much didn't like.

She felt the anger in her body abruptly drain from her at the sight of her brother's face, at his defensive stance. She knew that the blame he felt since that day had saved her family's interests, as her grandmother had counseled her that it would. That he would not touch Joffrey Baratheon so long as he felt he could not even protect his own sister.

But Margaery could not force her brother to live another moment in the hell he had fallen into since that day.

"It wasn't your fault, Loras," Margaery said, running her fingers through his hair as he tucked his face away in her lap. "What happened to me that day."

He went abruptly stiff, turning his head until their eyes met. "It was my fault," he said dully, and she shook her head, but Loras did not allow her to speak. "I shouldn't have left you alone for an instant."

"Loras..."

He sat up. "You are the Queen of Westeros, Margaery, and you should never be left alone. I don't care how good you are at talking yourself out of bad situations. I should have been there, and instead I was fucking Olyvar-"

Margaery shook her head. "You couldn't have known that a Kingsguard was going to attack me."

He snorted. "I can't even keep you safe from a godsdamned child. You should have just told Joffrey that I wasn't doing my job that day. He would have forced me out of the Kingsguard like he did Ser Barristan the Bold."

Margaery rolled her eyes. "Or he might have killed you," she pointed out, before realizing what she had said and wincing.

Loras gazed up at her, smiled thinly.

"Do you think it doesn't kill me, every time I leave you alone with a Kingsguard who isn't me? Because it was a Kingsguard who attacked you, Margy. Or every time I 'take a walk' while you are trying to spare the modesty of the Stark girl, and leave you unprotected..." he trailed off, looked away. "I can't stand it, Marg."

She swallowed. "Loras, I..." took a deep breath. "I know that we have all said that you must protect me, and that is why you joined the Kingsguard, but..." she glanced up at him, swallowing once more. "My life is not worth your own," she said bluntly. And, when Loras opened his mouth to speak, she raised a hand, silencing him. "No. I don't want you to throw your life away, protecting me, whether that means running in front of a blade for me, or slowly killing yourself with your guilt. Do you understand me?"

Loras looked at her for a long moment, and then sighed, sinking back onto his bed as Margaery sat down beside him, reached out to touch his arm.

"Do you know," Margaery said suddenly, "the day when Renly came and took you away to Storm's End to be his squire, I ran to Grandmother and cried about it for hours?"

Loras stiffened. "You never told me that," he said finally.

She shook her head. "Of course not. When you came back, you were so happy with Renly that I didn't dare mention how much I'd even missed you."

Loras winced. "I..."

"I didn't finish," she told him, and her brother gave her an indulgent smile.

"Of course."

"Grandmother picked me up, when I was done, looked me in the eyes, and told me in that voice of hers, the one she reserves for those she thinks particularly foolish-"

"I know the one," Loras interrupted, grinning.

Margaery smiled, rather certain that he did. "That there was no use crying about something after the deed was done. That I was better off talking a man out of doing the deed beforehand." She swallowed. "I couldn't talk Ser Osmund out of it."

Loras stiffened, eyes going wide in alarm.

"That was the one day my words failed me," Margaery continued. "He was Cersei's pet, and he wasn't going to disappoint her. I don't know what she had over him, if she had anything over him." She shook her head. "And I'd never felt so powerless."

"Gods, Margaery, did he actually..." her brother trailed off, staring at her in horror, and Margaery realized abruptly what her brother had almost comprehended in her words, backtracked quickly before he could make the conclusion he most certainly would have to go to his grave without.

Her grandmother had once warned her that if they were to go through with this marriage to King Joffrey, and it seemed that they had no other choice, given Mace's ambitions, her brother was far more likely to become a Kingslayer than Jaime Lannister had ever been. That one foul word against the little beast Margaery was to invite into her bed would set him off.

She wanted her brother to let go of the guilt he felt, but she didn't want him to suddenly decide to kill every Lannister he came across.

"No," she lied in a quiet murmur, not too quickly or too slowly, lest her perceptive brother grow suspicious, "Of course not. But what did happen..." she looked away, allowed just enough pain into her expression. "It was horrible enough."

Her brother nodded, jaw set tightly.

"You can't be with me every single hour, Loras," Margaery said gently. "We both know that. But...I won't send you away again. And I do hope you'll use your discretion, where Sansa is involved."

He swallowed hard, nodded. “I will,” he promised, and she believed him, remembered all of the discretion she had used with him and Renly before the need for an heir had prompted her to action.

"About Sansa," Loras said, almost conversationally then, and Margaery groaned, but he was not to be dissuaded. "Have you done anything about what I told you?"

She sighed. "I've been working on it," she promised. "I wanted...I wish she would have told me herself, because now that I know it, I can see the weight it has been, hanging around her shoulders all of this time. And...it hurts, that she has said nothing." She took a deep breath. "But I know what I have to do, now that you have told me." She glanced up at her brother. "Prince Oberyn has no idea that Olyvar told you?"

Loras shook his head. "Of course not. I would not believe his words if he did. Olyvar merely...overheard the conversation, between Ellaria Sand and Prince Oberyn, while they thought he was dozing after..." he flushed, and she wondered how her sweet brother could still find such things worthy of blushing over.

She certainly didn't, and she did not think she had quite the level of experience that her brother did.

She wondered if fucking someone who worked for Littlefinger was similar to fucking a woman married to another man. It was the sort of thing she would never be able to figure out, of course.

"I see," Margaery murmured, and then drew closer to her brother. "Thank you," she murmured, and his eyes met hers, confusion lacing them. "For telling me."

He swallowed. "Margaery...what are you planning to do, with the information Olyvar gave us?"

She forced herself to smile. "We shall see," she promised, because, in this moment, she knew that his guess was as good as hers, and Loras groaned.


	111. SANSA LXVIII

After the excitement of the tourney had come to an end, Sansa found herself left alone for the most part. It seemed that her husband was going to 'have a word' with Lord Tywin over Lancel's promotion to the Kingsguard, something he didn't think Sansa should be present for, he'd said, as if she had any desire to be present for such a thing.

She may have felt some guilt that Lancel Lannister was only a boy and not much older than she, but she loathed him as much as every Lannister, save perhaps sweet Tommen and Tyrion, and he had never gone out of his way to be kind to her, as they had at the very least attempted.

Let him rot in the Kingsguard. It would be little different from the days when he had gleefully reported to Joffrey on all of the reasons why Sansa should be beaten, only now, he would be doing the beatings himself.

She somehow couldn't see that sneering, boyish face lifting a hand toward her, not like she could imagine Joffrey doing, if pushed.

But he would, she knew. Because they all did.

She swallowed, hadn't realized how much she needed Margaery until this moment, after the excitement of the tourney. She knew that Margaery had gone running after her brother, that no doubt she would be busy tending to Loras' wounds and wouldn't have time to comfort Sansa, but Sansa could feel bile rising in the back of her throat.

And she had a desperate feeling, even if she couldn't explain it, that Margaery's soft lips would push the taste from her mouth.

Shae had offered to eat a light meal with her at first, but all Sansa could think about was the way Ser Loras had been knocked from his horse, the blood that could have emerged and yet hadn't, and her stomach clenched unpleasantly.

She told Shae that she would like to go to the library again for a time, ignored the knowing look the older woman had sent her before Sansa had slipped away, for once pleased that she was not important enough to the King at the moment for someone to have an eye on her at all times.

They knew by now that she would not run, of course, knew that the smallfolk were only peaceful for Margaery, and so they let her wander as she wished.

Out of sheer stubbornness, as her stomach filled with air and nausea, Sansa found her way to the library, even if she knew it was unlikely Margaery would be there.

It was empty, of course. Everyone in King's Landing was still distracted with the excitement of the tourney, and there was meant to be a feast later tonight, to commemorate the victors and to celebrate the men raised into the Kingsguard, and Sansa knew that most would be preparing for that.

Sansa had little to prepare, of course. She supposed she might still wear the gown that Margaery had had made for the tourney, the one that Tyrion had frowned at but said nothing about when he had the chance.

She did not feel like feasting. But then, Sansa had endured many a feast that she did not wish to attend at Joffrey's whims in the last few years, and she would endure this one as well, thankfully by Tyrion's side rather than Joffrey's.

She sighed, opening the door to the library and finding it blessedly, or perhaps unfortunately, empty.

Sansa stepped inside, closed the door behind her and reflected that she was rather pleased with her newfound freedom, since she had married Tyrion. Shae may watch her like a hawk most of the time, but Sansa no longer had the Hound peering over her shoulder at every moment as she explored the Keep.

She wandered through the library idly, a part of her inanely wishing that Margaery would appear as she walked past songs that no longer held much meaning to her, now that she knew how deceitful they were.

And then she came to the place where the book had been, the one that Margaery had first found her in here reading, what felt like a lifetime ago and yet not, when Sansa had fretted over whether or not Margaery was still her friend after everything the Tyrells had done to show otherwise, while now she fretted over how Margaery felt about her as more than a friend.

Sansa supposed not as much had changed in that regard as she had thought.

The book was still not there, and Sansa thought about how she had last seen it on Margaery's shelf, confused about why it had been there, but not asking the girl.

Just like Sansa didn't ask Margaery how she truly felt about Sansa or Joffrey, and just like Sansa didn't ask Margaery how she would feel about Sansa leaving her and going to Dorne with Prince Oberyn.

She chewed on her lower lip for a long moment, staring at the place where the book had lain before, the square free of dust while dust surrounded the area around it, and she sighed, squaring her shoulders.

It had been some time since the end of the tourney, after all, and while Ser Loras had been injured by Prince Oberyn, it had not been a horrible injury, Sansa was sure, or there would have been more blood.

Watching Loras, knocked from his horse by Prince Oberyn, had forced Sansa to realize that there were enough problems in King's Landing at the moment. There was enough mystery, with the Tyrells and the Martells plotting against each other at every moment, and the King thriving in it.

It was time she put that to rest.

Sansa took a deep breath, bolstering herself, before turning and walking out of the library, headed for the Maidenvault. She knew that her resolve would vanish the moment she arrived and learned that Margaery could not be seen, that she was too busy preparing for the feast that evening, but Sansa had to try.

Had to try before she was whisked away to Dorne, or Sansa would never forgive herself.

She made it to the Maidenvault, passed Ser Loras' chambers when she found them suspiciously empty, and stopped just outside the door to Margaery's chambers, noting the little light on under the door and smiling.

"Is Loras all right?" Elinor’s light voice asked from inside the rooms, and Sansa found herself pausing outside the door to Margaery's chambers, even with her hand poised to knock.

She didn't know how she felt about Elinor Tyrell. There was something about the girl, something that made Sansa's hackles rise and made her want to lay her claim to Margaery before half the court, law be damned, and yet, she couldn't put her finger on what it was. Elinor was always more than civil to her, acting as if they were friends for all that they scarcely knew each other, and, unlike with Lady Reanna, she seemed to genuinely care for Margaery.

And still, Sansa couldn't bring herself to step into that room, after hearing Elinor's voice, anymore than she could bring herself to step away.

She knew that she should not do this. Should not sit here and eavesdrop, as she did with so many other conversations around King’s Landing, because this was Margaery, and yet. And yet, some feeling, some emotion, staid her hand.

Later, she could not say what it was. A chill down her spine, warning Sansa back, perhaps. Warning her that if she entered that room, she would not like what she saw.

Which was ridiculous, of course. She knew that. Knew that the conflicted feelings she'd had since watching Margaery with Joffrey in her bedchambers, or perhaps before that, were clouding her senses, that she needed to let them go because she knew Joffrey meant nothing to Margaery but a crown.

She heard Margaery’s long sigh. “He will be,” she murmured. Then, “I hope. I think Prince Oberyn wounded his pride more than anything.”

Elinor laughed softly. "He certainly has enough of it."

Margaery's laugh sounded fairly more bitter. "He has that." A pause. "He's been getting worse, Elinor. Ever since..." a sound that was very suspiciously like a sniffle, and Sansa inhaled sharply, not even sure why.

She couldn't remember if she had ever seen Margaery cry. Even when Margaery was vulnerable, her face twisted into one of sadness and her pretty lips pursed so beautifully, eyes shining with anger or grief, Sansa did not think she had ever heard something so un-dainty as a sniffle from her.

"Oh, Margaery..."

"I don't..." another sniffle. "I'm fine, Elinor. Really, I just. Sometimes..."

A shushing noise. "I know," Elinor was murmuring, and Sansa closed her eyes and could imagine the other girl running her fingers through Margaery's hair, comforting her in the way that Sansa had, just the once. "I know."

"You don't," Margaery rasped out, and her voice was so full of pain in that moment that Sansa jerked a little, hearing it. "You can't know, you have no idea what it was like..."

Sansa's hand laid on the door latch, ready to knock and yet not, and then she heard it. The sound she been listening for, the sound she had somehow needed to hear, from the moment the Martells had invited her to Dorne.

It was an unmistakable noise, when it came, and Sansa closed her eyes, exhaled slowly to keep herself from crying aloud and revealing herself.

She had made that noise herself, but never before pressing her lips to Margaery's, never without tasting the sweet frosted scent of flowers on the other woman's lips.

And Elinor was making that noise, now, around the sound of Margaery's tears.

"I don't," Elinor was murmuring. "I can't know, you're right. But I'm here, Margaery. I'm here, and you have all of me, you know that. I will do anything to help you. Just...let me help you."

Another one of the sounds, the soft, wet _schmack_ of lips against skin.

_You have all of me._

Sansa's hand started shaking before she had even lowered it to her side, and still, she could not bring herself to leave.

 _You have all of me._ For a moment, Sansa allowed herself to think that this was just comfort, to a Queen who had nearly seen her brother killed, but those words would not stop ringing in her ears. Perhaps it would otherwise have been all right, but for those words. _You have all of me_. As if this wasn't the first time. As if Elinor had given herself to Margaery in the same way that Sansa was beginning to realize she herself had.

 _You have all of me_.

She should go. She could not even manage stepping away from that damning sound when Margaery murmured, just loudly enough to hear, "Anyway, I can't talk to my brother anymore. I..."

Elinor's soft sigh. "Then don't _talk_ , Your Grace," her voice was teasing despite the sigh, Sansa thought idly, and had a very clear idea of what Elinor Tyrell would like to do instead of _talking_ with Margaery.

_Have all of me._

Sansa took a step back, and then another.

"Elinor..."

Sansa ran, didn't realize she was crying until she had reached up to wipe at her face.

It had been different, somehow, Sansa thought, when she finally stilled her frantic heart and hid herself away in her room, slamming the door on Shae. Different, listening to Margaery and Joffrey together while she stood by helpless in Margaery's wardrobe, near to tears and trying to rationalize what she was hearing with her sweet queen. She had hated at the time, but she'd understood at least a little, later. Margaery was only doing her duty to her husband. Margaery didn't care for Joffrey at all, but somehow did for Sansa.

No one was forcing Margaery to kiss Elinor, to touch her like that, the way she touched Sansa. She wasn't performing some duty. It wasn't just a game she needed to play for the sake of her status, of her family. And she certainly hadn't sounded like she didn't want it.

You have all of me, Elinor had said, and Sansa had once thought that she had the rest of Margaery that didn't belong to Joffrey, but now she found herself wondering if she had any of the other woman at all, or if Margaery merely had pieces of all of them, instead.


	112. SANSA LXIX

"It's a beautiful dress," Margaery said, staring from the gown inside Sansa's wardrobe back to Sansa in obvious confusion.

And well she might have, Sansa supposed, for Sansa had dragged her here without really explaining her intentions, after all.

"I'd like...I'd like you to have it," Sansa blurted out then, and Margaery's eyes shot up from the dress so quickly that Sansa immediately backtracked, "I mean...if you don't wish to..."

Margaery shook her head. "No! I mean...Why do you want me to have it?"

Sansa blushed crimson, not quite meeting Margaery's eyes as she stammered out, "I'dliketotearitoffyou."

Margaery stared at her for a long moment, and Sansa was expecting her to laugh, to smile that half-smile and say what a strange girl Sansa was, or perhaps to tell Sansa what a foolish idea she found that, but, to Sansa's surprise, a moment later Margaery began unbuttoning the front of her blouse.

"Wh-What..."

"You wanted to me wear it, didn't you?" Margaery asked her coyly, fluttering her lashes at the younger girl.

"I...I..." Sansa found her voice just as Margaery pulled at the corset binding her breasts. "Not here!"

She rushed forward, grabbing Margaery's hands and yanking them away from her gown.

Margaery laughed at the expression on Sansa's face. "Fine, fine," she chuckled, letting her hands fall to her sides, the small folds where her gown was meant to cover her breasts still hanging open evocatively.

Sansa licked her lips at the sight, remembered the sound of Elinor kissing Margaery, and turned on her heel, ignoring the small pout that marred Margaery's lips at her lack of a response.

But Margaery followed her, staring appreciatively at the gown that Sansa had slung over her arm, before grabbing Sansa by the arm and linking her own arm through Sansa's, dragging her along while ignoring her dutiful Kingsguard when they stepped out into the hall, Ser Lancel not meeting either of their eyes where he stood beside the door.

Margaery favored him with a bright smile, not at all perturbed by the newest member of the Kingsguard being assigned to her for the day.

Sansa had heard that it was some punishment, that he had made it known that he was less than pleased with the arrangement of his joining the Kingsguard, as pleased as his father Lord Kevan was, and Tywin had made sure the boy was assigned to Queen Margaery since then.

Sansa supposed that would be a rather boring assignment, for a boy like Lancel Lannister.

Margaery dragged her to the Maidenvault and then, with a calculating expression, turned to Lancel outside her door.

"Ser Lancel," she murmured, "I don't suppose it's time for the guard change? I know my brother Ser Loras is to see to me today."

Ser Lancel eyed her, and then Sansa, as if he knew already that there was something going on here that he didn't understand, but certainly didn't approve of, before jerking his head. "I have a few moments more."

Sansa crossed her arms over her chest.

Margaery smiled pleasantly. "I don't mind, Ser Lancel. I'm sure there are far more exciting things to do in the capitol for a young man like yourself than play septa to Lady Sansa and myself."

He stiffened at that. "I am doing my duty, my lady," he assured her, sounding almost nervous, and Sansa noticed the almost imperceptible way that Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. Lancel did not.

"Of course," she murmured, "but-"

"Ah, Ser Lancel," a familiar voice said, and Sansa bit her lip to keep from smiling as a far more jovial than usual Ser Loras came walking into the corridor, his Kingsguard cloak in pristine condition.

Margaery had assured Sansa that her brother Loras was fine, after the incident, more wounded pride than anything, and he certainly looked it here, walking without a wince and smiling as he threw his arm a little too tightly around Ser Lancel's shoulders.

"I'm early for my shift," he said, giving the man a little wink as Ser Lancel eyed him with something like disgust. "I know how boring it can get, babysitting my little sister."

Ser Lancel ducked under Loras' arm, moving away from him and straightening his armor a bit more. It seemed to dwarf him. "Of course. I will just go and...report to the White Tower."

Ser Loras flashed Lancel far too white teeth, and Lancel practically fled.

Loras turned back to Margaery, ignoring Sansa altogether as he gave his sister a tight nod and opened the door to her chambers for her.

Margaery eyed her brother for a moment, before giving him a small smile that he returned, and dragging Sansa into the room, shutting the door with a soft thud behind the two of them, Loras a steadfast guard outside their door.

The thought made Sansa uncomfortable, but she did not have long to think over her feelings on the matter before Margaery was on the move once.

"Seven, I thought we'd never get time alone," Margaery said with a little laugh, pulling the gown out of Sansa's grip and moving toward the center of the room, not seeming to notice the little strangled noise Sansa made as she thought of the last time she had been here, standing on the opposite side of that door, listening to Elinor-

The front of Margaery's gown fell down around her hips, exposing her tight breasts, the nipples already hardened in anticipation, and Sansa felt her thighs grow instantly wet, to know that her own idea had caused such a reaction.

She swallowed thickly as Margaery got to work on the rest of her dress, shimmying out of it and allowing it to fall to the ground in a small pool.

It only occurred to her then that Margaery was naked while she was not, but Margaery did not seem bothered by this in the slightest as she took the Dornish dress from Sansa's unresisting fingers.

Margaery gave Sansa a teasing smirk, pulling open the front of the gown and placing it over her head, fingers deft as she pushed it around her head and down onto her body, smoothing the gown out as it fell into place, clinging to her skin in places that had Margaery pulling at it with a little laugh.

Sansa's mouth went dry.

"I'm not sure this gown fits me," Margaery teased, glancing up with darkened eyes.

Sansa found her voice, somehow. "I think it's perfect," she whispered.

Although Margaery was not much bigger than her, and Sansa was in fact taller, the dress fit even more tightly on her then it would have on Sansa. And something about the skintight tan fabric that barely covered Margaery had Sansa moving her hand between her legs, rubbing at her womanhood wantonly, desperately in need of friction.

The gown barely went to the top of Margaery's thighs, concealing the hair of her womanhood, but not much else, and held her legs tightly together, the little slits on the sides riding up to her hips.

Sansa swallowed, eyes travelling upward, to where the gown clung to Margaery's waist and stomach, and finally resting on her breasts.

The bosom of the gown seemed barely able to hold in Margaery's breasts, so tight across them that Sansa noticed Margaery was beginning to breathe heavily, the strings atop the chest of the gown not even tied.

Sansa found herself wondering what Margaery would look like, were they tied, and then she was moving before she really knew what she was doing, reaching out and doing just that.

Margaery let out a little moan as Sansa pulled the strings tighter than necessary, arching forward, but Sansa stepped back, not allowing the friction and giving Margaery a stern look.

Margaery licked her lips, eyes darkening.

When the strings had been knotted, Sansa reached out, rubbing at Margaery's hardened nipples through the thin fabric of the gown until she had Margaery moaning loudly, pushing against her as Margaery's nipples peaked against Sansa's dexterous fingers.

"Do you like it?" Margaery whispered in her ear, breath kissing the shell of it, and Sansa shuddered, sucking in a breath.

"You're beautiful," she whispered, and Margaery laughed.

"You always say that," Margaery teased.

Sansa's hand ran down the fabric of the gown, until she was rubbing the cloth against Margaery's womanhood. Margaery sucked in a breath, glancing down between them once more before attacking Sansa's neck with her lips, the action filled with desperation.

"That's because it's true."

Sansa liked the affect her words and actions were having on Margaery, liked how Margaery was losing control before her, wanted it to happen more often.

"Get on the bed," she whispered, half to see if Margaery would actually do it.

Margaery seemed to have no complaints, moving to the bed wordlessly and draping herself across it, glancing back at Sansa with a mischievous look on her face.

"Are you going to tear it off me now?" she asked, smirking.

Sansa shook her head. "Not yet," she told the other girl. And then she moved onto the bed as well, crawling up beside Margaery and running her fingers through Margaery's hair.

"Well," Margaery said, her tone conversationally, "You may wish to do so soon, before I lose all sense of feeling in my body and can't feel you fucking me."

That surprised a laugh out of Sansa, even as she choked on her next breath. "What a naughty queen you are, Marg," she teased, "Perhaps I ought to punish you and leave it on all night."

Margaery groaned. "I knew that this was a bad idea."

Sansa swallowed, sat back on her heels. "Do you want to...do something else?"

She couldn't quite get the image that had been plaguing her since the day of the tourney out of her head, even if she had never seen it, for Sansa's imagination had run wild afterwards, had gone through every possible extreme for what had been happening between Margaery and Elinor. But she had no wish to make Margaery do anything she didn't wish to, even if Sansa was still angry.

Even if Sansa knew that they probably shouldn't even be doing this, with the anger balling itself up inside of Sansa's chest, a tight, red hot ball of heat that hadn't dissipated even when she had put Margaery into that dress.

Margaery glanced up at her, the teasing look in her eyes dying away to that of seriousness. "Of course not. Gods, Sansa, just fuck me already."

Sansa blushed at the obscene word, as she always did, and then whispered, "Spread your legs."

Margaery swallowed. "I think I'll rip the gown if I spread them any farther than they are already," she admitted, eyes darkening with something like desire for just that to happen.

Sansa raised a brow, and Margaery sighed with fake dramatics, spreading her legs by just a fraction, the gown riding up her hips invitingly as she did so.

Sansa licked her lips, reaching out and fingering the fabric just above Margaery's womanhood, smiling at the expression on Margaery's face. And then she ripped the fabric, the sound loud in the otherwise quiet room, ripped it up to her belly, her womanhood growing wetter as she watched the Dornish gown split away from Margaery's body.

It gave surprisingly easily beneath her fingers, and she wondered at how thin it was, if the Dornish had invented it for this purpose.

That thought made her blush.

Sansa reached between her legs and fingered herself, ignoring the fetid moan that Margaery let out as she watched, the way she reached up and attempted to pull at the ties of the gown.

"Not yet," she whispered, and Margaery groaned. "I want..."

She wasn't quite sure what it was she wanted, but Sansa found her fingers moving as if they knew, running down Margaery's body in slow, even strokes that had Margaery panting and keening beneath her, Sansa matching the tones sound for sound.

Margaery threw back her head, letting out another small noise that went straight to Sansa's cunny as Margaery exposed a long swathe of pale skin, neck arching, and Sansa moved, bending down and pressing her lips against it, sucking gently.

"Sansa..."

Sansa shook her head, allowing her teeth to graze against the soft skin at the apex of Margaery's neck and collarbone, marveling in the way the other woman groaned, enjoying the quiet desperation in Margaery's own lips as they lowered to brush against Sansa's collar. Margaery pulled apart the ties of Sansa's collar with her teeth, and Sansa pinched herself to keep from crying out, with the knowledge that Loras was still outside.

And then Sansa could feel her breasts swinging free of the binds of her gown, just as her lips reached the beginning of the Dornish gown on Margaery.

Margaery didn't hesitate for a moment, pulling her neck somewhat out of Sansa's reach to grasp at Sansa's left breast with her plump lips, and Sansa let out the smallest cry, breaking her focus on leaving her mark all over Margaery's neck when Margaery's mouth enveloped one of her nipples, teeth tugging gently at it.

"Oh, gods..."

Margaery's right hand reached out, pulling at the top of Sansa's gown until it was splayed out around her waist, and Sansa shimmied out of it desperately, remembering then her feral attack of Margaery's collarbone in the next moment, hands moving to brush against the tan gown where it clung to Margaery, tight and as alluring as the other woman's skin.

Sansa's nipple had darkened beneath Margaery's tongue, and she let in a sharp intake of breath as the skin tightened around it, as Margaery sat halfway up in bed and, with her other hand, grasped at Sansa's thin waist to keep her in place.

Sansa squirmed as Margaery's tongue flicked against her breast, as it moved off suddenly to have a go at her right breast, until it was as sensitive as the first, and Sansa reminded herself that this wasn't what this was about.

She keened again, pulling Margaery off of her to push the other girl back into the sheets, ignoring the bemusement in Margaery's eyes and instead moving to lap at Margaery's chest through the thin fabric of the gown.

She glanced up, meeting Margaery's eyes and seeing the want in them.

"You're so beautiful," Sansa repeated, swallowing a little. "Gods, Margaery, I want..."

"Tell me what you want," Margaery whispered, her voice almost pleading as she bucked her hips up against Sansa.

Sansa did not need much more encouragement than that. "I want to fuck you," she murmured, running her lips over the fabric along Margaery's stomach, revelling in the long breath she sucked in. "I wish that you never had to see Joffrey again, so that I could leave marks on you, everywhere, so that everyone could know that you belong with me, could know the things that we do to each other in the dark. Gods, Marg..."

Margaery whimpered. "Then fuck me, Sansa."

Sansa's head lifted abruptly. "I...what?"

Margaery grinned at her. "You said you wanted to."

Margaery was the source of almost everything Sansa knew about the bedroom. Her septa had never told her the sort of sordid things Margaery whispered about to her in the dark.

"...What?"

Margaery groaned, closing her eyes. When she opened them again, they were full of exasperated fondness. She reached down between them, pulling the gown up over her stomach and taking Sansa's hands in her own, leading them forward until Sansa was forced to sit on Margaery's thighs or fall over on top of her.

Margaery smiled at her, spread her legs until Sansa fell between them, then reached around Sansa, wrapping her arms around Sansa's waist and tugging her forward, Sansa's gown bunching up around her hips.

Sansa's sharp intake of breath was a sound she was sure even Loras heard outside of the room as Margaery maneuvered her womanhood directly beneath Sansa's, as she bucked up against Sansa's hips without further ado.

Sansa glanced down, met Margaery's lust-filled gaze.

"Fuck me," Margaery repeated, and Sansa bit her lip, rubbed her cunny experimentally against Margaery's, shivering when the rocking motion sent a jolt straight through her that nearly had her blacking out, nearly had her erupting then and there.

She nodded, riding Margaery as she pushed them together, the sensation not quite like anything they had ever done before, the sweet, soft feel of Margaery's wet womanhood sealed against her own sensitive one, moving with it.

Sansa bit her lip and closed her eyes as Margaery's hands lifted to wrap around her breasts, to tweak at her sensitive nipples until Sansa let out a silent shout.

Margaery went stiff at the sound, panting heavily. "Sansa..." She reached between them, fingers brushing at the place where they entwined, and Sansa groaned.

"No. Not yet," Sansa repeated, and Margaery writhed a little beneath her. Sansa pushed again against Margaery, enjoyed the sounds it elicited from the other woman as they writhed together, moving as one.

Sansa had never felt closer to Margaery than she did in this moment, not even when she had her lips inside of Margaery's hot cunny, not when Margaery had her fingers inside of Sansa's.

She was beginning to see stars at the edges of her vision, and Sansa panicked, reaching down to pull at the Dornish gown where it still clung to Margaery, half in tatters, now.

Margaery's breasts swung free from the tight confines of the gown as Sansa tore the rest of it off of her, and at the same time, Sansa felt the hot spurt of Margaery's come against her hand where it had joined Margaery's, just at the same that she felt her own come dripping down in a small torrent.

She gasped at the sensation, even if she had felt it a dozen times at this point, the feel of Margaery's hot fluids staining her fingers, staining her cunny where it lay against Margaery's, and closed her eyes, throwing her head back.

When Sansa came to herself again, Margaery was still lying beneath her, staring up at Sansa with a sad, knowing expression that instantly made Sansa's stomach twist into knots.

Sansa took a look at what remained of the gown, lying in pieces on the floor, and burst into tears.

Margaery bit her lip, and then opened her arms wide, expression free of any judgment, for which Sansa was absurdly glad.

Sansa did not need more encouragement than that. She fell into Margaery's arms, curled up onto the huge bed beside the older girl and snuggled against her, head falling onto Margaery's chest as she closed her eyes.

"Sleep now, Sansa," Margaery whispered against her skin, kissing the shell of her ear. "Everything will be all right when you wake."

And Sansa believed her, of course, because Margaery would be there when she woke. Even if she wasn’t sure she should believe anything that came out of Margaery’s mouth, what with the knowledge of what she had overheard Margaery doing with Elinor.


	113. SANSA LXX

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sansa and Margaery finally have a much needed talk.

"I'm sorry," Sansa said the moment she woke up, voice thick from sleep and crying. She glanced up, saw Margaery sitting on the edge of the bed next to her, brushing out her hair with her fingers.

Sansa wondered how long she had been asleep, for Margaery was wearing a thin, purple gown that wasn't quite sheer, and the lights from the torches hanging in Margaery's chambers were dimming almost to nothing, now.

Margaery glanced back at her, and Sansa's stomach clenched at the look on her face, at the way her lips were pursed even as tear tracks dried on her beautiful face. Sansa had done that.

"I don't...I don't know what happened," Sansa whispered, fully aware that it was a lie and not at the same time.

What she had done...

She thought she might be sick with the guilt of it, with the perverse pleasure she had gotten from punishing Margaery like that, as if...As if she were Joffrey.

Sansa gagged, and that was all the warning she had before the little food that she had managed to consume last night at supper with Margaery in an attempt to convince the girl everything was fine came back up.

Margaery, to her credit, moved quickly, pulling Sansa up into a sitting position and holding her over the basin they had used to wash their feet in the night before, filled with grimy water, now.

Sansa did not know how long Margaery held her there, cleansing her stomach of anything, until the only thing still coming up was bile and far too much of it, and her head ached, a dull throbbing arising behind her eyes, by the time it was finished.

Margaery shook her head, brushing out Sansa's hair where she had rescued it behind Sansa with her fingers and rubbing gentle circles into her back. Sansa did not become aware of the soothing motion until she all but collapsed back into the bed, into Margaery's arms.

"You don't need to apologize, my love," Margaery whispered gently, another pretty lie to complete the night's worth of them. "It happens, sometimes, when things are...so intense, in the bedchamber."

Sansa shook her head, sitting up a little and blinking stupidly at Margaery. "You've...done something like that before? With...Joffrey?"

Margaery barked out a laugh. "Not with Joffrey, certainly. I think if he ever caught me crying in the bedchamber, he would never let me stop." She shivered, and so did Sansa. Sansa wondered what she would have done if Margaery had started crying while they were still going at it, as her words seemed to suggest.

"But...with others. There are some people who...crave that sort of intimacy, all the time. I knew a girl back in Highgarden..." Margaery noticed the look on Sansa's face, trailing off. "Does it truly bother you so, knowing how many people I've slept with?"

Sansa pulled away from her a little, glancing around for her own clothes and finding herself suddenly unable to meet Margaery's eyes as she thought of Elinor, kissing the other girl. "I don't know how many people you've slept with," she pointed out.

Margaery's eyes narrowed. "What is that supposed to mean?" she asked, voice still insufferably calm, for Sansa was suddenly angry and didn't want to be the only one.

Sansa suddenly wanted Margaery to be as angry as she was, to experience that black-red-hot anger deep in the pit of her gut as Sansa did now, with no way of expressing it.

"Do you even know?" Sansa demanded, rounding on Margaery. "Do you even know how many there's been, with all of your...experience?"

She said the word like a curse, and flinched at the shock that appeared on Margaery's face at the question.

"Sansa, what's brought this on?" Margaery asked, brows furrowing as a flash of pain crossed her features before she buried it deep. "I thought I made it clear to you some time ago that you were not my first, and neither was Joffrey. What..."

"I was a virgin the first time we did anything, Margaery," Sansa said blithely.

Margaery closed her eyes. "I know."

Sansa didn't think she knew, understood. "I'd only ever kissed anyone, before you."

Margaery's eyes flashed, and she pulled away from Sansa, eying her warily. "If you think I'm a whore, Sansa, just say so. Don't try to confine me in some tight gown because you think it will keep me from sleeping with anyone else."

Sansa swallowed thickly, trying to get the image of Margaery from moments or hours ago out of her head. Trying to get Margaery's words just now about what it had meant, when Sansa had not even known at the time, out of her head. "Do you?"

"Do I what?" Margaery snapped back at her.

"Do you sleep with anyone else? Besides...Joffrey, I mean."

Margaery's jaw twitched. "Sansa..."

"I heard you with your cousin Elinor," Sansa accused then, the words finally bubbling out of her just when she had thought they would never make themselves known. "I came to your chambers the other night, after the tourney, because I was worried about you, because I wanted...but you and she were... Are you growing tired of me?"

Margaery's expression softened, and she stood, turning to stand before Sansa. "Oh, Sansa..."

She reached out to touch Sansa, but Sansa flinched away, and Margaery merely let out a small sigh at the motion. She turned away from Sansa, running her hands through long, unbraided hair and gritting her teeth.

Sansa watched the older woman pace, watched as she walked up and down the length of the room, from the bed to the chaise by the other end of the room, watched the frustration bleeding out of her stance to be replaced with something else.

And then Margaery spun back to her, giving Sansa a thin, watery smile.

"Of course not," she said, as if that answer should be obvious, as if Sansa should have known that so long ago. Sansa felt another jab of guilt in her stomach, wondered if she had any more bile to release.

"Elinor and I...we've been pillow friends for years," Margaery continued, no longer looking at Sansa as she spoke, staring instead down at her shaking hands. Sansa had done that, too. "I...care for her, immensely, but I don't feel for her the same things I do for you. I never have. I don't...I can't quite describe how I feel for you, Sansa, not the way I can how I feel for her."

She sounded so lost as she said the words, and Sansa felt something like relief at hearing them, at hearing that Margaery was just as confused about all of this as Sansa was.

"Then why did you let her kiss you?" Sansa asked miserably, for her thoughts had turned to her lady mother, and she found herself wondering if this was how she had felt, every time she looked at Jon, the living reminder of her husband's infidelity.

"In my family, we were never taught to only confine ourselves to one encounter," Margaery admitted quietly, sitting down on the bed next to Sansa, but making no move to touch her, still staring down at her hands.

"As long as there were no...complications, there was no need to remain so strict." She shrugged. "I guess...I've never really known anything different. My mother and father, they love each other deeply, but even they often find themselves in the beds of others, and are happy enough with such an arrangement. I only knew that such a life is dangerous for a queen, for Joffrey's queen. I'm...sorry if it bothered you. I never meant to hurt you by it."

Sansa took a deep breath, wrapping her arms around her stomach as if to hold in what she felt there. "My mother loved my father," she whispered, thinking of all of the times she had lived in awe of her parents as a little girl, seeing perhaps more romance there, in the formal way they regarded one another, than was actually there. "And they never strayed from each other while they were wed. But I think she hated him a little, too. For Jon."

"Your half-brother," Margaery said.

Sansa nodded. "It just...isn't done, in the North. Oh, they have their bastards there, of course, and there are people like Walder Frey," she shivered at the mere mention of him, at the reminder of what he had done to her family, "But my mother always believed that it was so important to be faithful, no matter what. I suppose..." she let out a tired laugh. "I suppose she meant to be faithful only to one whom you've wed..."

She couldn't continue the thought. Couldn't think about what her mother might think of her now, knowing that she willingly shared the bed of a married woman, not when her mother's specter already haunted her enough.

Margaery's eyes flitted over to hers, before moving back to her hands once more. "And do you hate me now?" she asked, in a whisper that was so loud in the otherwise silent room.

Sansa forgot to breathe. She half-turned where she sat, pulling one leg up onto the bed so that she could face Margaery fully.

"I could never," she whispered, the words half a declaration and half a promise, and Margaery stared at her for a long moment before nodding, more to herself than Sansa, and pulling her lip between her teeth.

"If you like, I can...I can stop." Sansa stared at her for a moment, and Margaery moved, reaching out and running her fingers hesitantly along Sansa's arm. The touch caused the hairs on Sansa's arms to stand, as Margaery clarified, "With Elinor, and with anyone else."

Sansa swallowed, eyes widening. "You would do that?"

Margaery nodded, made a noise low in her throat when she saw the look in Sansa's eyes, tilted up Sansa's chin with her fingers. "Sansa...If you haven't realized it by now, there is quite a lot that I would do for you. And I...I am sorry that I hurt you. We may do things differently in Highgarden, but I know it was wrong in your eyes, here in the capitol, where things are so very different from Highgarden. I just...Elinor was there, and I was worried about my brother, and, in that moment, I had convinced myself I needed her."

"I'm sorry," Sansa whispered, tears stinging at her eyes. "I shouldn't have gotten so angry. And I shouldn't have implied that you were a..." she flushed. "I know that you don't belong to me. That you've never belonged to anyone but yourself. I just..."

Margaery's eyes flashed with hurt. "I may be Joffrey's wife and queen, Sansa, I may _belong_ to him, but I don't care about him like I do you." She reached out, taking Sansa's hands into her own. "Surely, you must know that." She bit her lip. "I've never felt for anyone the way I do for you," Margaery continued, lips pursed as though she were forcing the words out, but Sansa felt a small thrill at hearing them all the same.

"R-Really?" Sansa stammered out, and Margaery nodded, giving her the smallest smile. Sansa bit her lip. "For what it's worth, I care about you too."

Margaery's smile widened, though, when Sansa met her eyes, she reflected that the other girl's eyes still looked quite sad. "I know, Sansa."

"And I really did want to tear you out of that dress. I'd been, ah, thinking about it for a while. Since I got it, actually."

Margaery looked startled, and then she laughed. "My little vixen," she giggled, and then leaned forward, kissing Sansa on the lips.

"Margaery..." Sansa said quietly, lifting herself up onto her elbows when they both pulled back.

Sansa gave her a small, half-smile. "I know," she whispered, and Sansa hesitated for a moment, before nodding.

"I know," Margaery repeated, "and let's never speak of it again, eh?"

Sansa swallowed. "I..." Then she nodded, not trusting herself to speak again without bursting into tears once more.

Margaery bent down, kissing Sansa's cheek.

But Sansa reached, out pushing the other woman back, and, at Margaery's perplexed expression, she whispered, needing to explain herself as she eyed the Dornish dress, now sitting in tatters on the floor beside them, "I want you to know, I..." She coughed, unable to quite say the word. "I think you're the most beautiful woman I will ever know."

Margaery stared at her for a moment, and then smiled widely. "Well, you aren't hideous yourself, my vixen," she teased with a chuckle in her voice, and Sansa forced herself to giggle as well.

And then she let the smile drop, a little. Or at least, Sansa thought it was only a little. Margaery sat up a little where she lay beside her, glancing at Sansa with a nervous tension in her shoulders.

Sansa licked her suddenly dry lips. "What if...What if I won't be your vixen forever?" she murmured. "I don't...I know that you belong to Joffrey in name only, I do, but it's only another reminder of how temporary all of this..." she swept her hand around the room to encompass everything she couldn't quite put a word to. "Is."

A part of her wasn't certain, after this display, that she would be able to let go of Margaery, when the time came.

Margaery's smile was gentle as she pulled Sansa into her, laid Sansa's head against her arm where it lay folded at the elbow on her pillow.

"Sansa," she murmured, her voice low and conspiratorial, "This can last as long or as short as we both choose it to," she promised, and something about that promise relieved Sansa more than she could say. "And it doesn't have to mean anything, or it could mean so much that it hurts, like it does now." She flicked Sansa's chin with her finger, making the other girl smile. "But you'll always be my little vixen."

Sansa swallowed, bit back a small laugh as she leaned forward and pressed her lips to Margaery's once more, tried not to think about how right it felt, to have her lips against Margaery's, and how wrong Dorne suddenly seemed, in this moment.


	114. MARGAERY XXXIV

“Oberyn Martell is going to steal her away from me. I had thought it would be Tyrion Lannister, like I once suggested he do to keep her from Joffrey, but it will be a damn Martell. And I will never see her again, if he takes her to Dorne. They hate us there, and we hate them."

Margaery was moody today, in a way she hadn't been since the pregnancy she'd not even known she was going through until it was too late, and she sighed, flopping down onto the divan in the corner of her room as Loras shut the door to her chambers behind Elinor, Sansa gone for some hours now since their...interesting coitus.

Elinor reached out, rubbed at Margaery's back comfortingly. They were sitting in Margaery's rooms again, the one place she seemed to be free to speak her mind, and yet where Joffrey had already invaded with his presence, and Sansa had nearly overheard things she should never have been able to, alongside what she had been so hurt by.

Margaery had come here after another round with Sansa, more hurt than she had let on in front of the other girl, by the Dornish gown, by the fact that Sansa was angry with her for being with another woman when she planned on leaving Margaery for good anyway, by all of it.

She used to be able to break down in front of Sansa, Margaery thought idly. The girl had been one of her few saving graces here, as the wife of Joffrey, for whom breaking down in front of would be fatal.

And now, Margaery had nothing but these damned useless rooms which had never kept her safe, not even from her own guards, and Elinor, the cause of their fight to begin with, to break down before without admitting to some horrible weakness that would push away the two other people she clung to out of sheer necessity.

"I thought you wanted her safe," Elinor murmured, voice doe-soft.

Margaery sucked in a breath. "I do," she whispered carefully, and then glanced at Elinor once more. "Of course I do. I...I should," she finished, and Elinor sucked in a breath.

"You really love her, don't you?" she whispered, and Margaery jerked at the word, pulled away from Elinor's gentle hands.

“I...don’t know how I feel about her,” Margaery whispered, looking crestfallen, but Elinor seemed to see through that easily enough.

“You do,” she said intuitively. “You do, and it scares you how much you do,” she said, reaching out and squeezing Margaery’s shoulder. “And if it bothers her that much then, burdensome as it may be for me," her lips quirked into a teasing smile at those words, "I won’t steal you from her again.”

Margaery glanced up at her cousin sharply. "Elinor-"

"You can thank me for it in some other way," Elinor said, with an impish grin. "One that won't make your little...companion jealous."

Margaery smiled for a moment, before her face fell once more. "I don't know that it matters," she said finally. "If Prince Oberyn gets around to finally leaving this place with her, and Olyvar didn't know of their plans or simply wouldn't tell Loras, because we know he's only telling us this for his own gain, then I will likely never see her again."

Elinor sighed, but then she sat up a little, her eyes narrowing. "The Martells are certainly taking their time to leave.”

Margaery opened her mouth to agree, then slumped a little where she sat, falling silent.

Elinor gave her a sympathetic look. “But they will. And then you will have to decide," she said, and Margaery glanced up at her in confusion until Elinor elaborated, "You have to decide, Margaery, how much she means to you."

Margaery swallowed. "I don't know," she whispered, and then ducked her head. "You seem to, but all of my feelings of late, about Sansa Stark," she let out a small breath, "about anything, have been so...muddled." She rubbed together shaking hands.

Elinor's face twisted into sympathy. "Oh, Margaery," she murmured, and then bit her lip, expression thoughtful. "If I could go back to that day and take on what Ser Osmund did to you myself so that you did not have to bear it, I would do so in a heartbeat."

Margaery hugged herself, gaping at her friend. "Do not say such things," she whispered, not sure if the whisper was from the need to be quiet about what had happened to her, or merely at the horror of what her friend was suggesting. "Elinor, I could not live with myself if I thought that you had suffered in such a way because of..." she bit her lip. "Because of m-"

"Do not finish that sentence," Elinor snapped, moving closer to Margaery and then hesitating, her arms falling to her sides. "Don't you dare. What happened that day was not because of you, Margaery." She sighed at what she must have seen as a lack of belief on Margaery's face. "It was because Cersei Lannister is a right bitch, and could not bear to share her son with anyone else. That is all."

Margaery sucked in a breath, thought of the blood that had quite literally been on her hands weeks after that event, ignoring, for the moment, Elinor's harsh words. "I goaded her," she protested weakly, ignoring Elinor's soft hands on her shoulders, rubbing gently as always used to comfort her in the past. It didn't, now. "I kept pushing Cersei, and-"

"And that somehow makes you responsible for her actions? For Ser Osmund's?" Elinor laughed incredulously, and Margaery jerked away from her, staring. Elinor sighed. "Margaery, have you told Sansa yet about what happened that day? Loras?"

Margaery whirled. "You know I cannot tell Loras," she whispered. "I can barely keep a handle on him as it is, these days. He would be shoving his sword into Joffrey's chest the moment he learned the truth, the throne be damned, and we would never survive the ensuing bloodbath."

Elinor sighed, rubbed at her eyes. "Sansa, then?"

Margaery shook her head, and Elinor pulled close to her again, pulled Margaery into her arms.

"You should tell her," Elinor said quietly. "She might come to understand you a bit better, if you do."

Margaery snorted wetly. "And what would be the point? If she...if she is leaving soon, then it doesn't matter, anyway. In our last weeks, days, however long together, she would merely feel pity for me, would treat me like something fragile, when she is the one person who...who I can be myself around."

Elinor stiffened a little at her words, hurt flashing across her face before she buried it, and then sighed. "You shouldn't have to bear this burden alone, Margaery," she whispered hoarsely. "I cannot stand seeing you like this."

Margaery shrugged. "I have you," she pointed out, somewhat to appease her friend after what she had just said, even if it was true, to an extent.

Ever since Elinor had learned what had befallen her at Ser Osmund's hand, she had treated Margaery like a piece of fragile glass, and, while sometimes she craved that, Margaery found that, other moments, she could hardly stand it.

Elinor's smile turned sad, then. "Not forever," she reminded the queen. "You know I'm to be married soon enough. Ser Alyn won't let me put him off forever, even if I am serving the Queen. And a married lady cannot continue to serve you in the same capacity as I have."

"Everyone is leaving me," Margaery whispered, lower lip jutting out into a small pout. "You, Sansa, everyone." She crossed her arms over her chest to keep them from shaking in front of Elinor. She shook her head. "I...I suppose it's selfish of me to say that. We must all grow up, after all."

Elinor shook her head. "You'll still have Alla and Megga, and the other girls." She bit her lip, suddenly hesitant. "I could stay, if you like. The betrothal between myself and Alyn is fluid enough, after all. He cares for me deeply, and my father wants the match, but my mother is almost as conniving as you, as you well know-"

"No," Margaery murmured. "Of course not. I could never ask you to do that for me." She smiled. "I've seen the way you look at him, every time you're together. And I would not want to stand between that."

She sighed, thought of Oberyn Martell, and wondered if she looked at Sansa Stark in the same manner that Elinor looked at her betrothed.

Elinor gave her a small smile, reaching out and brushing the hair from Margaery’s eyes, and Margaery flinched back at the touch.

“In any case,” she murmured, not meeting Elinor’s eyes, “That wasn’t what I meant. What happened, with Ser Osmund. That’s not why...”

Elinor raised a brow. “It wasn’t?”

Margaery sent her a small smile. “No. I meant...ever since Joffrey called her to our chambers, and wanted me to...” she shook her head. “Ever since then, everything has been so muddled. When I’m around her, I want her so badly, and then, sometimes, I remember how this all even started between Sansa and I, between the two of us, and...”

Elinor reached out again, her movements gentle, slow as she tucked a strand of Margaery’s hair behind her ears. “There’s nothing wrong with the two of you,” she promised, finishing the thought for Margaery when the other girl could barely put a name to it, and Margaery’s breath hitched at the words. “I don’t care how this started, between the two of you. You deserve the small bit of happiness you bring each other, and not to have to sit and think about why you have it.”

Margaery laughed wetly. “Perhaps I shall have to keep you from marrying Ser Alyn for a while longer, Elinor. I’m not quite certain what I’ll be able to do without you around to give me such...straightforward advice, you fisherman’s wife.”

Elinor frowned at her. “I mean it.”

Margaery sighed. “I know. I know, I just...You said you know what this feeling is, between her and I. I still don’t, but it...doesn’t feel like anything else I’ve had.” She looked through her lashes at Elinor.

“And that scares you,” Elinor finished for her.

“How do you know?”

Elinor smirked. “Because I’ve certainly felt that before. It’s all right to feel that way, Margaery,” she told the other girl. “I know your grandmother has taught you that it isn’t your whole life, but it is. Dangerous, but all right. And...I think you know what it means, about this situation with Prince Oberyn, as well.”

Margaery stared down at the tremor in her hands. “Well, I don’t,” she murmured, and Elinor sighed, stood to her feet.

“I think we should go and have tea on the solar,” she told Margaery, wiping her own hands on her gown. Margaery gave a noncommittal grunt. “I’ll go and tell the other girls. And Sansa, how about that? She seems to enjoy these sorts of events, as long as there’s lemon cakes. And you.”

Margaery reached out to throw one of the small pillows on her bed at the other girl, didn’t make it in time before Elinor was skipping from the room.


	115. MARGAERY XXV

"I think you might be a better rider than I," Sansa said, panting as they brought their horses to a halt, the guards grumbling behind them as their mounts struggled to catch up to the racing mares.

They had just reached the Blackwater Rush, and Margaery could remember the last time they had come here, when House Tyrell was still courting Sansa, the deadened trees the two of them had found in this forsaken part of the Kingswood. She blanched, hoping Sansa's mind did not dredge up the same memory, for she had no wish to remind Sansa of those times when House Tyrell was merely using her.

"Nonsense," Margaery murmured dismissively, pulling her horse to a stop so that their annoyed guards might catch them. She turned to Sansa, smiling widely. "You're just out of practice."

Sansa pouted. "It's not like there's a lot of opportunity for me to ride, in King's Landing," she told the other girl, and Margaery sighed.

"I used to ride out every day in Highgarden with my ladies," Margaery confessed, expression slipping a little before she turned back to look at Sansa with a small smile. "My brother loved horses, and taught me to love them from a young age. I...I miss that."

"You could still do it, here," Sansa pointed out, but Margaery merely shrugged.

"With the smallfolk as antsy as they are, and King's Landing constantly on the verge of war?" she shook her head. "It is merely a treat now, unfortunately. Besides, someone needs to keep a hand on Joffrey."

She saw Sansa swallow thickly, and instantly regretted the words, but already Sansa was speaking.

"I suppose that is true," she agreed, and then glanced back at their guards. "Though I'm not sure this is precisely where I would wish to go for a 'treat.'"

Margaery smirked as they came closer to the Blackwater. "Perhaps I have developed a taste for the macabre, as Joffrey's queen." Or perhaps as Sansa's lover, though Margaery did not dare say that thought aloud.

Sansa's face softened. "I hardly think that's true. Your gowns are still as pink and frilly as ever."

Margaery swatted at the air where Sansa rode beside her. "You little fiend. I suppose you are right."

Sansa snorted. "I'm always."

"Your Grace," the guards interrupted them then, before Margaery could retort, surrounding them now in a tight semi circle, and Margaery turned a blinding smile on the one who had spoken. Not Loras, she noted, who was glaring at her in turn. "You should not attempt to lose your protectors in such a way," she was lectured by the green cloak. "You could be taken advantage of by the woods people, or an assassin."

Margaery frowned. "Of course. My apologies, good ser; I suppose Lady Sansa and I allowed ourselves to get carried away. It won't happen again, of course."

The man sniffed, and Margaery wondered how it was that she had more respect, as more than just a foolish young girl, from the Lannister gold cloaks and Kingsguard then her own father's men. "Of course."

Margaery kicked her heels, and her horse moved along, the Tyrell guards following them with Ser Loras as Sansa kept stride with Margaery, the two of them talking happily of nothing as they rode.

Margaery would miss this. Megga was a lovely riding companion, but she wasn't Sansa. Wouldn't be a replacement for the girl when Sansa had gone off to Dorne.

They stopped for a little picnic on the edge of a clearing of dead grass surrounded by hollowed out wood, sending the guards to watch the perimeter with their backs to the girls as Sansa set up their blanket and Margaery emptied the picnic basket the kitchens had provided for the Queen. Margaery had not wanted to cross the Blackwater Rush again, and Sansa didn't mention it.

It wasn't quite the privacy of Margaery's bedchambers, but in the open like this, Margaery knew that it was the closest they would come to, and she was content with that.

Margaery collapsed onto one edge of the blanket, noticed Sansa's eyes flitting apprehensively to the guards before she sat in the opposite corner, and sighed, moving herself so that she rested on her elbow, hair falling in Sansa's lap, their feet tangling together.

Sansa shot her a worried look, but her face softened at whatever it was she saw on Margaery's that so often reassured her, and Margaery took the opportunity to fill two small plates for the both of them while Sansa was distracted.

The food Margaery had ordered made for this little trip was all carefully bland; breads and honey cakes, lemon cakes to entice Sansa and pears, figs and dried meats that had been smoked to a delicious softness, and honeyed wine. Truth be told, she was rather proud of the assortment she'd come up with, and was rewarded for it with the small spark of interest she saw in Sansa's eyes as she looked over the meal, before dutifully taking her made up plate from Margaery's hands.

Margaery found herself watching Sansa eat like a mother might watch her child, feeling a strange, smothering feeling deep in her chest as Sansa ate far less of her own plate than Margaery did of hers.

_If Sansa went to Dorne with Prince Oberyn, who would be there to tell her to eat?_

The thought hit Margaery with a sudden force, and she jerked where she lay, spilling her wine onto the edge of the blanket before righting her goblet just in time. Sansa glanced down at her, radiating concern, and Margaery forced herself to smile.

It was not as if she was doing the best job of making Sansa eat herself, though Margaery knew that, between she and Shae, they were at least ensuring that Sansa had three meals a day and ate most of them. Would they do so in Dorne?

Margaery tensed when she felt a hand listing through her hair, worn long and down today despite the rigors of riding. For all that it made her look, in Elinor's words, like a banshee to wear her hair down when riding, Margaery enjoyed the feeling of the wind through her hair when she did so in Highgarden. Enjoyed it even more for the rarity it was in King's Landing.

Sansa's fingers in her hair were hesitant, pulling gently at the long strands, and Margaery forced herself not to move, not to pull away from the touch, for, even with their argument over that damned Dornish dress, Margaery was not sure they both knew where they stood together, and she did not want Sansa getting the wrong idea from a rejection of that sort.

"Do you want some more?" Margaery asked when she felt like the touch was strangling her, when she felt like Sansa's hand was pulling her hair around her throat and tugging, holding out the basket of lemon cakes her ladies had brought for this venture, and Sansa glanced at them for a moment before laughing, reaching out and taking one to set on her practically empty plate, effectively distracted.

Margaery was glad enough not to have that conversation, as badly as she knew the last one had needed to be had, for she did not know what so bothered her about the feel of Sansa's fingers through her hair, while she laid her head in Sansa's lap. Perhaps the vulnerability of it, for she did not react so when Alla brushed her hair, or when Megga plaited it.

It frustrated her, that Margaery should react in such a way at all. Elinor, her only confidante, had tentatively suggested once that it had to do with what Ser Osmund had done to her, this need to appear strong all of the time. She had not done so again, after Margaery had laid into her, convinced that it was merely the result of her worry that Joffrey should ever find his queen weak.

Whatever the case, the need was growing with each passing day. The need to display her strength, the itch she felt beneath her skin at random times prompting her to fuck Joffrey harder each time they were together, the tremors in her hands at the mention of anything reminding her of Ser Osmund pushing Margaery further into Sansa's arms.

Margaery shook her head, not wanting to focus on such thoughts for a moment longer. She sat up, taking another sip of her wine and turning to face Sansa where she sat cross legged on the blanket.

"Sansa," she said, watching with slight amusement as Sansa stuffed a second lemon cake into her mouth. The amusement faded, however, as she thought that the other girl ate an almost steady diet of the things, that on any other girl, it would show.

Sansa glanced up, flushing a little, which had not been Margaery's intention at all, and Margaery made certain to steer the conversation to other waters.

"Elinor won't be bothering you anymore," Margaery said quietly, not meeting Sansa's eyes. "I spoke with her about the matter we...discussed, and she agreed that it was for the best if she merely attended to her duties as a lady."

Sansa blinked, worked her throat for a moment, as if she had forgotten quite how to use it.

"Oh! I..."

"Sansa," Margaery reached out and took Sansa's hands into her own. "I want very much to make you happy, as I have told you. Elinor is...a dear friend of mine from my childhood, but we are no longer children anymore, and some things must change between then and now, after all."

Sansa bit her lip. "I was wrong to get so angry about it," she said finally. "You've known her a lot longer than you've known me, after all, and-"

"Sansa." Sansa lifted her head at the harsh tone in Margaery's voice, a tone Margaery had never used with the sweet girl before. "Never apologize to me for how you feel, all right? Do us both that courtesy, at the least."

Sansa met her eyes, flushing. Gods, the way that pink color bloomed across Sansa's skin...the other girl had no idea what it did to Margaery, she thought, somewhat annoyed to realize as much. "All right," she promised, and Margaery nodded, relieved.

"I'm glad that you let me know how you really felt," Margaery went on, "even if some of it hurt me." Sansa flushed, but allowed her to go on, "And I am glad that it was something I could fix."

Sansa licked her lower lip. "I shouldn't have implied that you were...that you..." she flushed again. "I shouldn't have said what I did about your bed companions, however hurt I was," she said, the words all coming out in a quiet rush that the guards would not be able to hear. "That was thoughtlessly cruel, and I didn't mean it."

Margaery sent her a small smile. "I know you didn't, Sansa," she answered gently. "I know."

She didn't mean it now, but she had meant it in the moment, hurt by what she saw as a betrayal on Margaery's part, where Margaery would never seek it out willingly. Margaery supposed she could understand the sentiment, from a distant sort of perspective; if Joffrey took a lover, she would be furious, of course.

But, as she had told Sansa, monogamy was not something that the ladies and lords of House Tyrell paid much attention to, and Sansa's anger over the whole thing bemused her. Margaery knew that her mother and father loved each other, but they did not keep the same bed after they had birthed enough heirs, and were quite happy with the arrangement.

She wondered if it was so different in the North, or if Sansa had merely been hurt by the fact that Margaery had been her first, as she had claimed.

Truth be told, Margaery still didn't understand the anger there, much as she sought to soothe it, much as she would do anything to atone for it, but it worried her, and not for the reasons Sansa might have suspected, had she known of that worry.

Sansa wasn't made stronger by their relationship together. Sansa would be made stronger by getting away from Joffrey, not remaining in his stifling presence. She wasn't like Joffrey; she was bright, and needed to shine, not to have her emotions pushed down as they always would have to be, in the capitol of her enemies.

What was that saying, Margaery mused, as she watched Sansa reach down to pick up a charred stick sitting beside their blanket and poke at the ground with it. If you love someone, let them go?

She knew what she had to do, of course. Had known from the moment Loras had told her what Olyvar had overheard. Knew the course she would take with this news.

"Sansa," Margaery said pleasantly, "Are you ready to return to the Keep, now?"


	116. MARGAERY XXVI

"My love," Margaery said, after she and Joffrey had had sex, for she always found him more amenable then, "I wonder if there is something I might ask of you."

He glanced up at her, and she saw in his eyes that he no doubt wished her to ask for something like a crossbow or another dead peasant.

He was in a good mood from more than just the sex. Lord Tywin had let him execute some poor, damned peasant for taking food from the Sparrows, as more and more poor souls were being arrested for doing since that edict had been read at the tourney. The fool had gone to his death muttering that the Sparrows were kinder lords than the Crown had ever been.

Joffrey’d had his stomach ripped out.

The Tyrells were now once again offering food to the poor, in massive amounts, but it wasn’t enough. The smallfolk wouldn’t be bothered to stop going to the sparrows for food, at this point, even if it could mean their own deaths.

And, much as Margaery would like to ask him for some barbaric thing that would endear her to him more, she would just have to disappoint him, and hope it would be enough. After all, she knew her resolve in this matter wouldn't last for long.

"Whatever it is, my lady," he said with a little, wicked grin that boded ill, "I shall see it given to you."

She smirked. "I do not doubt it, darling, only..."

He looked at her, saw the serious expression on her face and sat up a little in the bed, the sheets pooling around his waist. "What is it?"

She sighed. "It's nothing..."

"Margaery."

She glanced up at that, for his voice had been cool, in a way she had not heard in some time, and she knew she could afford not to speak no longer.

"It is only...Oberyn Martell has been...in King's Landing for a very long time," Margaery murmured, reaching her hands up to rub at her husband's shoulders.

He nodded, tense under her touch. "His Dornish stink has certainly filled the brothels," he said, and she thought of Olyvar in those brothels and barely withheld a snort at her husband's barely veiled feelings toward...activities of that nature.

How ironic, that he seemed not to be bothered by such activities when they were done with her, so long as she reminded him why he should enjoy them, each time.

"And..." She reached out, rubbing her fingers along his chest with tantalizing slowness. "You know how my family feels about him. He crippled my brother Willas, and for nothing but sport. And now one of his has been named to the Kingsguard, and watches me at all times." She shuddered, even if Ser Daemon Sand was hardly around her and she had no particular quarrel with the man. "It makes my father worry for me."

Joffrey turned to face her, lips twitching as he reached out and cupped her cheek. "A crime if ever there was one, to mar the pretty smile on your face, if nothing else."

Margaery gave him a quiet frown, in turn, and wondered not for the first time how it was that the little bastard could play so well at courtly love. "Prince Oberyn's continued presence here has only served to make both myself and my brother Loras...uncomfortable," she continued quietly, choosing her words carefully.

Nothing to make Joffrey think her vulnerable, not for an instant, but he would certainly remember the sparring that had nearly become a bloodbath at the tourney. She had seen just how much he had enjoyed it, watching her brother get beaten into the dirt.

"And the way he parades that Dornish whore about as if she were his wife is disgusting," she added, almost as an afterthought, just as she watched Joffrey's eyes light up in memory.

Not that she particularly cared one way or another about Oberyn Martell's paramour, but she would take what she could get. She knew how Joffrey felt about things that he personally considered indecent, after all. And no doubt, he had heard about her grandmother’s tart words to Ellaria Sand in the gardens, just days after the woman’s arrival here. Words aroused more out of irritation toward the Viper than his paramour, in truth.

Joffrey snickered. "Isn't it? And to think, he's never bothered to marry her, or anyone else. Though, I suppose she is just a bastard."

Margaery nodded eagerly, thought of Sansa far and away, lounging under a Dornish sun, and felt a pang, deep within her, but it was the good kind of pain, she told herself, and tried to believe it.

She didn't need to keep Sansa close so long as Sansa was safe, after all. It was simply up to the Martells to get her there.

"And his contributions to the Small Council have been unhelpful and miniscule since his arrival, according to my lord father, who is offended by his very presence," she continued, smirking slightly as she recognized that victory was close at hand.

It was a fine line, after all, for she could not have Joffrey growing too angry with the man. That would not help, at all, for Joffrey was as like to expel him, and thus Sansa, a little faster back to Dorne as he was to chase him with an army back there.

"His people keep your sister in Dorne like a prisoner, not even allowing her to come to your wedding when you know how much I wished to meet her, while he is allowed to lounge about King's Landing, making sport of visiting all of the brothels in Flea Bottom."

Joffrey snorted. "He is...every bit the degenerate that I understand Renly Baratheon was."

She nodded again, expression full of serious disgust, pretended the reminder that Renly was "degenerate" did not bother her at all. "So I've heard as well, Your Grace. It is...quite troubling to many of my ladies, knowing such a man prowls King's Landing."

For Sansa, for Sansa, for Sansa, the litany kept running through her mind as she watched Joffrey's upper lip curl in disgust, and wondered if Joffrey's fervent hatred of 'degenerates,' as he oft called them stemmed from something deeper.

"Very well, my lady," he grinned at her. "You've made your point. It's high time more Lannisters sat on the Small Council, anyway."

That was certainly not what she wanted, for the Tyrells dominated that Small Council just now, Oberyn or no Oberyn, and to have more Lannisters would only serve for annoyance. But Margaery smiled prettily anyway, and nodded.

For Sansa.

The damn Martells were not moving quickly enough, and the longer they dallied here the longer Margaery mistrusted their willingness to help Sansa.

The longer she found herself deliberating over whether or not she could let Sansa go.

“Thank you, my love,” she murmured, pecking his cheek. “You are too kind.”

Joffrey grinned at that, at the cruel irony imbedded in those words, and then tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and gazed at her like he was picturing devouring her whole.

“I don’t suppose you’d like to go hunting, my lady?” he asked, and Margaery withheld a sigh as her husband shoved the sheets off the both of them.

Nothing came without a cost, anyway, as the Queen of Westeros knew well, now.

_For Sansa, for Sansa, for Sansa._


	117. TYRION VI

"You named Lancel to the Kingsguard," Tyrion spat out, remembering that when he was the acting Hand of the King, he hadn't forced those who wished to speak with him to make an appointment for the chance to do so. It only made him more annoyed, as he stormed his way into his father's office in the Tower. "He's just a boy. He didn't deserve that."

Tywin snorted, looking faintly amused by the anger on his youngest son's face. "And his father didn't like it anymore than you, but sacrifices must be made."

"By Jaime, you mean."

Tywin gave his son a droll look. "The last time I checked, your brother Jaime was still a part of this family, much as he likes to dress as a knight and play swords."

Tyrion clenched his teeth. "The Tyrells were practically salivating at the chance to get another one of their own into the Kingsguard. The boy didn't even fight-"

"The Tyrells have been salivating for far more than they deserve for some time," Tywin spat out, and Tyrion stared at his father.

"What have they done this time?" he asked tiredly, for he was far less fond of those petty Tyrells than his wife seemed to be, and then his father was tossing a piece of parchment in his direction.

Tyrion picked it up, didn't get the chance to read it through before his father revealed its contents.

“The Tyrells are offering their assistance to the Boltons,” Tywin Lannister shouted, and Tyrion grimaced, for he hadn’t had a hangover like the one he’d induced the night before in some time, and his father could always be counted on to make it worse.

"If the Boltons begin to believe that they do not have the support of the Crown, they will declare for Stannis," Tywin said, gritting his teeth when neither of his children spoke.

Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek. "Stannis had a firm support in House Stark. He won't accept their allegiance quickly. And House Tyrell is loyal to us, or did I miss something?"

Tywin gave his son a look as though he believed that what Tyrion had just said proved how much of a dullard Tywin had always wished he was. "Stannis Baratheon does not have the opportunity to be turning down allies, just now. And the Boltons have already proven themselves power hungry traitors. And House Tyrell is not the Crown."

The Dornish Red Prince Oberyn had sent him as a thank you in advance for his assistance in bringing down the Lannisters (by the gods!) was giving him quite the headache.

“The Tyrells expressing their sympathies to the Boltons-”

“In the form of wheat and wine and supplies that should have been sent to King’s Landing as they agreed to do,” Tywin muttered.

“-Is hardly a cause for concern about the Lannister legacy,” Tyrion said dismissively. "Winterfell, if you haven't forgotten, still belongs to us through Lady Sansa."

Tywin snorted, looked less than impressed at the lecture from his least favorite son. “Would that Cersei were still here. She may be many things, but your sister at least understands the need for preventative action.”

He peered at his sons over the top of his desk, and Tyrion felt all of seven years old again, holding up the work his maester had told him to bring to his father and waiting for approval that he would never get.

Tywin let out a hopeless sigh before snapping, “Today it was food and drink. Tomorrow, it will be part of the largest army in Westeros helping to back them against Stannis Baratheon.”

“Yes,” Tyrion said quietly, “And having the Tyrells send aid to the Boltons against a man who has challenged Joffrey’s claim to the throne time and time again will make us look weak, make us look as though we can’t send that aid ourselves.” He glanced at their father, pretended he didn’t yearn even now for the man’s approval at his realization, but Tywin merely grunted. “Which means you will want to deploy our men, first.”

“The Tyrell army will never reach Winterfell before a Lannister army does, should Stannis turn his eyes on Winterfell,” Tywin agreed, “Particularly not the one stationed in Casterly Rock.”

“But that will leave Casterly Rock open to any enemies,” Tyrion pointed out. “That could be what Stannis is hoping for.” He paused. "Or perhaps that is what the Tyrells are hoping for."

Tywin blinked at him, and the small moment of impressed surprise in the man’s face before he blinked it away and his face cleared of all emotion was not one Tyrion was likely to forget.

“Indeed.” Tywin coughed. “Then we will send soldiers from King’s Landing with Joffrey’s blessing, and make an open show of it, let the Tyrells know that sending their own troops would be ill-advised, at this moment.”

Tyrion's brow furrowed. “Mace Tyrell is an idiot, but the Queen of Thorns isn’t,” he said finally, “She wouldn’t be stupid enough to try and destroy an ally she needs if it meant gaining Stannis Baratheon the upper hand, would she?”

Tywin pursed his lips. “I think she would much rather fight a battle on one front, rather than two. But I think this was more a warning than an outright threat. She departed quickly after Joffrey started treating his queen like one of Littlefinger’s whores,” he said darkly, and Tyrion swallowed, thought of Margaery Tyrell’s insistence that he take Sansa to Casterly Rock, not so long ago.

Perhaps it had truly been out of concern. Or perhaps the girl was even smarter than he’d taken her for. Perhaps she wasn’t as good of a friend as Sansa believed her to be.

Sansa was married now, and the whole world thought their marriage consummated; she was no longer a useful tool as a bride, and if she were to be…taken out of the game entirely, if Stannis Baratheon happened to take Casterly Rock while she was in it, Winterfell would be free for anyone who could take it.

And, as his father had mentioned, the Tyrells had the largest army in Westeros.

He sighed, and thought of the Dornish wine Oberyn Martell had shared with him, wondered if there was a chance of gaining more off of the man, if he somehow managed to promise the man Gregor Clegane's head.

Then again, Oberyn Martell had overstayed his welcome in King’s Landing; the wedding was long over, and he had yet to explain his continued presence here beyond that he still had yet to have his demands met and wanted to keep his seat on the Small Council from falling into someone else’s hands if he left.

"There's something I need to tell you, Father," he said finally, and Tywin narrowed his eyes at him. "About Oberyn Martell."

He hadn’t known, not truly, what he was going to decide on the matter until this moment. Wondered if he ought to be ashamed or pleased at the thought. Glanced at his father’s face and couldn’t find the answer there.

But he knew what he had to do, even if every time he looked at Joffrey, a part of Tyrion wished someone was able to take down the little shit.

His father steepled his hands. "Is this important, Tyrion, or another concern that we are taxing the Dornish party out of a kingdom through the brothels?"

Tyrion ground his teeth. "Oberyn Martell approached me the other day, demanded Gregor Clegane's head."

Tywin waved this off imperiously. "He has nothing to negotiate with. It is of no concern presently, not with these Tyrells to deal with."

Tyrion swallowed convulsively. "He mentioned Myrcella."

Tywin lifted a brow. "Oh?" Only Tyrion's father could sound so disinterested and bemused at the same time.

"As a tool of negotiation," Tyrion elaborated, and Tywin straightened suddenly, gave Tyrion a long look.

"He threatened her?"

Tyrion shrugged. "The Dornish are very adamant that the man they believe killed Elia be turned over to them for justice."

"And you didn't think to mention this sooner?" Tywin roared, half-standing from his position behind the desk.

Tyrion didn't bother to respond, and Tywin made a face of disgust. "What is it you want for this...information, boy?" he asked, as if Tyrion were some mere informant, rather than a member of this family.

Tyrion supposed that, for the first time, he almost deserved that scorn, from his father’s eyes.

Tyrion held back a snort before answering. "I wasn't going to tell you," he said at last, "Because the Viper may be many things, but his brother is the leader of Dorne, and will allow no harm to come to Myrcella when she is second in line, according to them, to Westeros, and so I knew that Prince Oberyn really had nothing to negotiate with. But I think I may have discovered a way to refuse his request without looking as though we are, what with Joffrey’s recent demands in the Small Council."

Tywin's eyes narrowed. "Oberyn has always been half-mad," Tywin said finally. Then, "We will send Clegane with the army to treat with these Boltons, and tell Prince Oberyn that the man will only be handed over to him if he returns, and the Tyrells and Martells will both be left unsatisfied. I understand that the Tyrells wish Prince Oberyn gone from King's Landing."

Tyrion raised a brow. "You want him to stay?"

Tyrion supposed it made some sense. Oberyn was not going to get the Mountain in a fight, not while Tywin Lannister lived, and he had threatened the life of Myrcella. Having a hostage in the second born Prince of Dorne if things escalated with the Martells was a good decision, even if Tyrion doubted Prince Oberyn would make for a pleasant hostage.

Tywin gave him a long look. "Keeping Oberyn Martell in King's Landing has its advantages." Tyrion wondered if those advantages had more to do with keeping an eye on what was happening in Dorne with a Dornish hostage, or pissing off the Tyrells. Joffrey had been quite adamant, when he made the request to the Small Council and was supported by Lord Mace, that Prince Oberyn leave King’s Landing. Prince Oberyn had been more than amused, where he sat at the end of the table, listening to Tywin proclaim that Joffrey’s wish would be “taken under advisement.”

"And the next time you encounter a bit of information that could impact our family, boy,” Tywin snapped, breaking Tyrion out of his thoughts, “you will not hesitate to share it, or I'll see you carted off to the Wall, this time without the pleasure of returning from it."

Tyrion swallowed, lifting a hand to his throat. "Understood, Father."

"If I have to get rid of that Northern whore to keep you from becoming distracted when you learn of such things-"

"It won't happen again," Tyrion promised lowly.

Tywin eyed him. "It had better not, boy. You would do well to focus your attentions on your as yet barren wife. Provide me with an heir, and I will allow the two of you to retire to Casterly Rock. Clearly, remaining at court is affecting even the most basic of your wisdom."

And, for all that Tyrion had hated being shut away in Casterly Rock for most of his childhood, he almost wished he could take his father up on that offer.


	118. SANSA LXXI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally going to be a smut chapter. Sorry.

"Stannis and his wicked army march toward Winterfell," Joffrey told the court, which began to titter with growing horror, and Sansa swallowed where she stood in the balcony as she had been told to, looking suitably resplendent even if she felt horrible, in a gown echoing the grays of House Stark, as Lord Tywin had ordered, her face suitably blank at those words.

It didn’t feel right, to be wearing her House’s colors again; in fact, it made Sansa feel rather queasy, and she swallowed hard, not meeting anyone’s eyes, staring straight ahead and biting into the inside of her cheek so hard she was surprised it had not yet begun to bleed.

She flushed at the thought of how many people were looking at her in this moment, of how many of them were judging her, sympathizing for her when they never bothered to help her in the past.

"But our very own Lady Stark is here amongst us," Joffrey went on, sending Sansa a wicked grin that had the blank look on her face faltering for just a moment. She forced herself to look impassive once more, even if she doubted that she succeeded in the attempt.

"And we will defend what's ours," Joffrey went on, speaking in such a tone as though he expected the whole of the court to cheer for him. When no one did, he frowned at them, his attention off of Sansa once more, and Sansa breathed in relief.

"The Lannister army will depart from King's Landing to aid the Boltons against the traitor Stannis Baratheon," Joffrey told the court, and Sansa forced herself to smile at the news, as if she wanted that at all. "The Tyrells will keep us safe enough, here in the capitol, will they not?"

He glanced at his wife as he said the words, and Margaery smiled and nodded and made her pretty promises to him. Lord Mace spoke next, droning on about how honored he was that House Tyrell was so trusted by the Crown.

Sansa barely heard a word of it, her hands sweating as she forced herself to say the next words, the ones Lord Tywin had demanded she say.

“I am honored,” she began when Lord Mace stopped speaking, then saw the look that Lord Tywin was sending her way from where he stood behind the Iron Throne and raised her voice. “I am honored, Your Grace, to receive your help in defending my homeland. You have my utmost gratitude.”

Joffrey grinned.

"When they bring me Stannis Baratheon's head, I want it on a pike!" Joffrey crowed when Sansa fell back into the shadows, and Margaery laughed alongside him just as if those were the funniest words she had ever heard, and Sansa wondered what Joffrey Baratheon would look like when he died, before making as timely an exit as she could manage, hurrying down the corridors to her husband’s chambers.

The moment Sansa returned there and slammed the door behind herself, she was violently sick.

She managed to run the last few paces to the chamber pot sitting in the corner of the room, kneeling down in front of it before whatever she'd eaten for breakfast, sweet bread or cake or something that had tasted so sweet then and was so bitter now, came up.

_"When they bring me Stannis Baratheon's head, I want it on a pike!"_

Sansa's body wracked with - something, sobs or pained shock from the way her stomach was heaving, Sansa couldn't say. Her head was beginning to pound behind her eyes, and every time she opened them she could see spots in her vision, obscuring the miniscule amount of decorations Lord Tyrion kept on the walls of his chambers.

She vomited again into the bowl, felt her body growing warm and achy with each subsequent bout of sickness, and curled in on herself, arms wrapping protectively around her belly even if that did nothing to stem the flow.

The Lannisters were sending an army to Winterfell. Stannis Baratheon was sending an army to Winterfell.

Sansa wondered which side believed themselves more in the right. She'd heard that Robb Stark had passed her over in the succession. Joffrey had enjoyed taunting her over that fact, over the fact that the Lannisters didn't care at all about what Robb Stark wanted, either.

She sicked up into the bowl again, stared down at the vomit and pretended that the sight of it made her queasy enough to sick up again.

And then Shae was ushering Tyrion out of the room, slamming the door behind his protests and latching it tightly, before she moved to where Sansa sat on the floor, wrapping her arms around Sansa and wiping at her mouth with a wet cloth and placing another bowl in front of her, the chamber pot full.

Full, Sansa realized with horror, even if the only thing she had eaten today was a bit of sweet bread and some lemonade. The thought, rather than encouraging her to stop, only seemed to make her stomach heave more.

And then Shae was there, murmuring something in Sansa's ear that only sounded like faint ringing, and Sansa shivered at the sound, remembered the way she had dipped down to curtsey to Joffrey when she had thanked him so prettily for defending her homeland. She dipped down as she had then, dry heaving into the bowl once more.

As if she wanted a Lannister to go near Winterfell.

Shae reached out, brushing the hair out of Sansa's eyes, and Sansa flinched away at the touch, entirely too cold on what felt like burning skin.

Shae sighed, glanced down at the bowl and then asked, "Better?"

No, no she wasn't, Sansa thought, even if she managed to force her stomach to stop heaving for these few moments.

"I...The Hound offered to take me away from this place," she whispered into Shae's skirts, unable to bring herself to look at the other woman, unable to explain where the words were even coming from, why she felt the need to say them to Shae. But Shae stayed silent, just listening, and Sansa was grateful for that, for the words needed to be said now that they were here, forcing their way past her lips.

"During the Battle of Blackwater, he offered to take me away from here." She sniffed, felt the arm around her waist, Shae's arm, and Sansa hadn't even noticed it there before now, tighten.

Shae didn't speak, though, for which Sansa was absurdly grateful.

"And I told him 'no,'" she continued, hating herself a little more in that moment, feeling the bile that she had thought gone from her stomach starting to rise once more. "Because..." she shook her head, shuddering as another spasm rocked through her body, as she turned and spat more bile into the waiting bowl, not able to meet Shae's eyes when the other woman ducked to meet hers.

"Because I thought that Stannis Baratheon was going to save me," she whispered. "Because he was allied with...with Robb." She shook her head, shook out the image of Robb's head taken off to be replaced with his direwolf's, of her mother's neck, raw and open and gushing after being slit. "Because I was a stupid little girl."

Shae reached out then, pulling Sansa around to face her and giving the younger girl a hard look. "You are not," she told Sansa, through gritted teeth, and Sansa forced a smile at the look in Shae's eyes, as if she was offended on Sansa's behalf.

She didn't appreciate Shae enough, Sansa thought idly. She never had.

"I thought he would save me," Sansa went on. "I thought he was going to finally take me home. And then he lost the battle, and now he's taking my home, and my first thought, my first fear, was that after that, he would come back to King's Landing again, instead of joy that he might take it from those Lannister loving Boltons." She looked at Shae. "What am I becoming?"

She didn't feel queasy anymore, Sansa realized, just tired, bone tired in a way she hadn't felt since Tyrion had told her of her mother and Robb's deaths.

"Sansa," Shae said, voice gentle in a tone she had never used with Sansa before, "You're afraid. Someone is taking your home, and you're afraid of what will happen to you when that happens. It's all right to be afraid."

Sansa snorted. "The Boltons already took my home, after they helped the Freys kill my family, and I didn't care, then."

Shae shook her head, sighing a little as her brows furrowed in confusion and concern. "Because you were grieving your family."

Sansa swallowed hard, hated the taste in her mouth and spat into the bowl some more. "No," she said. "No, it isn't like that." She looked up at Shae. "I'm not...I'm not Sansa Stark anymore," she whispered, the revelation coming to her as she tasted blood on her tongue once more, once more felt nausea rising in her throat.

Shae reached out, placing the back of her hand to Sansa's forehead, and it took Sansa a moment to realize that she was checking for a fever. Sansa didn't flinch away from her, this time.

"I've become someone else, staying here, amongst so many lions and roses." She reached out then, gripping Shae's arms in an attempt to steady herself when Shae finally lowered her hand. "Whatever I am, it isn't a Stark anymore."

"Sansa," Shae said, glancing toward the door and then turning a full look of concern on her, "We all have to change sometime," she said finally, and Sansa blinked at her, for those were not the words she had next expected to come out of Shae's mouth. Shae sighed. "You've done what you had to to survive in this horrible place," Shae continued gently, "And it will hurt, of course it will, to realize what that person is, but you are still Sansa Stark."

She sounded like she was convincing herself more than Sansa, and Sansa wondered for the first time what it was like, to go from being a young woman from so far east who made her living whoring to a lady's maid in King's Landing. Wondered if Shae was speaking from experience.

Sansa shook her head. "No. No, I...I let myself forget, for a while, let myself be that other person, but that other person was content to let Sansa Stark die in order to live here. And..." she reached up, biting into her fist lest she vomit again. Her ribs were shaking like a rabbit's. She wanted to cry. She wanted Margaery here. She wanted to vomit again, only there wasn't anything left in her stomach.

She wanted to stop feeling so _guilty_.

"I don't even know which of them I want to win," she whispered out. "The Boltons, or Stannis Baratheon." She shivered. "I was so afraid then, too, during the Blackwater. When Cersei told me what would probably happen to me if the soldiers took King's Landing, when I was reminded of how the Hound had to save me during that riot in Flea Bottom. I just want to stop being afraid. I just," she took in a shuddering breath, "I just don't want to be afraid anymore."

Shae was petting her hair, the motion oddly soothing. Like her mother used to do, when Sansa was sick, back in Winterfell, when the only thing Sansa had to be afraid of was Arya playing some horrible prank on her.

She hadn't been afraid, Sansa thought. These past few months with Margaery, yes, there had been fear, fear of what Joffrey might do to her if given the chance, fear of being hurt, fear that Margaery didn't care for her the way Sansa did for Margaery, but nothing like the fear Sansa Stark had felt in all of the time she had been stuck in King's Landing before Margaery's arrival, before their relationship had become something more.

Sansa hadn't been afraid, because she was allowing herself the illusion that everything would be fine, no matter what it was. That the Dornish were going to take her away from this place, that Margaery would keep her safe from the worst of what Joffrey might do to her, that Tywin Lannister wouldn't let anyone touch her as long as she was his key to the North.

She thought of Winterfell, of a blade cutting through flesh, of a woman, holding in her stomach as her child erupted out of her, of Robb, flesh of his neck yellow beneath the blood gushing out of it.

Sansa turned back to the bowl, and tried not to hold back a sigh, tried not to think about whether it was fear or shame that had her heaving air and water into the bowl, had her flinching away when Shae reached out to rub at her back.


	119. SANSA LXXII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aforementioned smut chapter...Really smutty. And angsty.

"Margaery!" Sansa gasped out, as Margaery pulled her tongue from Sansa's throat abruptly enough that Sansa mourned the loss and pushed her back onto the bed, as Sansa nearly stumbled when her knees fell against it and she nearly fell over backwards.

Margaery sent her an impish grin, and Sansa found herself grinning back, even as Margaery maneuvered her further onto the bed, as she stripped off what remained of Sansa's clothes with expert precision, tossing them into the pile that had already gathered on the floor, and moved to lay on the bed as well, straddling Sansa's legs as Sansa moved backward on the bed, resting her head against Margaery's pillows, feeling utterly safe here in a way that she had not in some time.

Margaery didn't know about her episode, after learning that the Lannisters were marching on Winterfell to fight Stannis Baratheon. Margaery didn't know how she had lost a bit of herself, sitting there in Shae's arms, and that was wonderful.

So she supposed she ought to let Margaery have this, this moment of happiness, moment of pretense, and comforted herself in the thought that it might be the last time they ever managed it, before Prince Oberyn took her from this place.

And, a small part of her admitted, she loved the moments like these, even when she knew she ought to hate them. Loved the way they were able to steal kisses in the bedchamber like this, in between Margaery going to meet Joffrey for supper and Sansa meeting Shae for mending Tyrion's shirts, as she had promised the other woman she would not force her to do it alone when Shae had no real experience in sewing.

Loved the thought that they couldn't be touched here, even if she was still self-conscious in the knowledge that Ser Loras was standing outside the door, guarding them, or about the fact that she herself would have to sleep in this room tonight, her husband laying on the divan not so far from this bed while she did so.

Margaery bent down to kiss her, and Sansa reached up, rubbed her hands along Margaery's breasts, all thoughts of the way she was defiling her husband's chambers forgotten completely.

"No," Margaery told her, and Sansa blinked in surprise, a flash of hurt crossing her features as Margaery pushed her down into the bed, pulled Sansa's hands away from her chest as if their touch offended her.

"Margaery?" Sansa asked uncertainly.

Margaery gave her a reassuring smile as she reached out, petting down Sansa's sides. "Don't want you to move for me," Margaery told her, and Sansa blinked again. "Want you to lay right there."

Sansa licked suddenly dry lips. "All right," she rasped out, rewarded with a small smile for her efforts, and then Margaery moved, crawling down Sansa's immobile body to press a kiss to Sansa's left breast, then her right.

Sansa's nipples pricked at the sensation, and she attempted to rut up against Margaery, only to be pushed back down, Margaery's hand pressing into her breastbone, the look she sent Sansa warning.

Sansa sighed, lay still as Margaery's kisses moved down her stomach, down her waist, and Sansa squirmed, felt her womanhood growing wet at what she knew was coming.

And then Margaery lifted her head, lowered it only when she had positioned herself on Sansa's feet, her lips on Sansa's lower thighs.

"Margaery, what are you doing?" Sansa whispered, glancing at Margaery in bemusement as Margaery moved away from her cunny without giving it any attention, pushed Sansa down flat on the bed when Sansa attempted to pull her back.

Margaery moved down to Sansa's legs, pressing butterfly kisses along the smooth, vulnerable skin of her thighs before moving downward, skipping her cunny altogether, kissing her knees lovingly, and Sansa groaned.

"Please, Margaery...haven't a lot of time. Shae will be looking for me. Please, fuck me already."

Margaery ignored her, pressed another chaste, gentle kiss to Sansa's left knee before moving downward, pulling Sansa's calves into her lap and kissing them each in turn.

Sansa blinked down at her, groaning again when Margaery sucked a gentle mark into Sansa's ankle. "Margaery..."

She didn't understand this. Yes, she and Margaery had been...intimate in so many ways, since they had fallen into bed together. And, in the beginning, they had been slow, gentle, because Margaery had understood that this was what Sansa needed.

But this...This gentle, torturous thing that Margaery wished to do to her, where Sansa lay passive as Margaery licked and kissed every inch of her save the part that needed it the most...

Sansa couldn't stand it. There was something about it, something that made the emotions she felt for Margaery well up too strongly, along with other emotions, ones she didn't want to think about in the bedchamber at all.

She was going to lose Margaery, when the Martells took her. She was going to lose this, this gentle lovemaking that was slowly breaking Sansa apart as Margaery touched every piece of her, claimed it, in this moment.

She closed her eyes, and suddenly Margaery was there, attentions to Sansa's feet abandoned as she gave Sansa a gentle tap on the cheek, startling Sansa into looking up at Margaery in surprise.

"Open your eyes, Sansa," Margaery ordered her, and Sansa whimpered a little, as those stormy, lust filled eyes looked down at her.

Sansa swallowed thickly, nodded. "Yes. Yes, please, Margaery, just..."

Margaery moved down, brushing her body over Sansa's, until their bodies lined up perfectly, until Margaery slowly began to rub herself against Sansa.

Sansa forced herself to keep her eyes open, to keep them looking up into Margaery's as her whole body shuddered, as she whimpered and felt her eyes prick.

Margaery reached out, brushing the hair out of Sansa's eyes, trailing her fingers over Sansa's cheek, brushing against her lip.

Sansa opened her lips invitingly, felt a shock of disappointment when Margaery didn't take the bait, didn't let Sansa take her fingers into her mouth and suck them.

"Margaery, please," Sansa said. "Just...What are you doing? Just fuck me. Please."

But Margaery ignored her, trailing soft fingers down Sansa's neck, reaching down beneath it to pull it away from the bed, wrapped her lips around a vein and sucked so hard that Sansa almost came then and there, gasping as her vision turned almost black with the sensation.

"Margaery..."

"It's all right, Sansa," Margaery murmured, pulling away from her neck for only a moment to breathe out the words before reattaching herself. "You're doing so well for me, darling. So well."

Sansa shook her head, desperate, reaching down between her legs in an attempt to bring herself some sort of release, but Margaery only batted her hands away, gave her a stern and yet somehow gentle look.

"Can't...can't last," Sansa rasped out, not even caring how needy she sounded in that moment. "Margaery, please. Need you."

Margaery tutted, fingers reaching out to trail down to Sansa's nipples, tweaking them so hard that a burst of pleasure shot through Sansa's body, and she moaned wantonly, no longer concerned with who might be standing outside the door, listening.

"Margaery..."

Margaery returned her vigor to Sansa's neck, even as her hands continued to play with Sansa's nipples, and Sansa barely remembered how to breathe, felt over stimulated throughout her entire body, moaning and whimpering like a whore.

"You are going to last," Margaery informed her, and Sansa shook her head, desperate.

"Can't," she rasped out again, felt Margaery give her another tap, this one slightly harsher than the last.

"You will," Margaery told her, and that voice...Sansa closed her eyes, shuddered again as her body was wracked with need. "Open your eyes, Sansa." Sansa opened them, blinking as she licked her lips at the look Margaery was giving her. "You're going to last until I tell you, Sansa, or I'm going to leave you here, sitting in your own-"

"Gods, Margaery!" Sansa tried to sit up, and Margaery pushed her back down again. Sansa whimpered, pushing herself up against the hand on her chest, desperate even for that contact.

Margaery, seeming to realize this, let go of her, and Sansa sighed, flopping limply back down onto the bed.

Margaery bent down, giving Sansa's neck another long suck. "Please, darling," she said, voice now pleading as desperately as Sansa's had been, a moment ago. "Please, for me?" She licked her lips, looking very young, then. "Want you to remember this when you're old and gray. Want you to remember this when someone else tries to touch you. Every kiss, every touch. Want you to never forget this, this moment. Seven, Sansa, want to do things to you that no one else will ever be able to."

She glanced up then, wounded eyes meeting Sansa's, and Sansa swallowed.

"I won't forget anything, Margaery," she whispered, and Margaery sent her that smile again, the one that Sansa thought Margaery wasn't even aware she had been sending to Sansa more and more frequently, over the last few days. The one full of a grief that Sansa didn't dare ask about, the one that faded every time she realized Sansa had seen it.

"But I'll try," Sansa whispered dutifully, and Margaery smiled, pleased, before continuing her ravishing of Sansa's neck.

And then Margaery sucked on the spot just above Sansa's collarbone, and Sansa wasn't certain, in that moment, that she was going to be able to keep her promise. She reached down, tried to grab at her own womanhood, only for Margaery to abandon Sansa's breasts in favor of batting her hand away, never once leaving Sansa's neck.

"Margaery..." Sansa gasped out, tears stinging the corners of her eyes, and she found herself unable to meet Margaery's eyes when the other woman sat up, looking at her with an unreadable expression.

And then Margaery bent down, pressing a chaste kiss to Sansa's lips before moving down her neck, her collarbone, her chest.

Sansa whimpered, bucking up against Margaery's skin, desperate for some friction between them when Margaery was carefully not touching any part of her save where her lips pressed against Sansa.

Those lips moved down, wrapped around one nipple, tongue rolling it to a marble hardness as Sansa gasped and pleaded beneath her, the pressure in her womanhood building to an almost unbearable strength.

"Margaery, please."

Margaery snaked out a hand, running spidery fingers down Sansa's over exposed ribs, down her side, to her hips, grasping them sharply enough to make Sansa cry out as Sansa bucked upwards, as Margaery's lips trailed kisses down Sansa's stomach, as she licked around Sansa's belly button.

"Knees apart, Sansa," Margaery ordered, and Sansa moved her legs apart without even thinking, whimpering at what she hoped that implied.

Sansa reached out, tangled her hands in Margaery's hair, tried to guide her downward, but Margaery resisted, remaining stubbornly at Sansa's belly button while her hands moved downward, and Sansa keened as they moved toward her cunny, relief washing through her - right up until Margaery's fingers bypassed it completely, trailing down her hairless thighs and pulling them apart further, lips pressing kisses into Sansa's inner left thigh, then her right, teeth grazing against the skin just gently enough that Sansa didn't think she was in danger of coming from the touch to such a sensative area.

"Gods, Margaery, please!"

"Tell me how much you want me, Sansa," Margaery murmured suddenly, pulling away from Sansa completely then to stare down at her with an expression that was almost as desperate as Sansa imagined her own was, and Sansa gasped up at her. "Tell me how every time you touch yourself from now on, you're going to think of this moment, of me undoing you. Please, darling.

"Margaery..."

Margaery pulled back even further on the bed. "Tell me."

Sansa swallowed, found herself suddenly unable to hold the words back. "Please," she whimpered. "Want you. Want you to touch me." She keened, felt a single tear spill down her cheek. "Need you to fuck me. Need to feel your cunny against mine. Please, I... Margaery, please!"

Margaery's lips quirked into a small, sad smile, and then she moved, wrapped her legs around Sansa's hips, bent down to give Sansa another small kiss before sitting up on Sansa's womanhood, pressing her own gently against it, fingers moving between them as she brushed against her own womanhood.

Sansa whimpered at the contact she had been craving since they entered the bedchamber, another tear spilling out of her cheek as Margaery slowly began to grind herself down onto Sansa's womanhood.

"So good," she heard Margaery murmur above her, as her eyes began to slip shut, as Margaery reached out and tapped her cheek again. Sansa opened her eyes, and Margaery smiled down at her. "Good. So good for me."

"Margaery..." Sansa bucked her hips up against Margaery, pleased when the other woman didn't tell her to stop, pleased when, a moment later, Margaery murmured, "Come for me, darling. You can do it. I bet you could have done it without me ever even touching your-"

Sansa didn't hear the rest of what Margaery said, her cunny erupting in the next moment, spilling against Margaery's as she stifled a scream in her arm, felt her teeth sinking into flesh in her desperation to keep quiet.

A moment later, Margaery came as well, and Sansa felt it trickle down onto her own cunny even as she lay boneless, feeling nothing else in the world.

And then Margaery laid on top of her, the sensation almost as if she were falling as she curled up atop Sansa, as she placed a gentle kiss on Sansa's cheek. Sansa reached out, wrapped an arm around Margaery's hips and pulled her closer.

She didn't know what, but Sansa felt as if she had lost a piece of herself, in the bedchamber today. Felt as if Margaery had broken her apart, piece by piece, but had neglected to give every single piece back.

And, Sansa was startled to find, she didn't mind at all.


	120. SANSA LXXIII

Sansa blinked awake, eyes bleary from the afternoon nap, and she smiled to see Margaery laying on the bed beside her, the other woman's eyes still closed, expression peaceful in a way that Sansa wished she could have.

She reached out, running her fingers through Margaery's hair, smiling at the way the other woman shifted and moaned a little at the touch, before moving closer to Sansa almost instinctively, and causing the sheets covering her form to slip down to her waist at the same time.

She wasn't entirely sure what that had been about, what Margaery had been saying, when she promised Sansa that she wanted Sansa to always remember that afternoon of Margaery making love to her, but, with a blush, Sansa could acknowledge that she doubted it was something she could ever forget.

Margaery's lips on her burning skin, Margaery's spidering fingers...

Sansa bit her lip, suddenly wanting nothing more than to ravish the other woman once more, despite how soon it was after their earlier encounter, and then froze, remembering suddenly why it was that this moment felt so blissful.

They were in Sansa's bed, and Margaery had fallen asleep in it. Fallen asleep, naked, and looking just as unkempt as Sansa felt.

"Margaery," she whispered, shaking the other woman awake, forcing down the small twinge of delight she felt when Margaery groaned and batted at her hand, giving the other woman another shake for good measure. "Margaery, you need to wake up."

Margaery's eyes slipped open, and she glanced up at Sansa, a small pout on her features. "Just a moment longer," she mumbled, burrowing her head into the pillows, but Sansa shook her head, shaking Margaery again.

"No," she told Margaery. "No, you need to get up. Come on."

It was almost adorable, the way Margaery clung to sleep despite Sansa's prodding, but Sansa thought it would be less adorable when the Kingsguard came bursting into the room, accusing them of adultery and dragging her away to lose her head.

That thought had her giving Margaery a pinch, and the other woman sat up abruptly, glowering at her, even if it was a rather cute glower, devoid of any real heat.

"You should probably get going," Sansa said. "I didn't realize...I didn't think we were both going to fall asleep after..." she flushed, remembering exactly why they might both be so tired.

Margaery's lips pulled into a small smirk, before the look Sansa gave her had her sighing. "Yes, of course," she muttered. Then, lazily, "I thought we had this conversation, though in reverse, about walking in on each other when we are...otherwise engaged," and Sansa's brows furrowed, before she yelped in surprise, scrambling to cover herself as Ser Loras let himself into the room, shutting the door rather loudly behind him.

"Joffrey is looking for you," Ser Loras announced without preamble, and Sansa and Margaery's heads both shot up from where they sat on the bed. "He is most wroth that he can't seem to find you. Of course, I couldn't mention that you happened to be in Lord Tyrion's chambers without some problems arising from that."

"Wroth?" Sansa squeaked, before remembering herself and scrambling for the sheets once more.

Ser Loras barely spared her a glance, looking at his sister with that intense gaze that Sansa had once wrongly assumed meant something else altogether.

Margaery glanced nervously at Sansa, and then sighed, pulling the sheets off of her body and standing to her feet.

Sansa squeaked a little, for she didn't think she had ever been naked before any of her brothers, but Margaery didn't seem to notice, glancing back at Sansa with that same concerned look.

"Will you be all right?" she asked softly, and Sansa gaped at her.

Ser Loras rolled his eyes. "I'll keep an eye on her. Go, Margaery." The last words were almost a shout.

She nodded, pulling on her chemise and glancing once at Sansa in regret before hurrying out the door.

Leaving Sansa alone with Ser Loras, who stood guarding the door and looking as if he had no intention of moving from that spot.

Sansa swallowed, reached up to tuck the sheets around herself like a loose gown, combing awkwardly at her hair to return it to some semblance of propriety, though that was clearly lost in what Ser Loras had just walked in on.

What he had just walked in on. She and Margaery, lying in a tangle of sheets in her husband’s bed, both nude as the day they had been born.

He had hardly looked surprised, either, and the thought made Sansa blush furiously, even as she swallowed hard in worry.

She eyed him, the set stiffness of his jaw, the anger smoldering just behind his eyes, and was reminded of how he had killed a boy for daring to attack his sister.

Wondered how Margaery’s family was able to keep him from killing Joffrey for the same crime.

Perhaps some part of him would not begrudge his sister this, while Sansa knew that most men likely would have turned them over to the Sept for more than just adultery.

Sansa coughed, turning away from him and beginning to pick up the remnants of her gown from the floor where they had been discarded in rather a thoughtless hurry earlier. She was still wearing part of her shift, but felt rather too exposed at the moment all the same, before a man whom she had once fantasized about marrying.

Sansa sighed, glanced down at her hands once she was dressed, even if her gown was still rather rumpled.

Loras' face softened. "I am sorry for shouting," he said finally. "I am merely worried about Margaery. When Joffrey gets into his tempers..."

Sansa nodded, but her mouth remained dry, and they stood in silence for a moment longer.

"You...didn't seem surprised to find us here, earlier," Sansa said softly, not certain why she felt the need to stay in this humiliating position, even if they were her chambers, and refusing to meet his eyes, for she knew that she was flushing hotly.

Some part of her felt that she should run, and yet she found herself standing still, terrified that he would call for the guards, Margaery’s brother or no.

Loras paused. "My sister and I are...very close,” he said suggestively. “We keep few secrets from each other." He smiled ruefully. "Save for those of politics, now." He gave her a long look. “I am surprised by how long she’s kept you in her bed, however. I once thought that Margaery would never find love with anyone while I would, but...” his face saddened. “I suppose the opposite is true.”

Sansa’s breath stuck in her throat. “She’s not...”

 _Love_ , Loras had said.

Sansa swallowed hard. "I...you should probably go," she said finally, not meeting Loras' eyes. "My lord husband may be looking for me, as well."

Loras smirked for a split second, as if he knew exactly what had made Sansa so flustered, before he nodded, face serious once more. "Indeed.”

She curtseyed to Ser Loras, and then he made his way out of Sansa's chambers, and Sansa wilted a bit in relief that he was gone.

She didn't have long to be relieved, however, for in the next moment, there was a knock on her door, and Sansa froze, even if the knock had been too light to be that of a Kingsguard armored glove, terrified that she was about to be dragged before the Iron Throne, that the secret between herself and Margaery was finally out.

Swallowing hard and wishing she had some of her husband's wine, Sansa moved toward the door, opening it only halfway, and blinked at the sight of Lord Varys on the other side of it, staring at her with a blank expression as he folded his hands in front of himself once more, lips pursed.

"Lady Sansa."

Sansa startled a little when he spoke, reaching up to run a hand through her hair and wondering if the Master of Spies could tell what she had just been up to, or if he would think she had only been taking an afternoon nap, for there was something about Lord Varys that worried her even more than Lord Baelish’s ability to keep secrets.

She swallowed hard, if only to give herself a moment to be composed, before responding, "Lord Varys. You startled me."

He smirked. "A talent, my lady, easily gotten as the Master of Whispers."

She nodded, biting her lip and glancing over her shoulder as a cold shiver rushed down her spine. "I see. I am sure my lord husband will be back soon, if there is something you need of him?” she glanced down the hall and then back. “I’m not certain where he is at the moment, most likely with his lord father or-”

Lord Varys glanced down her figure, folding his hands in front of him for a long moment, before smiling thinly. "I can't imagine that to be the case, my lady. But I am here for you." He eyed her, and Sansa was struck by how difficult it was to read his gaze. "It is time; you must come with me."

And Lord Varys held out his hand to her expectantly, head angling toward a darkened corridor at the end of the hall.

Sansa knew that he would drag her into that corridor, into the shadows, and she would never be seen or heard from again, and hesitated, hand kept firmly by her side as she stared at the Master of Whispers in confusion.

"I...don't understand,” she said finally. “I...I do not believe I am expected anywhere.”

She had a sudden fear that the Master of Whispers was taking her to the throne room to be thrown down at Joffrey’s feet, pleading for mercy beside Margaery because of what they had been doing for months now.

But Joffrey would not have sent Lord Varys for that, she was certain.

Lord Varys had never shown an interest in her since her arrival in King's Landing, not in the way Lord Baelish had, and she found the two of them very similar in some ways, even if she could not say why, but they did not appear to be friends.

And yet, she had a feeling already that she knew what Lord Varys wanted of her, knew where Lord Varys would be taking her if she took his hand, and the finality of that suspicion had her hesitating where she had not thought she would do so, when she finally faced this moment.

Lord Varys waved his hand impatiently. "Prince Oberyn sent me to collect you, Lady Sansa. He is waiting to take you from this place.”

Sansa stared at him. Somehow, in all of the times she had imagined fleeing with Oberyn, she had never thought of how they would do it. Whether he and Ellaria would show up at her rooms with bags in tow and drag her along with them, whether they would do so at the head of an army or with the Lannisters’ permission, somehow. But she could honestly say, in her nonexistent imaginings of this moment, she had never thought that they would send someone else for her.

Someone they had not told her she could trust, and Sansa didn’t know what to do.

Lord Varys sighed. “I understand that this may be difficult for you, Lady Sansa,” he said, voice almost gentle, “but we must leave now, or the Lannisters will find out and you will never leave King’s Landing again.” He held out a piece of brown cloth to her that she supposed might have been a common woman’s scarf. “Put this on.”

She swallowed again, knew it was foolish even as she reached her dainty hand out to the eunuch's, but then, if she believed that Prince Oberyn had sent him-

She wrapped the scarf around her auburn hair with one hand and took the eunuch's hand with the other, and he yanked her into the dark corridor without another word.

The Dornish were keeping their promise, she told herself, as Lord Varys dragged her into a rather tight corridor.


	121. SANSA LXXIV

"Sansa," Ellaria breathed upon laying eyes on her, obviously recognizing her despite the flimsy disguise, smiling gently and moving down the docks to pull Sansa into a short embrace. Sansa clung to the other woman for a moment, closing her eyes and pretending that the Dornish spices hanging off the other woman reminded her of her mother.

Sansa pulled back, eyed the rest of the party in bemusement. Ellaria's ladies were there, as well as the Dornish guards, but Oberyn himself was conspicuously absent.

But it took her only a moment to hear his voice, loud and annoyed, echoing down the docks from the ship, where he appeared to be in a less than friendly conversation with the ship's captain, and Sansa flushed at the bit of relief she felt, at hearing it.

She glanced back at where Lord Varys and she had emerged from a strange tunnel leading out of the Keep, but the Spider was already gone, vanished once more into the blackness of the passageway.

If Sansa's heart wasn't already beating fast enough to burst from her chest, Sansa might have been frightened by that.

Lord Varys had silently taken her through the dark tunnels beneath the Keep, dragging her along with only a flickering torch for light until Sansa thought she might trip and fall, and no one but the eunuch would ever know what had become of her.

But she didn’t, and when they made it out of the Keep and then to the city walls, making their way through one hidden passage to another until they had reached the docks, Sansa remembered how to breathe once more.

"Are you ready?" Ellaria asked her gently, seemingly not as bothered by Lord Varys' vanishing as she was, and Sansa almost didn't answer the question. Of course she was ready; she had been waiting so long for this. Of course she wasn't; she had not been given the time to bring along the scant few belongings she possessed; she had not been given the chance to say goodbye to Margaery, to explain herself.

“Lord Varys...?” she asked, breathlessly deflecting the question.

Ellaria shook her head. “A friend to us, I assure you. He agreed to help us smuggle you out of King's Landing."

Sansa blinked in surprise, for she hadn't realized that Lord Varys had ever been her friend, even if he was a friend of the Martells.

"Why..." Sansa wasn't even sure what it was she wished to ask, but Ellaria simply smiled, hugging her once more.

"Oberyn was less than pleased by Lord Tywin's wish to keep him prisoner here, or any of us. If he wishes to enforce that idea, he will have to take it up with Dorne's impregnable walls. And," she gave Sansa a small smile, "We felt that you had waited long enough for us to fulfill our promise to you. Now. Are you ready? We really should be making our way onto the ship."

And, with a feeling of trepidation, for something was churning in Sansa's gut that she couldn't explain, Sansa took Ellaria's hand and moved down the docks toward the ship, not meeting Ellaria's eyes.

Ellaria and Oberyn were keeping their promise, she reminded herself. It was finally time to go.

Ellaria gave her a small smile, reaching out to rub a thumb gently over Sansa's cheek. "It's going to be all right, Sansa," she promised, and Sansa gulped and tried to believe the other woman as they moved forward, as one of the Dornish guards signaled to the ship's captain, and the captain began shouting orders to his men.

Sansa flinched at the sound of shouting, as if one ship's captain shouting might give the whole game away, but no gold cloaks came out to stop them, she did not hear the sound of horses stampeding the shipyard.

Still, it was not until they had made it onto the ship, a sleek thing belonging to a Dornish merchant happy to be of service to the Prince of Dorne and his paramour, that Sansa realized what the feeling was. That she had not said goodbye to Margaery, had not even hinted to Loras, to Shae, to her husband, for she hadn't even known she was leaving until the moment she did.

She had just...left. She hadn't even brought any of her things with her, though, if Sansa was honest about it, she wasn't sure she could regret that part of it.

And she reminded herself that the Martells were doing this, committing treason by stealing her away, out of the goodness of their hearts, and that she should not begrudge them their planning.

Sansa stepped daintily over the rail of the merchant vessel, taking the hand of one of Ellaria's ladies when she offered it, and clutching her scarf a little more closely around her head with the other. She knew that these people must be loyal to the Martells, and yet she found herself not willing to take the chance of recognition.

Ellaria reached out to take Sansa's hand once they both stood on the deck of the ship, seeming to realize how helpless Sansa felt, in that moment. She paused, reaching out to fix Sansa's headscarf.

Sansa wobbled a little where she stood, not used to the feel of the sea beneath the ground she stood on, and Ellaria smiled at her, looking faintly amused.

"Captain," Oberyn said when he caught sight of Sansa, giving her a reassuring little wink that had Sansa smiling despite herself, and Sansa watched as he tossed the captain a bag that jingled. "The rest, as promised."

The captain weighed the money in his hand for a moment, and then nodded, but not before giving Sansa a cool, assessing look. "We will be ready to leave momentarily, my prince."

And then he turned, ankles clicking as he walked away, and Sansa reminded herself to breathe again, if only for a moment. Ellaria seemed to notice, turning to her once more.

"Come, Sansa. Down below, while the men get the ship ready to leave the harbor," Ellaria told her, and Sansa swallowed, shot the other woman a small smile.

She followed Ellaria into the belly of the ship, stepping nimbly down the provided ladder and ignoring the stairs of the sailors as they went, as Ellaria's ladies followed after them in silence.

Sansa's heart was beating so quickly in her chest that she was afraid it was going to pop out of her chest, her mind flitting from one extreme to another. She was finally leaving this wretched hole of a place. Everything about this leaving, now that it was finally happening, felt wrong in a way that left her stomach full of bitter nausea. Joffrey was going to figure out immediately that they had escaped and track them down, kill everyone and drag Sansa back. She was finally going to reach Dorne, a place she felt she knew so much about from Ellaria's tales already.

"Sansa?" Ellaria called, and Sansa blinked, forced herself to give the other woman a smile.

"Sorry," she murmured. "I..."

Ellaria's face softened, and she reached out, taking Sansa's hand once more. "You're safe now, Sansa," she promised the young woman. "The Lannisters have lost you. And we will provide for you everything you might need, in Dorne."

Sansa shook her head. "Surely, they will come after me. They will-"

"Then we will deal with that when the time comes," Ellaria interrupted her gently, though there was something about her sympathetic expression that left Sansa far from relieved.

And then she was leading Sansa down the hall before the younger woman could protest, leading her into a small cabin at the end of the hall and ignoring the looks the sailors were sending Sansa, a room bare save for the luggage sitting in the corner, and several hammocks that had been set up.

Sansa bit her lip, glancing over her shoulders to watch as Ellaria's ladies, Lady Blackmont and her daughter, moved into the room as well, wondered if they were now inhabiting the captain's quarters. It was the sort of thing that she had heard was allotted to noblewomen aboard a ship.

She glanced around the room, rubbing her arms and feeling rather bare in the gown she had only managed to scrounge around herself when Ser Loras had come barging into her rooms. The cabin was not quite as large as the chambers she shared with Tyrion, but then, she supposed that hardly mattered. It would be a matter of days before they were in Dorne, and far from King's Landing, and Sansa didn't care if she had to make the journey in a crate.

The other ladies were dressed in cooler clothes, clothes befitting a long ride at sea, even if Dorne would be far warmer, and Sansa wondered how much warning they'd had, before hurrying off to the ship.

She rather regretted not grabbing something of her few belongings to take along with her, when she had taken Lord Varys' hand and disappeared down the hall with him. Wished she'd had more of a warning.

"You will have to share these quarters with me and my ladies, if that is all right," Ellaria told her, and Sansa nodded shakily. "Prince Oberyn and the other men will have their own quarters. I thought that might make you more comfortable."

"Of course," Sansa murmured, feeling a little loss where she stood. "You've been more than kind even bringing me along with you," she told the other woman, and Ellaria merely smiled at her.

"We made you a promise," she told the younger girl blithely, before sweeping further into their chambers and collapsing into one of the hammocks, rubbing idly at her temples. "Though I wish the Crown had not forced our hands."

Sansa glanced up, the worry on Ellaria's face making her worried in turn. "Do you think they really will come after us?"

Ellaria smiled, though Sansa thought it was meant to be more reassuring than genuine. "I doubt it, dear child," she promised Sansa. "Lord Tywin may be a very stubborn old man, but even he knows which battles to fight and which to leave lying, and he has no reason to believe that we would steal you. Princess Myrcella is still in Dorne, as well, and if he ignores our departure, it will only make his words of keeping Oberyn in King's Landing seem like a show. And I do not think that he will immediately suspect that you have left with us. Your husband seems..." she inhaled. "Sympathetic."

Sansa winced, wondering what the bloodbath would be like if Lord Tywin decided to come after Prince Oberyn when he realized that Sansa was gone, as well. Wondering if Margaery would be caught in that crossfire. Wondering what sort of woman so casually mentioned Myrcella as a piece of leverage against the Lannisters, should it come to that. "I..."

She didn't know what to say, and, after a long moment of silence, Ellaria seemed to realize this. She gestured to one of the hammocks, and Sansa found herself crawling down onto it, even if she felt rather awkward, doing so. If she had thought the rocking of the ship beneath her feet was bad enough, this was entirely different, if not unpleasant.

"Sleep, Sansa," Ellaria murmured, motioning for her companions to give them some space, ignoring the strange look that Jynessa Blackmont was sending their way. "I will keep watch. You'll have everything you need, once we reach Dorne." She reached out, brushing a hand through Sansa's hair beneath the scarf over it, and Sansa found the touch rather comforting. "Sleep."

And Sansa rubbed her eyes, and tried very hard to believe the other woman's words.

The lull of the ship after she felt them rock against the docks once more before they left the harbor behind completely eventually had her closing her eyes, and Sansa leaned into Ellaria's fingers in her hair, ignored the sound of whispering voices above her, and found a bit of peace, as she slept.


	122. MARGAERY XXV

Margaery took her husband's hand, a little at a loss for how one comforted an insane man who hated to show any weakness, and hated anyone who witnessed him doing so. At a loss as to whether or not she should even be comforting him, or whether he would rather crow victory, at the news.

She wished Sansa was in the room, that she might get a read of which to do from the other woman's face.

Sansa didn't seem to realize it at all, but there were times when Margaery only knew how to react to Joffrey by reading Sansa's face. The younger woman knew Joffrey better than she thought she did, and she had, after all, been present, or at least in the Keep, when Robert Baratheon had died, and might be able to shed some light from that in her expressions.

But Sansa had not been invited to the King's inner bedchamber to share in this news; that had only been Margaery, dragged from her bed in the early morning by her ladies at Joffrey's command.

Margaery had not even known that Lord Tywin was dead until she was halfway down the hall to her husband's chambers, the words whispered to her by Alla as she shrugged into her shawl. Margaery had just had the time to plaster on a face of mourning and shock before she was pushed into her husband's chambers, to find him sitting on the edge of his bed, looking even more shocked than she.

Margaery knew that her young husband did not like Lord Tywin, was afraid of him and did not like that the Hand so openly bossed him about and controlled him. Knew that he did not like being told 'no' by one of the few in Westeros willing to do so.

But she also knew that Lord Tywin was his blood, and actually knew how to run the kingdom while Joffrey postured and pretended and had not a damn clue.

A part of Margaery almost could not believe that the old lion was dead, that anyone could be foolish enough as to kill the man, even if he had been hated by half of King's Landing.

He'd been killed, not in some grand battle or by some fatal enemy, but squatting over his own shit, a knife through his heart by some unknown assailant.

Lord Tywin was dead, and the rest of King's Landing seemed to have gone to the seven hells, without him.

He had died just the night before, though no one had found his corpse until early this morning, it seemed; some unsuspecting serving girl had been sent to summon him to a meeting of the Small Council, and found him like that.

Margaery couldn't imagine what the Hand of the King's chambers had smelt like, at that point.

And, as if that was not bad enough, Sansa appeared to have vanished, according to Alla's whispered words in her ear later in the morning, as she and Joffrey sat through a bland, silent breakfast. One of Margaery's ladies had gone to find her, only to see that Lord Tyrion's chambers were empty of anyone save the equally shocked Tyrion Lannister, sitting on his bed in shock, his supposed lover Shae kneeling before him, looking concerned.

Margaery had experienced a sick worry at the warning from Alla for a few moments, before she managed to convince herself that Sansa was merely somewhere else within the Keep, had to be, despite the early hour. Or tried to, at any rate. The coincidence of the timing of being unable to find Sansa and everything else that had happened in the last couple of days was too striking.

She reached out, running a hand through her husband's hair and struggling to withhold a sigh when he jerked away from her.

She would have to send a letter to her grandmother about this latest development as soon as she was free of Joffrey's presence. She knew that the old woman was getting antsy the longer that Cersei remained away from King's Landing, and her own letters to Margaery painted quite a different tale of the Lannister Lioness than Willas had as yet been sending her.

"I am truly sorry for your loss, my love," Margaery murmured, looking at the far wall in lieu of her husband, at the painting on the wall depicting what the smallfolk were calling the Red Wedding.

Joffrey grunted. He looked shaken, face pale and eyes beating around the room manically. His eyes were red rimmed, though he had not been crying when Margaery had entered the room and did not look near to tears now.

"They just...found him," he gritted out, and it took Margaery a moment to realize that her husband was not sad with grief, but...angry. Furious, even. "Sitting over his own shit, stinking of death for all that he was barely gone. No one was even there."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "A shame," she murmured sympathetically.

Joffrey grunted again. "He would have hated it to be known that he died like that. My grandfather was a very proud man. Whoever killed him will pay."

Margaery nodded, surprised by her husband's thoughtfulness at all. For a scant moment, she found herself pondering her own death, the thought appearing out of nowhere and refusing to leave once it did. She imagined herself murdered somehow, and in her mind's eye it was always Cersei accomplishing that, imagined Joffrey's shock at the news, wondered how he might react to it. If he would even be this thoughtful about it.

"It is a great shame, my love," she murmured, reaching out to stroke his shoulder as she found herself once more, reminded herself that Cersei was off in Highgarden even now, even if she knew the woman would not remain there long, with the news of her father's death. "Are you all right?"

He turned on her, where he sat beside her on the bed, their legs not touching, for Margaery had curled her own up onto the blankets, unsure if her husband would be able to feel the way she was shaking, but not wishing to risk it.

"Of course I am," he said, tone dismissive. "I am the King. My Hand's death is a tragic thing, but we will overcome it because we must."

And because her lord husband did not wish to appear weak before his wife, Margaery reminded herself, or perhaps because he truly could not feel any more emotion than that about another human.

"Of course," she agreed dutifully. "I only meant...it must feel very strange, to lose a man who has been at the center of our kingdom for so long."

Joffrey waved a hand, clearly done with this conversation, even if his face had not yet regained the color it had lost the moment he had learned the news of his grandfather's death. "He was a good Hand," he acknowledged, "but we will take what he has taught through his many years and improve upon it." He sniffed, looking at Margaery in that predatory way that always meant he was imagining Sansa Stark in her place. "In many ways, he was behind the times."

And now he was dead, and unable to keep the King from doing as he pleased, Margaery read into the words with a certain dread.

Margaery nodded, wondered if he was faking even this much emotion because his wife sat beside him, or if he was merely questioning the fact that his wife, seemingly his equal in that regard, should feel anything at all about Lord Tywin's death, either.

"Well," Margaery said then, trying her luck as her hand snaked down her husband's arm, to his waist. "We have earned one good thing from this tragedy," she murmured, hand petting her husband's thigh.

Joffrey's eyes flitted up to meet her own, and he smiled darkly, one hand reaching out and caressing her side teasingly. Margaery arched into the touch, wondered, if the gods exist, what they must think to see her profiting so quickly from that old lion's death.

But then again, Tywin Lannister had been a hateful man, and Joffrey, for all that she hated him, was only a hot blooded boy. She had to work with what she had, and the vision of Sansa, bent over the bed as Margaery beat her at Joffrey's command, had never quite left her mind.

She pressed her lips into her husband's neck, enjoyed the soft sound he made at the sensation, before he pulled away from her, leaving Margaery sitting on the edge of the bed, bemused.

"I want to talk to my Small Council!" he announced, and the men huddling just outside the door began to titter loudly, before the door opened to admit them.

Her father, standing just outside the door with half a dozen other members of the Small Council, all vying for the King's attention and all of whom Margaery'd had to pass by to get into her husband's chambers, stepped inside, forcing down a smile that he was particularly bad at hiding for having gained it.

Margaery pulled back from where she had moved to gain her husband's interests, put out.

"Your Grace," Lord Mace said, dipping into a bow and ignoring his daughter completely. Margaery struggled not to roll her eyes.

Joffrey looked pleased, however, so she didn't bother to question it as he glanced over the members of his Small Council still present. "Where is my fucking uncle?" he demanded, clearly annoyed by the lack of the man's presence. "Is he not also part of the Small Council, or has he gone off to fuck more whores in the brothels while my grandfather lies dead?"

Margaery's father looked back at the assembled members of the Small Council, frowning when he did not see Lord Tyrion. He looked bothered, either by Joffrey’s vulgar tongue or by Margaery’s exposure to it.

Margaery bit back a snort, for she had been exposed to far worse, as Joffrey’s wife.

Margaery found herself wondering for the first time what her father thought of her success, to keep her mind off of Lord Tywin's gruesome death, of Sansa's vanishing.

She had known of his ambitious nature when he had married her to Renly, of course, but, while he was now a member of the Small Council, she did not know how much power he actually possessed, nor if he was happy with that amount. She would have to discuss it with him, soon, of course.

She would need to know if her father wanted to make any more overtures for power over the throne, and plan accordingly, no doubt by contacting her grandmother first.

"Perhaps he is merely mourning the loss of the Hand. I will send someone to fetch him immediately, Your Grace-"

He needn't have bothered. In the next moment, Tyrion was rushing into the corridor outside of Joffrey's chambers, his coat undone, one arm still slipping into a sleeve, and he froze when he saw the eyes lighting on him.

Margaery's eyes narrowed as she saw how not together Lord Tyrion appeared. Even when he was drunk, which she could admit seemed to be most of the time, and exhausted, which definitely appeared to be about half the time, Lord Tyrion seemed more put together than he was, at the moment.

More able to lie his way through anything, though Margaery didn't smell the drink on him. Maybe his father's death had affected him more the rumors at court had been causing her to expect.

But, when Joffrey's eyes turned on Tyrion, for a scant moment, Margaery thought the man looked almost afraid, before he quickly hid the expression under one of pained coolness.

"And where is your bitch of a wife?" Joffrey was asking Tyrion, when Margaery focused her attentions on her husband once more. "Does she stand outside to offer her sympathies?"

Tyrion swallowed loudly in the otherwise silent chamber. "She does not, Your Grace."

Joffrey scoffed. "Surely she should be here, sharing in our grief, with my mother and Uncle Jaime not here to do so. After all, she is family."

Tyrion hesitated, not meeting Joffrey's eyes. Margaery noticed that he was panting, wondered if he had been summoned from his chambers with the knowledge that his father was dead and Joffrey wished to see him. She shivered. "I am sure that she is still in her chambers, Your Grace, coming to terms with such information. Prince Tommen is also not present-"

Joffrey guffawed, a vile smirk twisting his features in a way that Margaery was certain boded ill. "No doubt. She loved my grandfather, after all, for his meddling in her life. Send for my lady aunt!" he said, shouting the last words to Ser Meryn. "I wish to see her tears myself."

He seemed not to care at all, when Tyrion told him that Tommen was not present, and Margaery felt a spark of pity for the little boy, that he was likely only being comforted over the death of what many had believed was a man he respected greatly by nannies and guards.

Margaery reached out, touching her husband's arm, for she saw a strange expression on Lord Tyrion's face, a flash of guilt before it was buried deep. And in that moment, she knew that Sansa was not in her chambers at all, knew that Lord Tyrion knew this as well as she.

The Martells had left yesterday, during the day, just hours before Lord Tywin's death, and, Margaery realized, around the time that Joffrey had sent for her, panting needily. They had done so against the direct orders of the King and of Lord Tywin, no doubt sensing the noose around their neck if they remained where the Old Lion could keep them in his grasp. Ships would probably have been sent after them to deter them from leaving if the capitol hadn't suddenly found itself caught up in the matter of Lord Tywin's death, and they had left unmolested hours before anyone knew of their going.

It appeared that her gut reaction had been correct, after all, and all the proof Margaery needed of it was the look on Lord Tyrion's face. Sansa was gone. But she couldn't allow herself to think of that; couldn't allow herself to think of the fact that Sansa hadn't said goodbye, had never trusted her enough to tell her that she was leaving in the first place, not even in the end, when Margaery likely would have been able to do little about it. That thought hurt more than it should have, for Margaery understood intellectually why Sansa had not done so. Had not told anyone, and yet still.

Still, Sansa was gone, and Margaery had known that she was going, had made love to her knowing that it would probably be soon, with the way that things were heating up in the capitol, but she had not been able to kiss her goodbye. Had not been able to utter the words, burn them into Sansa's skin until the other girl never forgot them.

The Martells had simply taken her.

 _Fools_ , she thought idly, for they had chosen the worst time to make such an escape, surely.

When she had learned that Sansa was going to escape with the Martells, she had thought they would at least do so with a modicum of sense. That they would bribe enough members of the Small Council, to make a trade for Myrcella or some such, and that they would do so when it would not make them look terribly guilty for the murder of the King's Hand.

Though, she supposed, the timing had exonerated them slightly. By mere hours. And Joffrey had not wanted to keep the Martells in the capitol for Margaery's sake, even if Lord Tywin wanted them there, and Lord Tywin was dead now. Perhaps he would let it be.

She held back a snort. Fuck's sake, this was Joffrey she was thinking of, and the moment he learned that Sansa was gone, he would have but one culprit. Were they _trying_ to start a war?

Margaery stiffened at the thought, glanced at her husband beside her, saw the fury radiating off of him even in the knowledge that Sansa was not there to offer her condolences over Lord Tywin's death.

If Sansa was not there at all...

"My love," Margaery said carefully, "I am sure Lady Sansa is not of enough importance to hear what words the Small Council might say in this time of tragedy-"

"She is my aunt," Joffrey interrupted her, annoyance flaring into his features. "And therefore a member of this family. She will be sent for."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "I do not wish to see her here," she said, spitting the words out in her desperation, and hoping that Joffrey could not smell that desperation upon her. She didn't dare to meet Lord Tyrion's eyes, even as she felt them bore holes into her. "She will only gloat silently over Lord Tywin's death. It would dishonor him to have her grieve with the family like this, and will appall me."

Joffrey eyed her. "I had no idea that you held Lady Sansa in such a light, my lady," he murmured, but Margaery merely shook her head.

"She is an uncommon girl and an amusing companion, my love," she allowed, "but she also has yet to accept her place amongst House Lannister. And it was your grandfather who was kind enough to arrange my marriage to you," she murmured, running her fingers down his arm, lower, onto the flesh of his stomach.

Joffrey's breath hitched. "Of course," he murmured. "Of course, she should not be here." He turned on his uncle with a sudden glare. "But I trust you will let her know of our displeasure with her, now that my grandfather is dead and that she seeks to rejoice in it?"

Tyrion was looking at Margaery knowingly as he answered, and Margaery forced herself not to meet his eyes. "Of course, Your Grace."

Margaery just hoped she had bought Sansa enough time, hoped that the Martells had the presence of mind to keep her hidden aboard the ship they had taken her on, and then shook her head at the thought, as if a mere raven would know that Sansa was aboard.

Joffrey looked over all of them, mouth pulled into an unattractive frown. "My grandfather's sudden death has shaken the foundations of the very throne," he told them, voice not as strong as his words. "And I rely on you, my Small Council, to ensure that our government remains firm in his absence, until a new Hand of the King can be found. And to that end," Joffrey continued, voice raising, "I want the one responsible for this...despicable murder of my grandfather to be found. Immediately, and brought before the Crown for severe punishment. I want their fucking entrails for this, for killing my grandfather in such a cowardly way. I want them found, now!"


	123. SANSA LXXV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Damn, the trailer for the new season looks epic! Also, if you're wondering why I've been updating so frequently lately, I've set a goal of where I want this fic to be plotwise before the new season comes out, so bear with me while I spam your inbox.

She stood there, on that dais, with the wind flapping at her gown and the air seeming completely still at the same time, mouth open to scream, but no sound came from Sansa's throat, despite the wracking soreness that seemed to fill it, the silent scream inside that only she could hear.

The only sound was that of Joffrey's cackling, the tumult from the crowd silenced in her mind as her father was forced to kneel before his executioner, as Joffrey cackled and proclaimed that the traitor would pay for his crimes, when it had been Sansa in the first place who had asked him to do this, who had begged him to confess, because Joffrey would give him mercy.

She felt numb, and everything in Sansa wanted to run forward and throw herself at her father's knees, beg for his forgiveness for being such a stupid little girl, or, at the very least, die alongside him, for she didn't want to live in a world where she could blame herself for his death, not with Joffrey smirking like that, not with that strange little smirk on Littlefinger's face as he stood nearby.

And Cersei, standing beside her on the steps of the Sept, a horrified expression on her face as she glimpsed, perhaps for the first time, the true evil that her son was capable of, the evil she had always pretended not to see before this, as Cersei reached out to whisper in her son's ear only to be pushed away.

Sansa spared a moment to wonder, if the blood splattered over Cersei's gown, would it even show against the bloodred Lannister colors beneath her tan shawl?

And then she wasn't thinking anything at all, because Ser Illyn's sword was lowering on her father's neck, and Sansa gasped, all of the breath leaving her at once at the sight of her father's lowered head, at the sight of the blood as it splattered onto the steps of the Sept, onto Joffrey's boots, onto the hem of her own gown.

Sansa screamed again, and this time she heard the sound, a long, low wail that cut through her throat like glass, as one of the Kingsguard - she had never bothered to figure out who - grabbed at her arms and held her back.

Her father's head rolled down the steps of the dais, and the common people cheered at the sight of it, and Joffrey grinned, to be seen as their hero in this moment, their entertainer.

Sansa felt tears slipping down her cheeks as she screamed again-

"Sansa!"

Sansa gasped awake, felt hands on her arms, holding her back as that damned Kingsguard had, and she flinched away, flopping about awkwardly in her too rickety, too shallow bed, heard a grunt as she swatted at those hands, before a voice cut through the panic filling her.

"Sansa, you're all right. You're safe now. It's all right. It was just a dream," Ellaria's voice, cool in the humid air of the cabin, and Sansa wilted at the sound of it, once again remembering to breathe and finding her air came in rapid gasps.

Sansa found herself unconsciously mimicking the other woman's calm breaths, watching Ellaria's chest rise and fall with a feverish intensity. And then she looked around, felt color flushing its way down her neck as she saw that she had awoken the other ladies in the room.

She blinked, looked up to see Ellaria bent down in front of her hammock, face filled with concern as she let go of Sansa, obviously satisfied that Sansa would remember to breathe on her own.

Sansa flushed a little, now that she was aware enough of herself to do so, unable to meet Ellaria's eyes as she glanced around the cabin once more.

It was dark within the cabin; most of the other ladies had been awake when she had fallen into a restless sleep in her hammock, she thought, but they were all clearly waking from sleep themselves. She wondered how loud she had been, wondered if she had woken Oberyn and the other men aboard this ship, and felt a small flash of guilt.

And then one of the ladies, Jynessa, was getting up, taking some water from the barrel at the corner of their cabin, and bringing a wooden cup over, handing it to Sansa.

The girl was Sansa's own age, she thought, or perhaps a little older, and gave Sansa a sympathetic smile as she handed over the cup.

Sansa took it awkwardly, hands firmer than she had expected them to be, taking small sips out of fear that she might choke on them otherwise, enjoying the way that they filled her stomach, made it unnecessary for food to do so.

She hadn't eaten this day more than the small amount of gruel Ellaria had insisted she have earlier that night, too sickened over having to thank Joffrey for sending troops to Winterfell the day before, unable to choke down a breakfast before she and Margaery had snuck off together, and the water sloshed awkwardly in her stomach, the sensation almost pleasant as she thought of all of that blood once more-

"Better?" Ellaria's voice cut through her gruesome thoughts, and Sansa forced herself to nod, flushing again.

"Sorry," she stammered out. "I don't..."

She didn't normally get nightmares. Hadn't, she didn't think, in a very long time, and the fact that she had gotten one now, and about her father, shook her. She'd not had a nightmare about her father in some time. When she did get nightmares, they were about her mother, throat slit and naked body thrown into a river.

But most of her nightmares accompanied her while she was awake, not while she slept, and Sansa had the very strange urge to curl more tightly into her hammock and pretend that Ellaria's hand, still touching her arm, belonged to someone else entirely.

"I'm sorry," she apologized again, lamely unable to think of anything else to say as the images swirled in her mind even still.

"It's all right, Sansa," Ellaria told her gently. "You have nothing to be sorry for. After all,” her smile was sad, “We all have had our fair share of nightmares, and you most of all.”

Sansa thought of her father's head, of the reason he'd been forced to give it up, and wished that were so. That there was no reason she ought to feel sorry.

She had not said goodbye to Margaery. Had simply left, or, more accurately, did nothing after making a foolish choice, and now people were going to die for it, just like her father had died for her stupid choice, and she had never gotten the chance to say goodbye to Margaery.

Ellaria studied her for a moment, and then pursed her lips, reached up and pulled a shimmering necklace over her head, holding out the talisman on it, a small piece of fur attached to a wooden carving of what Sansa thought looked like a spear, out to Sansa.

Sansa took it gingerly, turning it over in her hands, unwilling to say aloud that just touching it felt almost comforting, before blinking up at Ellaria in bemusement.

"It is my daughter's," Ellaria said, with a small smile, as Sansa held the talisman out from herself. "She believes it will bring her luck, even when I tell her that such things do not exist." Her expression darkened. "She wished me to take it with me when I traveled to King's Landing."

Sansa smiled, too. "Thank you," she murmured, and Ellaria let out a small sigh, gesturing for Sansa to move over on her hammock that Ellaria might sit beside her. Sansa made room, and, a moment later, the other ladies were returning to their own hammocks, seemingly assured that all was well once more.

When they had turned their backs and laid down, Ellaria finally began to speak.

"I am sorry that we could not give you a better warning," Ellaria told her gently, voice low as to keep from disturbing the other ladies, "But you must understand. Oberyn believed that we were in danger, the longer we remained in King's Landing. The Tyrells hate our presence there, and have made no secret of the fact, going so far as to demand my lover leave King's Landing during a meeting of the Small Council."

Sansa stared at her, trying to rationalize her friendship of both houses in her mind. Wondered if, by now, Margaery knew of her betrayal. Wondered what the other girl would think of it. Wondered if she would realize that the Lannisters had been right about Sansa all along, that she was nothing more than a foolish girl who oughtn't be befriended, because she burned everything she touched-

Sansa chewed on her lower lip. "Do you think they will suspect that I went with you immediately?"

Ellaria shrugged. "Perhaps." She sighed. "I am truly sorry, Sansa, that our plans have become so dangerous and derailed so quickly.

Sansa swallowed hard. "If I knew the danger I would put you in back then, you and Prince Oberyn, by going with you, Ellaria..."

"Nonsense," Ellaria interrupted her, reaching out and tilting up Sansa's chin. "I was happy enough to do it, child."

Sansa shook her head, hair flopping awkwardly around her shoulders. "I..."

She couldn't respond to that, to the open kindness in Ellaria's words, and Sansa bit her lip, flinching a little when Ellaria pulled Sansa into her gentle embrace. Sansa found herself leaning into the touch, relieved at the thought of the other woman holding her, closing her eyes and for a moment pretending that Ellaria Sand was her mother, back from the dead.

"It's all right, my dear girl. You just cry, if you need to."

And Sansa did, the image of her father far too fresh in her mind, the sensation of Margaery's lips on her skin, the sound of her scream in that nightmare far too vivid. She cried silently against Ellaria's shoulder as the other woman held her close, and pretended there weren't other women in the room, women she hardly knew, overhearing her.

And, when the tears finally stopped, she clung to Ellaria for a while longer, and inhaled the strong scent of Dorne hanging off the other woman.

Ellaria petted her hair, silent for some time after Sansa had finally stopped shaking from her tears, before venturing, "Now. We should speak of other things. Dorne is some days' journey yet, and we shall have to pass the time doing something other than worrying."

Sansa bit her lip, nodded. "Will you...will you tell me more about Dorne then, Ellaria?" she asked, and Ellaria smiled.

"What would you like to know?" she asked gently, and her smile vanished in the next moment, when Sansa voiced her request.

"Tell me...tell me what you know about the Tower of Joy," Sansa murmured, and Ellaria's eyebrows knit together in a frown.

"You mean...?" To Maria asked hesitantly, and Sansa nodded. Still, Ellaria seemed unsure. 

"Are you certain? It is not a pretty story, and I do not know all of it," she said quietly, reaching up as though to check Sansa's forehead for a fever. Sansa flinched back, and they sat together in silence for a moment, Ellaria's hands slipping onto her lap, before she ventured, "But I will tell you what I know of it, if you wish."

She knew that, Sansa thought, an age old tiredness filling her bones. "Tell me anyway. I've had enough of pretty songs."

 _"And then, will you tell me what was so important that we had to wait in King's Landing for it for so long?"_ Sansa thought, but didn't quite dare to ask that question yet, not while King's Landing still loomed behind them.

Because she couldn't quite bring herself to blame them for that. That time, after all, had been spent with Margaery, who likely hated her for her lies by now, but whom at least she would never have to see again, and whom she could remember the way she had been that last afternoon in bed together, happily snuggling into Sansa's husband's bed, hair mussed and eyes bleary with sleep.


	124. SANSA LXXVI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry in advance about the cliffhanger. Warning for threats of rape/non-con, graphic violence. Also, Grrm never seems to explain the time it takes to travel anywhere, so I'm fudging a bit with it taking a week to reach Dorne from King's Landing by ship, if one's in a great hurry.

They had almost made it.

It had been a week's journey, with Sansa alternating between terror at the thought of being discovered, and joy at finally getting away from that horrid place, no matter the cost all of the time.

And then they reached the Broken Arm, and found their small merchant vessel suddenly facing down a fleet of warships surrounding the Stepstones of Dorne. Dozens of ships from the Houses loyal to the Lannisters in the Stormlands, lying in wait like vipers.

And a warship larger and sleeker than the rest, seated in front of all of them, pointed toward the Dornish vessel as if it was prepared to ram and board them without even a parley.

And three Dornish ships, sent out to meet the fleet, though they did not offer their support.

It seemed that Prince Doran had chosen to repudiate his brother in this matter.

"We're on our own. Tyrell sails," the captain announced, setting down his spyglass with a pinched expression on his face, and Sansa's heart clenched.

"How in the fuck did they make it here before us?" one of Oberyn's male companions demanded, disgust roiling across his features. "Those fucking Tyrells are like bloodhounds, every time we turn out backs on them."

Sansa shivered, looked at the huge Tyrell ship once more, saw what she assumed, for she could barely see it beyond a speck of green from here, the rose fluttering from its flag.

"If we make a run for it, I have no doubt they will deliver on the threat of ramming us," the merchant captain told Oberyn, though his tone was apologetic.

Ellaria scoffed. "Nonsense. They know the King will want us alive to answer for our escape."

"Will he?" Lady Blackmont muttered under her breath.

The captain turned to Oberyn, where he stood on the deck beside him, who had yet to say anything. The man was merely staring out at the coast with narrowed eyes, staring at those Dornish ships lined up, with their stance, to ensure his compliance. He looked older suddenly, than Sansa had ever thought him before.

And then he turned, looked directly at Sansa, and Sansa trembled at the indecision in his eyes, pulling the wrap Ellaria had let her borrow a little more tightly around her shoulders as the winds of the sea seemed to pick up around them.

She wondered how it felt, to be turned on by his own brother. To know so obviously that the other man was choosing the Lannisters instead of him, was choosing not to fight for him-

And all because of Sansa. Because Sansa had foolishly taken his offer to come with him to Dorne, because she hadn't thought of the true consequences of leaving, the ones staring down the noses of a fleet of ships at them right now.

"Take Lady Sansa down below, Ellaria," Oberyn ordered, voice cold as Sansa had not heard it before.

"Oberyn, that won't help," Ellaria warned him, but Oberyn was not looking at her, was still staring at Sansa with that emotionless expression that made her want to look away, and yet she found herself unable to at all.

"Ellaria," Oberyn told her, paused, eyes hooded as they turned away from Sansa's to meet his lover's. "For once, do as you're told."

Ellaria glared at Oberyn, and then swept forward, pressing her lips in a hard, cold kiss to his, in full view of the fleet.

"You had better be right about this," she murmured when they pulled away, and, without waiting for an answer, reached out and taking Sansa's arm, leading her down below as Sansa did not utter a single peep of protest.

Sansa stumbled on the steps down, but Ellaria's hand on her arm was insistent, and some of the panic she had been feeling earlier bled into Sansa's own thoughts, spurring her along when Ellaria's gentle voice could not.

Sansa did not think she had ever been so frightened of anything to do with the Tyrells, and that thought startled her a little, as Ellaria pulled her into the cabin Sansa had spent the last two nights sleeping in and shut and latched the door behind them.

She knew that the Tyrells would remain loyal to Joffrey, even if Margaery cared for her. Knew that, somehow, they had found out about her going with the Martells, and this was their answer.

The threat of war. For daring to steal Sansa Stark and make off with her. For daring to leave when Lord Tywin had told them not to.

She should never have been so foolish. Should never have put the Martells in such terrible danger.

Sansa swallowed hard, walking over to the water barrel and taking a long sip from the wooden mug placed on the lid of it, turning back to see the frightened look on Ellaria's face before she hid it underneath an impassive mask, and moved to sit on one of the hammocks.

"Sit with me, Sansa," she murmured, and Sansa blinked at her, before taking her seat next to the other woman, rocked a little against her as the ship rocked.

Sansa jerked, glancing up at the ceiling of their cabin, as if she expected it to already be burning; she didn't know what she expected, only knew this could not end well. Oberyn Martell was a man of pride, and would go down fighting, she thought, even if his kingdom did not appear to be supporting him.

She wondered at that, wondered what sort of kingdom would not stand by its prince when enemies came to threaten war upon them. Wondered what that said about the kingdom that Ellaria had failed to mention on her own.

Sansa found herself shaking fearfully. Even if Oberyn foolishly decided to fight for her, for she wasn't worth it, surely he could see that, they wouldn't win. They wouldn't win, and then she would be dragged back to Joffrey, and this time, there would be no mercy for her.

Ellaria let out a long sigh, rubbing at her forehead.

"I was worried it might come to this," she told Sansa gently, reaching out and brushing at Sansa's hair, and Sansa jerked at the woman's candid admission.

"To...to war?" she choked out, and Ellaria nodded, looking down at her hands as she pulled them down into her lap.

"Oberyn was convinced that the Lannisters would not react so strongly so quickly, and now..." she too glanced up. "I had thought we would have more time before the Lannisters sent a fleet upon us. They must have sent a raven to cut us off."

Sansa shivered, thought of how angry Joffrey must be, for them to send a fleet so soon after learning that Sansa was gone. Or perhaps this was all the cold, calculating Lord Tywin, not wishing to lose his leverage to the North, and wanting to punish the Martells for daring to leave when they had been told not to, as well.

She had been foolish, to think for a moment that he was not as horrible as Joffrey, just because he was able to keep Joffrey from raping her.

Sansa swallowed. "Do you think...do you think he will be able to settle whatever it is the Tyrells want?" she asked quietly, ringing her hands. "I mean...I did not think Lord Tywin would be so quick to call you back. And I know you said you did not think it would come to war, but you've stolen me, and-"

"Sansa," Ellaria interrupted her, squeezing her hand, "breathe."

Sansa gasped in a rather loud breath.

"My lover has quite the silver tongue," Ellaria reassured her. "He may be able to convince them that we did not take you, and convince them not to search the ship, but the Tyrells will stop at nothing to humiliate us." Her eyes shifted, not meeting Sansa's as she spoke the words.

"They'll notice when you're not present," Sansa pointed out.

"Then I shall go up to them," Ellaria said, with a half smile. "And you will remain down here, if that is the case. But for now, I shall stay down here with you."

And, for a moment, Sansa allowed herself to believe the other woman. Wanted to believe her desperately, because to believe anything else was to give way to complete panic.

"They won't be satisfied with that," she blurted out. "They know you took me, or they would not have resorted to this. They..." she shook her head. "Why are they just sitting there? Why hasn't Prince Doran-"

That was when the shouting started, the scuffling that Sansa could hear above them, and she stopped talking abruptly, throat suddenly very dry.

"Because Doran does not wish to risk a war on all sides, and the Lannisters likely promised him that Dorne would remain blameless if he handed us over," Ellaria said, tone low and laced with bitterness, even as she attempted to distract Sansa from the sound. "Though I have a feeling he is barely holding the other Houses back on that alone."

"But...Oberyn is his brother," Sansa whispered hoarsely, and thought of Robb, leaving her to rot as a Lannister prisoner for much the same reason, because he lacked the resources to free her.

"And Doran is the ruling prince of Dorne," Ellaria said, with another sigh. "There is much that he and Oberyn do not agree upon, but they will always put protecting what is ours first." She sighed again. "I thought that we would be hidden safe within the impenetrable walls of Sunspear long before the fleet arrived, however."

 _Then why did he take me?_ Sansa thought, her next thought being that Ellaria was remarkably calm about all of this. No doubt to keep Sansa calm, and that thought only had her breathing more harshly.

Sansa blinked, but no, she couldn't think about that. There was a Tyrell warship above them, threatening to ram them down, and...Oh gods, the screams, oh gods...

"If Prince Oberyn refuses to surrender," Sansa said slowly, "What will happen?"

Ellaria's lips pinched into a frown. "We will likely not be sunk before they board the ship. They wish to take prisoners; we are too valuable to merely sink to the bottom of the ocean. And then Prince Doran will have to seriously consider declaring war whether he wishes to or not."

"I hope it doesn't come to that," Sansa told the other woman. A pause. "Should...perhaps it would be best to just...just hand me over. King Joffrey will offer his pardon, and-"

Ellaria laughed. "Will he?" she sounded bitterly amused, and Sansa fell silent. "We made you a promise, Sansa, even if we executed it poorly, and so we will not just hand you over to them, unless that is what you truly want." Ellaria shrugged. "I told Oberyn that perhaps we should have remained in King's Landing longer; I wished to leave as much as you," she assured, at Sansa's startled look, "But with Lord Tywin demanding that we remain longer..." she shook her head. "But Oberyn was offended. Over Gregor Clegane being sent to fight Stannis Baratheon, over you, and would not see reason. However, there are times when he will. When it is his brother's will, at least."

"Over me?" Sansa asked incredulously, and then flushed. She knew that Oberyn had been bothered when Joffrey had tormented her in front of him, knew that he had been angry by her treatment here, and by everyone's apparent willingness to allow it, of course she had.

But, for some reason, the word offended had never reached her mind.

Ellaria, however, was not given the chance to respond. The moment she opened her mouth, they heard the pounding of footsteps down the stairs, and Sansa froze, eyes widening as they darted to meet Ellaria's.

Ellaria, however, was not afflicted with the same uncertainty, grabbing Sansa's arm and yanking her off of the hammock, pushing her backwards to the back of the cabin, reaching for one of the barrels to push her behind.

"Don't make a sound," Ellaria warned her, and Sansa found herself forgetting to breathe.

The door flung open just as Sansa knelt behind the barrel and tucked her knees underneath her, peeking out behind the narrow crack between that one and the next, and a dozen Tyrell soldiers burst into the cramped cabin, weapons drawn.

Ellaria had somehow managed to unclasp her shift from her left shoulder, baring her breast just as the soldiers came into the room, and they froze, staring unabashedly at her.

"What is this, then?" Ellaria asked, attempting to sound coy as the Tyrell loyal soldiers moved closer. "Can a lady not dress for her capture in peace?"

The man at the head of the semi circle moved forward, frowning at them both. "Ellaria Sand?"

She nodded, moving her shift to recover her breast with perfect calm.

One of the men muttered appreciatively, smacking his lips obscenely in the otherwise silent room, "Oh, don't put it away for us, love. You're hardly a lady, anyway."

She rolled her eyes, fixing the clasp on her shoulder despite the way the men's hands tightened around their weapons as she did so. "And I would like to know just what you believe you are doing-"

The leader of the group moved forward, brushing past a boy who looked younger than Arya, holding a Tyrell flag in both of his shaking hands, squinting at her for a moment before lowering his sword.

"We have received a raven ordering us to place you under arrest, along with Oberyn Martell, for leaving the capitol despite direct orders from the King-"

"A direct invitation, you must mean," Ellaria corrected idly. "And it is Prince Oberyn."

The soldier raised his hand, and Ellaria's head flinched back, even as she stared back at him resolutely, before he lowered his hand once more, clenching it rather tightly. "Where is Sansa Stark?"

"And that would be 'Lady,' unlike my own lack of a title," Ellaria went on, sounding amused. "I don't know. I understood she was a prisoner in the capitol. Is that no longer the case?"

Sansa watched with wide eyes as Ellaria fingered a knife that seemed to have come from out of nowhere in her left hand, where it sat behind her back.

The soldier, however, seemed to be less than a fool, for he reached out, grasping her arm and forcing it forward, glaring at the offending weapon in what looked more like irritation than anything.

"Listen, Whore," he hissed out, "You are outnumbered in a fight you won't win. You can return with us to the capitol of your own volition, or can do so dragged through the sea behind our warship with a sword through your belly."

Ellaria stiffened. "If you are accusing us of a crime, then I would suggest you name it. Unlike some, we do not kidnap and harm little girls-"

"I hope that's not the only sword she'll have in her," one of the other men murmured overtop her words, leering, and Sansa flinched.

Ellaria fell silent for a beat. Then, "My paramour is up on deck. Lay a hand on me, and he will kill you, whatever bonds you may have used to subdue him before you made it down here."

It was a gamble of course, but Sansa didn't dare think that Oberyn had been killed, was bleeding out on deck because of her. Couldn't think that.

The same man who had spoken grinned. "I don't think you're in a position to be making threats, cunt," he muttered. "Though, if you like, I could remedy that and put you on your back."

"Enough," the leader of this ugly troop snapped, and the man's teeth clicked shut. "Let go of the knife, woman, or we'll be forced to take it from you. Is Sansa Stark aboard this vessel?"

Ellaria smirked. "I'd like to see you try," she murmured, and the leader pursed his lips. Then, "Search the room."

And that was how it had started, a fight quick and dirty that left three men downed before Ellaria seemed to realize she would not win it, though Sansa wondered if the Dornish ever cared about the odds.

One of the soldiers felled her, and she dropped to her knees, the knife falling out of her hand when one of the soldiers stepped on her wrist, crying out as the sharp edge of his blade pressed against her neck.

"We shouldn't kill her," the little boy with the flag said nervously. "The King said he wanted everyone as we could capture alive in the raven."

The men ignored him. The man with his sword at Ellaria's throat only smirked.

"Seems a shame to just slice her throat," he told the other men, "before we've at least seen what it is she does that so enthralls the Prince of Dorne."

And then Ellaria looked up at him, a smirk on her face as she murmured, "Do it, coward."

The blade nicked her skin, and Sansa covered her mouth with both hands as a bead of blood dripped down her neck.

"How dare you call me a coward, bitch," the man hissed, and Ellaria's smile only grew.

"You're a Tyrell, aren't you?"

The knife cut deeper into her skin then, and Sansa cried out.

The room fell silent at the sound, the soldiers' leader raising a hand to keep the man with his sword at Ellaria's neck from continuing.

Sansa closed her eyes, all of the air in her belly escaping her as she realized that she had been heard, and then Ellaria was screaming out at a bloodcurdling range, "Oberyn!"

It took Sansa a moment to realize that she was attempting to make the soldiers believe it had been she who had made the noise, but it was obvious her attempt was too late. The soldiers were already fanning out across the room, cutting down hammocks as if they expected her to just be lying in them, before one of them moved over to the barrels.

And then light was streaming into Sansa's hiding place, and she grimaced as one of the Flower soldiers grabbed her by the arm and yanked her to her feet.

She met Ellaria's gaze, saw the calm storm in it, and blinked in surprise, wondered how the woman could be so calm at a time like this.

When they were pushed together and surrounded, Sansa had thought that would be the end, thought she would be dragged back to Joffrey in chains.

Joffrey, who was no longer inhibited by his lord grandfather. Whom no one would be able to stop if he decided Sansa should be dragged before the Iron Throne, stripped, and raped for-

One of the soldiers smirked, shoving Sansa closer to Ellaria. "Don't kidnap little girls, do we?" he asked mockingly, and then froze.

Froze because, in the next moment, Ellaria had taken advantage of their victory to dart closer still to Sansa, wrapped one lithe arm around her waist to pull her closer, and reached into her gown to pull yet another knife loose, pressing it against Sansa's throat.

Sansa's breath left her in a quiet gasp and she forgot to take another. She found herself staring down at Ellaria's unshaken hand, white where it clutched the bone hilt of her knife, as she breathed calmly against Sansa's back.

"Let her go," one of the Tyrells ordered, and Ellaria grinned at him.

"Why should I? She is my leverage, after all."

Her voice was so cold that Sansa stiffened where she stood, listening to it, tried to glance back at the other woman and see that reassuring look in her eyes, but couldn't.

This woman whom she had thought of as a mother, even when she hardly knew Ellaria, whom she had felt at least marginally safe around, compared to most in King's Landing. Who had told her pretty stories of Dorne, but who had been kind enough to tell her what she and the Dornish thought had really happened at the Tower of Joy.

And now she had a knife to Sansa's throat, as if none of that had mattered to her that it had to Sansa. Sansa started to shake, and it was then that the Tyrells seemed to realize Ellaria's threat was a serious one.

The leader raised his hands, sword dropping to the floor of the cabin with a loud clatter. "Lady Sansa is aunt by marriage to the King. Let her go, and we will ensure that you are unharmed and unmolested until your return to King's Landing."

Sansa barely heard the words, her breaths coming in shaky gasps as she stared down at the knife against her throat, at those hands, so white around the knuckles.

Ellaria wouldn't hurt her, she told herself. This was for show; the Tyrells had to believe that Ellaria would hurt her, in order to let Ellaria leave with her captive, and then they would make their way to Dorne, anyway.

Ellaria's voice, whispering in her ear with the ring of defeat, broke Sansa from her hopeful musings, "Is that what you want, Sansa? To be handed over to the to return to King's Landing?"

Sansa wanted to scream that she had never wanted that, that how could Ellaria even ask such a thing? But she couldn't breathe.

And Sansa, for a moment, thought to take the coward's way out, thought to tell Ellaria that she wanted to choose the course most likely for her to survive it, didn't want to risk falling as Ellaria dragged her from a ship and away from an entire fleet, because she was a coward for all that she was a traitor's daughter, and that was why she had not pushed Joffrey from the ramparts the moment he had shown her her father's head.

But she doubted that her mother had begged for her life, when the Freys had sliced her throat open, and Ellaria was only meaning to use her as leverage.

And Sansa wanted very badly to be a Stark once more. Wanted to be brave, as Ellaria had been, fighting off those soldiers on her own.

"No," she said, wasn't certain if it was a whisper or a shout, hadn't even been certain that she would say that word until it slipped past her lips, but Ellaria heard her, at least. And acted before Sansa could take the word back. Sansa wondered if that was mercy.

She did not know what she had truly thought Ellaria would do. Tell the guards to let her pass, convince them to free Prince Oberyn and the others, put them in the Dornish harbor and leave them all alone.

She had always been such a naive little girl. Every time she thought she understood how the world worked, she learned that lesson yet again.

It was not until Ellaria's blade was actually scraping across Sansa's neck, until the blood was running down her chest, that she truly believed the other woman would kill her.

Having her throat slit was not quite like Sansa had imagined it, when she had been told so gleefully by Joffrey how her mother had died.

The knife dug deeper than she'd thought it would, and it certainly wasn't painless, as she'd somehow thought it would be, either. It hurt, the sort of pain that was far more intense than any weapon beating her back, than any words Joffrey could hurl at her. Sansa heard a strangled, wet scream work its way past her throat before the knife dug deep enough to cut that noise out into strangled whimpers.

She could feel wet blood gushing down her neck, staining her gown so deeply that Sansa doubted she would ever be able to wear the thing again.

And then she tried to laugh, because of course she would never wear her dress again. She was going to die, after all. The sound came out as more of a strangled gurgle.

Sansa had always known that she would die in King's Landing, far away from any that remained of her family or her mother's, far from her homeland, for some time. Had thought that the Lannisters would be responsible for her demise, that Joffrey would order her raped and beheaded while a hundred people watched. Or, that every piece of her would chip away as it had been doing in recent months, until nothing remained and she merely...slipped into darkness.

It was strange, how slowly a throat slitting seemed to be, when it was happening to you. Sansa saw everything; saw the Tyrell guards surrounding them, shouting in anger and rushing toward her, attacking Ellaria mercilessly after some talking that Sansa could not hear beyond the rushing in her ears.

It was so strange, to think of Ellaria as both gentle and the woman brutally killing her.

 _Let me brave_ , she thought, as Ellaria's knife nicked at her skin. And then, an errant thought of Margaery, her elegant face pulled down into a frown.

 _This isn't bravery, Sansa, this is just another cowardice. Fight her, do something!_ the other girl's voice whispered in her mind, and Sansa startled, for it had seemed for a moment as if Margaery was really there, as if Margaery had just said those words.

And as she jumped, her body pushed forward of its own accord into Ellaria's knife, and the blood began to spurt from her, as Sansa's scream stuttered off into a shocked gasp.

The sensation of choking did not last much longer.

Ellaria's bone hilted knife was being scraped away from her throat in a way that was almost more painful, flying through the air and landing in the dirt somewhere, and Sansa collapsed to the ground, no longer supported by Ellaria’s gentle arms, abused lungs filling with air, blood still streaming down her front.

But she didn't feel the dull impact of her body hitting the wooden floor of the cabin, and Sansa was thankful for that; she knew enough about such wounds to know that they shouldn't be jostled as much as they were being now, and she had to keep her head upright. Had to stem the flow of blood, if she wanted to live.

There was so much shouting, but Sansa barely heard any of it, could only focus on the pain of her throat as she lifted a hand to brush at the blood, grimaced at the feeling of slick wet heat against her fingers as they slipped down to her stomach, landed in her lap, staining her gown further.

Hands were grabbing hold of her, pushing her onto her back on the cabin, and she abruptly remembered that soldier, telling Ellaria what he would do to her on her back, and fought the hands, but found herself too weak to fight them off, and they only batted at her irritably.

When she looked up, for a brief moment that she could focus on anything, there was the boy who had come into the cabin carrying the flag, lowering her to the floor and handling her arms with shaking hands, as if he had never seen a woman injured in a battle before. And Ellaria, behind him, grabbed by several soldiers, attempting to twist out of their grips.

Sansa's vision was beginning to blacken around the edges, but she glanced up at the boy holding her in something like dazed awe, watched as he reached for something to cover her bleeding neck with, before picking up the Tyrell banner. Sansa closed her eyes for a moment and imagined that Margaery was the one placing it about her neck with such gentle fingers.

She heard the boy murmur, over and over as more soldiers knelt around her, "You're going to be all right. You're going to be all right. You're going to be all right."

And then everything faded to blackness.


	125. SANSA LXXVII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sansa starts playing the game of thrones.

“Lady Sansa,” Joffrey smirked down at her, as if nothing had changed at all since Robb's murder, and Joffrey was about to angrily order that she explain her brother's newest actions on the Front.

Except that Robb was dead now, killed by Lannisters, and Sansa was kneeling before the throne for her own misdeeds, about to explain herself for attempting to flee her chains in King's Landing.

Sansa forced her body to remain still as she knelt before the Iron Throne, before this little beast for whom she had knelt so many times in the past, only to have her back beaten and bruised, her father's head chopped off despite her pleas.

Everyone always died in spite of her pleas. Joffrey didn't care to hear her pretty pleading anymore than the gods did, except for when he got off on it. She knew, somehow, that if she began to plead, if she explained herself and begged for the King's mercy, that this time, she would not receive it.

If anything that Joffrey had ever done in the past could be described as mercy.

His words from a lifetime ago flooded through her mind, of how "mercy" had been cutting her father's head off, of how she ought to get down on her knees and kiss his boots for that alone.

"Your Grace," she whispered, and pretended that her voice did not shake as she spoke, did not sound hoarse and too low, as if she was sick from a cold, from the way the knife had dragged across her throat just days earlier, from the hasty healing the maesters had done once she had been returned to King’s Landing, ordered to keep her alive and, preferably, able to talk, for her words were needed to figure out this conundrum with, as Joffrey was taking to calling them, "the godsdamned Martells."

A conundrum. Sansa supposed that was an adequate enough word, from the perspective of everyone who had remained in King's Landing. Pure idiocy, on the part of the Martells, to steal the Stark girl and make off with her, expecting to go unmolested for it. Expecting no one to be hurt by it.

The last time a Stark girl had been taken, it had started a war.

The Tyrell banner had fluttered into the sea as they had sailed hard back to the harbor, coated in blood, and Sansa had watched it and wondered how deeply her neck would scar as it disappeared beneath the waves, lost forever.

Sansa had spent the next several grueling days lying sick and near death in her husband's bed, dragged, still half delirious and close to death, before the best of King's Landing's maesters.

She had not seen her husband's since she had returned to King's Landing, and no one would say anything about him, not even Shae, who sat by her bedside day and night, seeming to know without being told about the nightmares, about the fear that someone would slip into her room in the night and slit her throat. Again.

The maesters said that she would always bear a scar, but she would live without complications. Would speak without complications.

She had not tried to speak until this moment, kneeling before Joffrey's throne. Had ignored all of Shae's overtures, had not obeyed the maesters when they tried to force the issue.

Sansa lifted her head, saw Joffrey where he sat upon the Iron Throne, saw the members of the Small Council all gathered around him like vultures, save for Prince Oberyn and the Hand of the King and Tyrion, all conspicuously absent, and her eyes fell upon little Prince Tommen, staring down at her with red rimmed eyes and flushed cheeks.

For some reason, that was the face which Sansa could not bear to look at, which she thought strange, out of all of the figures standing there, awaiting her demise.

She glanced up at Margaery where she sat at the King's right hand, dressed in the flowing black silk of mourning, though Sansa did not know whom she was mourning and felt her stomach clench, because perhaps it was Sansa, already deemed dead by everyone else.

"Lady Sansa," Joffrey repeated sharply, and Sansa realized that he had spoken and she had not heard him.

She swallowed hard. "Your Grace, forgive me, I am..." she trailed off, glanced around the throne room again, wondered where her lord husband was. Surely he would have heard of her plight by now, or he had lied when he told her that Lord Tywin was not the only one who would protect her, now.

"We are all affected by this situation," Margaery spoke up for her then, presenting her most charming, and yet somehow also grief-stricken, smile to the court at large, and Sansa winced to see it.

But Margaery was here, still attempting to save Sansa in some small way, while her husband was not, and Sansa sniffed, thoughts drifting back to her worries aboard the ship, that Margaery would never forgive her for leaving.

They felt so trivial now, alongside everything else. No doubt Margaery would never forgive her for dying, as she was about to do, either.

"But one we must push through nonetheless," Joffrey interrupted, sneering. "Why did you run away with the Martells, Sansa?"

Sansa swallowed hard, thought of what Margaery would say to get herself out of this situation and came up completely blank. "I..."

"But she couldn't have," Margaery's voice interrupted suddenly, and Sansa's eyes went wide as she looked at the other girl, as the whole of the court looked at the other girl.

And then she studied the look on Margaery's face, really read it in a way she had not allowed herself to since returning to King's Landing. Not when she had lain in her husband's bed, drifting in and out of delirium with the potions the maesters had given her, Shae a constant guard over her bedside, and pretended to be asleep when Margaery had come in and asked how Sansa was doing. Not when, every time she looked in Margaery's direction, she was overcome with the feeling of her own betrayal, terrified to see the anger in the other woman's eyes, where it would not linger on her face.

But there was no anger in Margaery's eyes today; today, there was only fear behind that bland smile, and Sansa found herself closing her own eyes again, unable to meet that look, not when Sansa was the cause of it.

Joffrey frowned. "My lady?"

He spoke as if he found her particularly thick for the first time in his knowing her, for if they had found Sansa with a contingent of Martells, surely it was self-evident, what had occurred.

Margaery's smile was cooler, now. "Sansa was in my company just hours before she disappeared and her face is easy to read. She would not have been able to hide such a thing from me."

Sansa flinched, realizing what the other girl was doing, and hating her a little bit for it, even if a part of her crowed, that it meant Margaery so obviously hadn't given up on her.

Joffrey raised a brow. "You did not tell me you were in Lady Sansa's company, my lady." He sounded gently reproving, though Sansa had never known him to be gentle about anything.

Margaery managed to shrug and make it look elegant. "I did not wish to burden you with anything, in this hour of need, my love," she murmured. "But I can promise you, whatever happened, Lady Sansa had no knowledge of it beforehand."

Sansa sucked in a breath, wondered if her wide eyes conveyed the fact that she thought Margaery was insane for doing this.

Joffrey waved a hand helplessly. "Then why was she found aboard their fleeing ship?" he asked calmly. Too calmly, for Joffrey, certainly at this point.

Certainly when Margaery could not have this good of a hold on him, not when he had the opportunity to punish Sansa for something. Sansa's eyes narrowed, and she wondered what sort of game Lord Tywin was playing here.

Margaery nodded her head to one of the green cloaks, the one who had pulled Sansa away from Ellaria and her knife, and the man stepped forward as if this had been planned from the start.

Sansa's eyes narrowed as she saw the discomfort in the man's stance, in his awkward bow at the waist before his king and queen, before his eyes flitted to Margaery.

"Your Grace," he began, voice booming in the throne room, "when we apprehended the Martells, Ellaria Sand had a knife to Sansa Stark's throat. Whatever the case, I do not believe that Lady Sansa went with them willingly."

Not quite the truth, Sansa thought idly. Ellaria had only placed a knife to Sansa's throat after they had caught her hiding amongst the barrels.

Joffrey raised a brow, turned back to Sansa. "Is this true, Lady Sansa?"

Sansa's breath left her before she could answer, to refute the words or otherwise, and her mouth was suddenly very dry. She forgot, for a moment, how to breathe, pictured the way Ellaria had held that night while she cried in the woman's arms after her nightmare, and sucked in an errant breath.

She knew that it was the not the truth, and suspected, by the malicious look in Ser Meryn's eyes, the fearful one in Margaery's, that everyone else in the room knew it was not the truth, as well. And yet, somehow, they didn't care. Almost seemed to want her to say it was.

All she need do was say 'yes,' and this would all be behind her, perhaps. If Joffrey was feeling particularly merciful today.

She didn't know what sort of game was being played here, but she knew that she would be caught up in it either way, for good or for ill, and she was too tired to fight that, because doing so would be futile. She had learned that lesson when she watched the axe drop on her father's neck.

She should never have agreed to go with the Martells, all that time ago. Should have turned her back on Oberyn and his treasonous plots the moment the offer left his mouth, no matter how much she wished to leave King's Landing and the horrible people who were her captors there.

It had been a mistake, and she was not the only one who was going to pay for it now, no matter what answer she gave. And if she said 'yes,' she could face whatever Joffrey threw at her. She did not know if she would have that luxury when he threw her into a cold, Black Cell to keep her from attempting another escape.

But she would also be accusing the Martells of kidnapping her, and she doubted that would avoid a war.

She watched the people around her more closely now, saw the fight itching in each of their eyes, and realized why they wanted her to say that she had been taken against her will.

That they wanted a war, wanted her to give them just cause to make one.

A part of her was tempted, armed with that knowledge alone, to tell Joffrey she had gone with the Martells of her own free will. That it had been her choice, and she could shout her hatred of the Lannisters and of Joffrey, could shout how glad she had been to be away from all of them, for the few scant moments. To deny them just cause for their war before they chopped off her head, as they had her father's.

But that thought just made her flinch, and for another reason. If she said now that she had gone with Oberyn willingly, she would be a ruined woman. They would think that Oberyn had been fucking her; a woman married to one of his political rivals, and had stolen her away to become another of his lovers. There would likely be those who would consider her ruined anyway, and she wouldn't have cared, only she knew what those who followed the Faith of the Seven did to a woman who had not been faithful to her husband, when they wished to make an example of her.

And Tyrion was not here to defend his wife.

Aboard the ship, as she lay on her back on a cold bunk, cold hands pressing at the skin of her neck, not listening to the murmurs of the one maester aboard the Tyrell warship, peeling a banner away from her neck where it had stuck itself as she sobbed, her thoughts had been on her mother, and the memory returned to her sharply now. Catelyn, sitting in Winterfell, crying for her daughters when she thought no one could see. On Cersei, sitting on her hands in Highgarden, silently plotting away as her husband ignored her out of sheer fright.

She was not responsible for the lives of thousands, Sansa thought, and the thought sounded remarkably like Margaery's voice. She was not responsible for the Martells, either; not after Ellaria had nearly succeeded in killing her, no matter how kind they had always been to her before that. She was only responsible for one.

And Sansa Stark wanted to live, no matter what Ellaria had assumed in the cabin of that ship. Wanted to survive, as Margaery had once told her they had to. She didn't want to be some broken, dead thing, destroyed by a cruel boy's machinations, locked away in some dungeon because she was deemed wholly untrustworthy, a loose woman.

She wanted to live to one day see Winterfell, and that would never happen so long as she was locked in a cell, rather than a cushioned Keep.

And the Lannisters would have the war they so clearly wanted either way.

She glanced up, saw Margaery mouthing a word, repeated it dutifully, almost without thinking, and certainly without thinking of the Martells.

The only image in her mind was of Ellaria's knife, scraping across her throat as she made the wrong decision, that time.

"Yes," she whispered, and was relieved when Joffrey did not force her to say it louder. It was easier, she supposed, to say the word when Ellaria and Oberyn were not here to hear it. She wondered if those playing the game better than her had known that, if that was why they were not present, or if they were in even now locked in a Black Cell.

"I...yes. I was terrified," she whispered, thinking of the guards swarming into their cabin, Tyrell guards, of how her body had quaked at the sight of them with their swords at Ellaria's neck. "I..."

Joffrey sighed, looking bored suddenly. "I see," he said, and Margaery reached out and squeezed his hand, looking pleased. "So you did not attempt to escape with the Dornish because you feared what would happen to you, what with your husband's hand in killing my lord grandfather?" Joffrey demanded, and Sansa gaped at him.

"I...I..." Sansa found herself unable to think of a single thing to say in response for a moment. "L...Lord Tywin is dead?" she settled on finally, and several of the assembled courtiers laughed at her surprise.

"Why, Lady Sansa," Joffrey said, voice full of glee, "You didn't know?"

Sansa shook her head, further perplexed as the rest of Joffrey's words hit her. "I...My husband?"

Joffrey's face had twisted into a grieving frown, even as his eyes sparked with glee. "Your traitorous bastard of a husband stands accused of stabbing my lord grandfather in the chest, not a week ago, hours after you and the Martells fucked off to Dorne."

Sansa blinked, the words seeming to be spoken underwater before they reached her ears. "My husband did this?" she asked incredulously, for she knew Tyrion hated his father in some intellectual way, in some of the same way that she did, and yet, she couldn't imagine him stabbing the man to death.

Joffrey's smirk fell; evidently, Sansa was not amusing enough for him, repeating his words like a bird.

"Yes. My apologies, lady aunt, for putting you through further trouble after your...excitement. I understand that these savage Dornish did not even allow you to take your own clothes with you, beyond what you wore on your back."

He leered at the gown she wore now, and Sansa flushed. It was not one of the more revealing Dornish gowns she had worn aboard the ship, and certainly not the one Ellaria had cut her throat in, ruined now, but rather one of her too thin, too short gowns, and somehow, that seemed worse.

Sansa blinked as the green cloak who had saved her neck from bleeding out on the cabin of that ship stepped forward and helped her to her feet with all of the gentleness of a sworn shield.

She shied away from him, the moment she had the chance, but he did not seem to notice, too busy giving her a gallant bow and apologizing for being unable to save her from "that harridan," sooner.

"Still, this is a strange situation," Joffrey continued once she was standing, on shaky legs, "And one which begs many questions which shall need further investigation." He grimaced. "For instance, why were the Martells fleeing, on the night of my grandfather's death?" Joffrey demanded, to the room at large.

Sansa was abruptly forgotten, and she found some relief in being able to melt amongst those in the crowd once more, not meeting Margaery's clearly relieved eyes.

"Your Grace-" the Grandmaester started to say, but Joffrey's glare cut him into silence, and it was one of the Tyrell guards who had come after them who eventually spoke.

"Your Grace," the same green cloak murmured, "when we caught up to them, the Martells claimed they were not fleeing, had merely decided to leave, as they had been planning to do so for some time, and did not understand Lord Tywin's directive for them to remain here until told to do otherwise."

" _I_ told them to do otherwise!" Joffrey screeched, leaning forward on that ugly throne.

The green cloak looked unsettled by Joffrey's words, before valiantly continuing, "They did, however, admit to the kidnapping of Lady Sansa, against her will."

Sansa blinked, wondered what it had mattered, her words in the throne room just now, if the Martells had already admitted to...to stealing her against her will.

Sansa thought of the way that Ellaria had fought off five Tyrell soldiers on her own, with nothing but a knife, and wondered if that had all just been a sick game of Joffrey's, to get her to turn against some of the only people in King's Landing who attempted to help her.

Joffrey raised a brow, leaning back in his chair, clearly mollified. "And they believed they would get away with this?" he demanded. "With stealing away my beloved aunt? With nearly killing her?"

His voice rose angrily as he continued.

All theater, Sansa thought, with a contemptuous snort that seemed to come from nowhere. No doubt Margaery had convinced Joffrey of Sansa's innocence in this matter before they had even entered the court room, though she did not want to think too hard on what that meant. For Margaery or herself.

She wasn't going to be punished, not openly, for escaping Joffrey for even that small amount of time. Instead, she was his "beloved aunt," and any action he would take against the Martells would be avenging her.

Sansa laughed loudly in the audience chamber. The room fell silent, and Sansa felt Margaery's eyes on her.

"Lady Sansa is not well," she heard the Grandmaester rasp out. "She has endured physical pain to be present here today, to present the truth of this past week for her, and is still under the influence of some pain relieving potions I have administered."

Sansa grimaced, and hoped that Shae had been with her throughout that.

"Of course," Joffrey said. "She must rest and be back on her feet as soon as possible. Someone take her away. I must assemble my Small Council. My aunt has been grievously wronged, and the perpetrators must suffer for it."


	126. SANSA LXXVIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, I wasn't going to update today, but then I realized it's been an actual year since I started this behemoth, so I shouldn't leave you guys hanging!  
> Warning: for mentions of/period typical view of suicide

"What has happened to..." Sansa shook her head, reaching up to brush at her forehead, glancing warily at Shae as the woman attempted to hand her that same bitter tasting drink she'd given her earlier, when Sansa was barely conscious enough to do so.

After the fiasco in the throne room, she had been brought back here, tossed onto the bed and given some foul drink by Shae, who stood by worriedly, Sansa's silent sentry. She'd fallen into a deep sleep then, and her voice sounded hoarse now from more than just her injury.

"Drink," Shae told her, tone rather hard, and Sansa grimaced, pulled away.

"I..."

"Sansa," Shae said, a sigh in her tone, "drink."

"I...I'm fine," Sansa gritted out, sitting up and hugging her knees, glaring at the drink shoved in front of her face.

"You need to drink," Shae's accent was thick, and Sansa found herself lifting her head, meeting the woman's eyes.

Sansa sighed, taking the drink from Shae's hand and forcing it down, grimacing at the bitter aftertaste lingering on her tongue, before handing the cup back to Shae and finding her voice.

"What has happened to Prince Oberyn?"

"Prince Oberyn is in enough trouble, and you should focus on your own," Shae warned her.

Sansa blanched. "Is he all right?"

Shae sighed, wiped at her forehead, which Sansa could see was mopped with sweat. The room, come to think of it, felt terribly hot, since the days Sansa had spent on the sea, but she had thought that had only been a fever produced by whatever concoctions she kept being forced to drink. Shae seemed as miserable as she.

"Prince Oberyn was badly injured, resisting the Tyrells when they forced their way onto the ship," Shae said, words slow and gentle, as if she understood the pain they would cause Sansa. "He was... further injured, upon his return to King's Landing." Tortured, Sansa took that to mean, eyes widening. "He has been confined to his chambers, and is being seen to by Martell maesters. And, before you ask, Ellaria Sand lives as well. She was confined to separate rooms upon her return to King's Landing."

"Lives?" Sansa asked, not liking the suggestion in that word.

Shae sighed again, longsuffering. "After...what she attempted to do to you, the soldiers aboard that ship beat her nearly to death," she confessed. "She was in almost as bad of shape as Prince Oberyn, when they brought her back, only the King is demanding that they both be healed before they answer for themselves."

Sansa sat up a little more, the breath leaving as she remembered Ellaria's disbelieving laugh, when the soldiers had offered her passage unmolested back to King's Landing. "I should-"

"Lay back down or I will knock you out," Shae snapped, and Sansa flinched at the anger in the other woman's tone. Shae sighed, flopping into the chair set up beside Sansa's bed, and Sansa blinked as her nose caught a whiff of rosewater from the blanket that Shae moved off the seat.

"I am sorry," Shae said quietly. "But...What in the seven hells were you thinking, Sansa?"

Sansa blinked up at her, sure that the woman's words, spoken what felt like a lifetime ago, had meant that she knew, at least somewhat, what Sansa and the Martells had been planning. Knew that Sansa wanted to leave this place more than anything.

Sansa glanced down, hands reaching up of their own accord to rub at her throat, at the skin that had been pulled into a long, lifted ridge around the base of it, grimaced at how hard the skin there felt.

"I know how badly you wished to leave," Shae said, "But you were smarter than this."

Sansa looked up at her. "Am I?"

Shae met her eyes for a moment, and then looked away, moved across the room to fidget with the tea pot laying out there, her back to Sansa.

"Tyrion has been arrested," she blurted, repeating the words Sansa had learned in the throne room when the silence grew so thick that Sansa wished to break it, but couldn't bring herself to. "The knife used to stab Lord Tywin; they say it belonged to Tyrion. He claimed he hadn't done it, but Joffrey does not see reason, and they threw him in the Black Cells. Your running away with those Martells, on the eve of the murder, only damned him more. They think you ran because you knew he was planning this, and did not wish to be punished for it."

She turned around, and Sansa raised her hand over her mouth, staring at the other woman as Shae brought a cool cup of iced tea over to her, shoved it into Sansa's hands.

"Shae, I swear, I didn't have anything to do with Lord Tywin's murder," she whispered. "And I would never...I wouldn't just..."

Shae laughed thickly. "You don't care about Tyrion," she said, sinking into the chair once more, rubbing at her temples. "You never did. You resent him for marrying you when you could have married someone far worse, you hate that you must sleep in the same room as him, and I want to believe that, if he had told you he planned to kill Lord Tywin, to comfort you after some horrible deed Joffrey did, you would not then plan to run off with the Martells, but I can't." She met Sansa's eyes. "I can't."

Sansa gulped. "And I don't blame you," she whispered. "I wish that I could feel for Tyrion what you do; in many ways, it would make my life here easier, and his as well. But I can't, and I cannot blame you for thinking the rest of me."

Shae sighed. "When I first met him, it was about the money," she admitted. "He didn't think so, but I could see it in everyone's eyes. Lord Varys, Bronn...He was a Lannister from the South, and he could take me far away from the too cold, boring North, and he had the money to keep me happy for as long as I wished. That was why I went with him. That was why I pretended to want him."

Sansa stared at her. "Shae..."

"But it didn't stay like that," Shae continued, staring down at her own knuckles now in lieu of Sansa. "It didn't. And I know that there were times that he might have doubted me, just a whore, and I know that there were times when he did not and should have. But...he is a man that I...he is loveable, Sansa. I wish you had tried to see that. If they kill him because you ran away and made him look twice as guilty, you will truly wish that Ellaria Sand had finished what she began on that ship."

Sansa paled, stiffened a little where she sat, and stared down blearily at the tea she had already drank from. Shae snorted.

"Don't ever do something foolish like that again, Sansa," she warned the other girl. "Yours is not the only life you may lose because, for a fleeting moment of whimsy, you think that death offers an escape."

Sansa jerked where she sat. "An escape..."

She had not thought of it as an escape, at the time. She had thought it was a trick, that Ellaria was merely demonstrating her resolve for a few scant moments before she would demand to be released with Sansa.

And then Ellaria had kept cutting.

"There was a girl, in one of the brothels in the North," Shae said, "She thought she could find an escape in death, because everything about her life had become pale and cold and dead for so long. She had fallen in love with a lord who would never take her for a wife, and he had spurned her when she told him." Shae fidgeted.

Sansa swallowed. "What happened?"

"She found her escape," Shae said, sniffing. "And I had to find her, lying dead on the floor, a knife through her swollen stomach. I had to clean the body, and I had to watch them bury her, and I..." she looked away, swallowed audibly in the otherwise silent room. "It is never an escape for the rest of us. You clean up your mess, once you start it. If you had let her kill you on that ship, Tyrion would likely already be condemned as guilty and dead, your death seen as a confirmation of that guilt."

Sansa rubbed at her suddenly cold arms, found herself wanting to apologize, for damning Tyrion, for Shae’s accusation that she had wanted to take her own life, anything to placate Shae's anger, but the words would not come.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, looking down at the blankets, tea cup hanging loosely in her hands, dripping down to stain the blankets atop her legs. "I didn't know she was going to do that, I swear. I didn't know..." She felt tears stinging at her eyes, but before Shae could respond, there was a knock at the door.

They both froze, and then Shae was moving across the room, unlatching the door and opening it as Margaery practically fell into the room.

Shae eyed Margaery appraisingly, and then nodded to Sansa, gave Margaery a little curtsey, and walked out of the room, slamming the door so hard behind her that the latch clicked into place of its own accord.

Sansa jumped at the sound, but Margaery did not even appear to notice, her dark skirts flying through the air as she swept toward Sansa's bed, sat down in the chair which Shae had just vacated.

"Sansa," she said softly, and Sansa stared at her, wondered what was going to erupt from Margaery's mouth, and knew that she would deserve it as much as she had Shae's words.

But Margaery didn't speak; just stared at her with wide, doe eyes, and Sansa had the absurd thought that those eyes could read into her very soul, could see everything there.

She shuddered, righted the teacup before it spilled all of its contents onto the bed, and took a hesitant sip. It didn't taste bad at all; perhaps rather sweet, but she could admit that she wanted that, after the bitterness of all of the concoctions she'd been forced to drink.

When she looked up, Margaery was still watching her. Sansa blinked; Margaery was watching her lips. Staring at them, licking her own.

Sansa swallowed, throat bobbing over the ridge of red that painted it, that had slowly been peeling away to the larger stitches that had been sewn in to keep Sansa's throat together on that ship, which had given way to smaller ones once she had reached King's Landing.

Sansa's hand began to shake as she thought of how close she had come to death. Of how she had wanted it, rather than to return to the Lannisters, to return to Margaery-

She didn't have long to ponder the thought; in the next moment, Margaery was upon her, shoving off of the chair to push herself onto the bed, straddling Sansa's thighs, kissing her wet way down Sansa's cheeks, her nose, her lips, arms reaching out and grabbing Sansa's elbows in an iron grip, slamming her back against the headboard.

Sansa moaned, the cup forgotten as it fell onto the blankets, staining them, as she pushed herself into Margaery's embrace, as she found herself hoping that Margaery wouldn't notice her stillness and decide to comment on it.

Margaery didn't seem to mind, for in the next moment her lips were on Sansa's, and Sansa found herself pushing back, her moment of passive bemusement gone as she found herself kissing the other girl with the same fervor, with the muted passion of one who had not thought to ever see her lover again.

Margaery laughed softly, swiped her tongue along the inside of Sansa's mouth, the way she liked it, pulled back, pulled Sansa's upper lip between both of hers, sucked.

"Oh, thank the gods, Sansa," Margaery whispered breathily, and then her lips were on Sansa's ear, sucking lightly before she pulled away just enough to speak. "I thought, when you disappeared, and then they brought you back, I thought..."

"I'm fine, Margaery, I swear I'm fine, I..." Sansa kissed her again, down Margaery's throat, her chin, her-

Margaery's fingers reached up, brushed at the marks Ellaria's knife had made on Sansa's pale, exposed throat, and Sansa swallowed hard, winced a little at the sensation.

It didn't hurt, not as much. It was still sore; of course, though Margaery wasn't pressing hard enough against it to hurt, and the maesters said that the soreness would fade with time.

Sansa almost wished that it would hurt.

Margaery grimaced. "Does it hurt?" Margaery asked quietly, reading her mind, and Sansa smiled, shook her head.

"The maesters say it will be fine," Sansa said, reaching up to touch at it herself, fingers brushing against Margaery's own when she did so.

"I know," Margaery said, eyes twinkling, and Sansa reveled in the vibration of Margaery's voice against her fingers, pulled her fingers back and traced them along Margaery's neck, her ears, pulled her in for another kiss that Margaery seemed more than happy to oblige.

They both paused, eyes meeting, and Sansa swallowed at what she saw in the other girl's eyes.

"Margaery..." she whispered.

Margaery kissed her, soft, gentle, the way Sansa remembered being kissed by her father on the forehead as a child. "I'm so glad you're all right. Safe."

Sansa swallowed. "I almost wasn't," she said, looking away once more.

Margaery shook her head. "No, but you survived, because that is what we do, together, Sansa. We survive."

Sansa couldn't acknowledge that, didn't know what she could possibly say in response to that, when she had never even told Margaery that she was leaving.

"I know that it was all an elaborate theater," Sansa said finally, glancing sideways at the other girl. "I know that it was planned beforehand. But what I don't understand is how you convinced Joffrey I did not go with the Martells willingly, or why he doesn't think I had something to do with..." She could hardly speak the words. "He knows how I...he knows how I feel about this place."

And so Margaery told her.

Margaery had convinced Joffrey that Sansa had been kidnapped and taken against her will by the Martells when to do otherwise would have seen her in a great deal more trouble, the moment the truth came out that Sansa was missing. Had convinced Joffrey that it was not because she had anything to do with her lord husband's plot to kill his own father, and that the Martells had acted on their own because of their treacherous ways.

And then they had sent out ravens, to their allies in the Stormlands, the Houses there still loyal to Joffrey rather than to Stannis, and to Dorne on their fastest couriers, to the Reach. The merchant vessel on which Sansa and Oberyn had been traveling was fast and sleek, but the messengers traveling by horse, traveling until they nearly killed their horses and then trading off, had managed to reach the Stormlands faster, and from there it had only been a matter of time, racing them to Sunspear.

The ships from the Stormlands had only just beat them there by half a day, had negotiated with Prince Doran on behalf of the Crown. Doran had attempted to make the situation lighter, to explain that his brother was hotheaded and had not been making any broad statements for Dorne, but the fleet, speaking on behalf of the King, made it clear that Dorne would not suffer war for the crime of Sansa's kidnapping, nor for the murder of Lord Tywin, if Prince Oberyn's vessel was handed over to the Crown without a fight when it arrived. Joffrey cared only for avenging his grandfather, and did not wish to start another petty fight with a kingdom they were at peace with, he had claimed, and Sansa raised a brow, hearing that.

Prince Doran had been clearly reluctant, his family furious, but he had agreed, for the sake of his kingdom. Margaery thought there was some talk of a pardon for the ladies who had traveled with Prince Oberyn and Ellaria, some talk of mercy from the King if Prince Oberyn could explain his theft of Sansa in a way that would not horribly offend the Crown.

Sansa wondered if that was still part of the arrangement, now, rubbing awkwardly at her neck as she did so.

Prince Oberyn had been...questioned, upon his return to King's Landing. Sansa took Margaery's veiled words to mean they had wanted to blame him for Lord Tywin's murder, but he had only offered the information that Sansa had not gone with them of their own volition. That they had stolen her from her chambers when they found her alone, and ran off with her, furious that Tywin thought to keep them in King's Landing as prisoners the same way he kept Sansa Stark.

And besides, Joffrey had another, much more amusing culprit to blame for Lord Tywin's murder, and, with Sansa corroborating Oberyn's words in the throne room, that she had been taken against her will, the chance to have a war with Dorne anyway.

Throughout all of this, Margaery watched Sansa in concern, as if she thought Sansa was going to wilt at any of the words, but Sansa latched onto the one part of this conversation which she could truly think about, at the moment, in lieu of being forced to tell Margaery about how she was feeling, at the moment.

She didn't think she could have that conversation just now, anymore than she could about the Martells.

"Tyrion's murder of him?" Sansa asked incredulously, stopping her.

Had not thought it was possible that the Dornish group was returning to King's Landing for anything less than their deaths and the war with Dorne that she had feared, when their fleeing seemed so...suspicious, after learning of what had happened to Lord Tyrion.

Margaery nodded sagely. "Of course. Your husband has always hated him, and everyone knows how Lord Tywin felt about his youngest son. Joffrey believes this was revenge for the humiliation of Blackwater, and the abuse of his past."

Sansa gaped at her. "That was...months ago!" she said finally, and Margaery merely shrugged.

"Joffrey believes that his uncle has been holding in his anger for some time, unsure of the best time to strike. Cersei will be screaming her vengeance all of the way from the Reach by week's end, and Lord Tyrion is hardly sympathetic about either to his nephew. And..." she hesitated.

"Tell me," Sansa snapped, and Margaery reeled a bit, at the bite in her voice. Sansa sighed. "Sorry."

Margaery shrugged. "The knife that was used to kill Lord Tywin was from Lord Tyrion's collection. It had his initials etched into the blade, so small they almost weren't seen, at first. Joffrey has had him arrested and sent to the Black Cells."

Sansa swallowed, for while she believed her husband was many things, she did not believe him fool enough to kill his own father, when everyone knew that they did not get along.

And Sansa didn't dare to ask who had put that thought of a motive in Joffrey's head.

"That makes no sense," she said finally, barely able to withhold the words. "I can believe, perhaps, that Joffrey blames Tyrion, but Prince Oberyn is by far the more obvious suspect."

Even she could admit that. It was more likely that the Lannisters simply hadn't discovered Tywin in time, that Oberyn had killed him before they had left for Dorne, and that explained the coincidence of their leaving on the same day.

Margaery shrugged. "Your husband recognized the dagger," she told Sansa. "It seemed to be of...quite upsetting origin, when Lord Tyrion saw it, and Joffrey needed no more proof than that."

"Of course he didn't," Sansa said, because this was Joffrey they were speaking of, no more inhibited by Lord Tywin because the man was dead, even if everything about this was wrong.

Margaery sniffed. "I'm glad you spoke against the Martells," she said, when Sansa looked up at her again. "They all want a war anyway, but at least this way, you won't be punished for it. And I don't care if you hate yourself for doing it, if you blame me for-"

"Margaery."

"I thought you would be killed, Sansa, for attempting that escape." Her voice wavered. "For helping in Lord Tywin's murder."

Sansa stared at her. "I didn't...I didn't help in Lord Tywin's murder," she mumbled, but Margaery appeared not to hear her at all.

"I was terrified for you," the other girl whispered, and Sansa closed her eyes, swallowed hard.

When she opened them, Margaery's concerned expression had not changed. "But I thought...I hoped you would at least say goodbye, before you vanished like that."

Sansa felt her throat close. "Margaery, I-"

"I understand why you didn't," Margaery said gently, which Sansa found rather amazing, for she herself certainly didn't just yet, "I do. But Sansa..."

Sansa bit her lip. "I'm sorry," she burst out. "I...I knew that it would happen soon, or at least, some part of me did. But I didn't want to tell you."

Margaery reared back, clearly hurt, and Sansa forced herself to continue, not wanting to see the betrayal in those features which a moment ago had been so happy. "I didn't want to tell you," she went on, "because in those moments when we were together, I could forget. I could just have you, and it wouldn't matter that I was going to lose you soon, because when I was with you, nothing mattered-"

"I knew," Margaery interrupted her, and Sansa fell abruptly silent, staring in shock at the other girl. "I knew, Sansa, that you were going to leave with the Martells, eventually. Whether it be the Martells, or your lord husband, or someone else. You were never going to stay in King's Landing forever, and I was going to lose you one day, because your situation here is intolerable, and if I were you, I would do the same."

Sansa stared at her, saw the truth in the other woman's eyes.

"So it wasn't really some tale out of the songs, when we were together, was it?" Margaery asked tiredly.

Sansa rubbed at her eyes. "I'm sorry." She shook her head, rubbed at them some more, even if she wasn't crying. "I wonder if I'll ever stop saying that."

Margaery reached out, lifting Sansa's chin with her index finger. "It's going to be all right, Sansa," she whispered, bending forward and kissing Sansa on the nose. "We're going to figure this out somehow, yes? I wish that you could have gone somewhere that you would be safer, but we'll figure this out anyway."

Sansa nodded, because that was just the problem, wasn't it? She had thought, in that ship, that she was ready to die, because her family was dead and Sansa Stark had died some time ago, had thought that surviving was not worth condemning others.

And then she had knelt in Joffrey's throne room, and all of that had vanished. She had wanted to survive, to live, and she had condemned the Martells because of it, even if they had confessed to the same already.

She hadn't changed at all from the little girl who had begged Joffrey for her life, for her father's life, because surely he would confess for her, surely he would let Sansa live the life of comfort she wanted, and all of this would happily disappear.

Margaery moved forward silently, kissing Sansa's eyelashes as tears slipped off of them, making soft noises in the back of her throat as Sansa reached out and wrapped her fingers in Margaery's shawl, clung to the other girl's heat.

"Hold me," Sansa whispered, and Margaery obliged, wrapping warm arms around Sansa's shoulders and pulling her in. Sansa tucked her chin against Margaery's shoulder, closed her eyes, breathing in the scent of roses radiating off the other girl.

Sansa hadn't changed at all, and Margaery knew that, and she didn't care, and Sansa wanted that more than anything. To not care, to only care that she still had Margaery, even if she hadn't gotten the escape she had waited months for.

For this to be enough. For it to not pale in comparison to the sweet warmth of Dorne, the freedom from the Lannisters that she could have had there.


	127. SANSA LXXIX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a boring chapter, I think? Sorry. Set up and all that.

"I would like permission to go and visit my husband in the Black Cells," Sansa said, kneeling before the Iron Throne as she had the last time she had asked to go and visit the Black Cells.

This time, even if Joffrey did say yes, she wondered if he wouldn't slam the doors behind her, and leave her down there.

Joffrey, where he sat upon his throne with an encouraging Margaery at his side, tracing her fingers along his hand, squinted at Sansa.

Beside him, Margaery was still smiling, still giving Sansa that look she had been giving her since Sansa had hesitantly suggested the idea, last night in her chambers, after she had finished crying.

The smile vanished a moment later, as Joffrey began to laugh.

"And why would you want to do that?" he demanded, and Sansa blinked up at him in bemusement. His laughter died away, and he merely stared at her. "Your husband is a suspected murderer and kinslayer, my lady aunt, and is being kept within the Black Cells for a reason. Surely you do not wish to meet him, and thus endanger yourself, should he decide to lash out at you as he did his own father."

Sansa bit her lip. If she said that she did not believe he would harm her, she would be all but giving the impression that Tyrion had killed his father, that she must have trusted him enough that he might have told her. And while all and sunder knew of his hatred for his father, they would take her words as the most damning.

"I...It is a wife's duty, Your Grace, to stand by her husband," she said, staring at the floor. "I know that it is of the utmost disgrace, to have a husband who may have murdered the Lord Hand, but I feel that I would be neglecting my faith to the Seven, to the merciful Mother and the wise old Crone, if I did not still attempt to fulfill such a duty."

Joffrey sneered at her. "Look at you, Sansa; we've turned you into a proper lady. Not a barbarian who still worships trees anymore." He sounded disappointed, Sansa thought, as he pulled his hand from Margaery's. "I had no idea you'd gotten so stuffy."

Sansa forced herself to laugh. "I believe that the...true terror of my recent ordeal forced such upon me, Your Grace. I..." she fanned herself, tried to look faint and wondered, by the look of concern that flashed across Margaery's features before she hid it, whether she had succeeded too well. "Such terror could inspire such a reaction in any woman."

Joffrey rolled his eyes, reached for his wife's hand again. "Not every woman, Lady Sansa, is as...feeble as you," he sneered out, and Sansa wondered if she had actually convinced him. "And in such a state, I do not think it would be prudent to allow you to visit Lord Tyrion." He smirked. "For your own safety, of course."

Sansa's face fell. "If that is Your Grace's decision," she agreed placidly, because Margaery had warned her to do nothing which might set Joffrey off.

Tywin was no longer around to keep him in hand, after all, and Margaery did not think she could spare Sansa on her own, given the current situation. She paused, "Might I, however, have the permission of Your Grace to go to the Sept, and to make my prayers before the Father, that he might offer his justice for the death of Lord Tywin."

Joffrey sneered at her. "Fine, then," he said finally. "But you will take a member of the Kingsguard with you, for protection."

Sansa agreed with a small nod. "Thank you, Your Grace."

Joffrey waved a hand, dismissing her, and Sansa was rather glad to be rid of his presence, for all that she kept such thoughts from her face. She curtseyed, to the King, and then to Margaery, and led Shae from the throne room, to go and prepare herself for the journey to the Sept.

Shae had been sticking close to her, ever since Sansa had returned from her rather failed escape. She claimed that it was because she thought Sansa might hear something about Tyrion that she might not, in the kitchens, but Sansa had the disturbing feeling that the other woman was watching her, waiting for her to attempt another escape and further put Tyrion's life in danger.

She knew that something had changed, irrevocably, between them, after Shae had given her that lecture, and Sansa was not entirely certain how she felt about it. When she had met Shae, the other woman had been a bother, a hindrance in her life whom Sansa was half certain was a spy for the Lannisters, or, at the very least, an inept servant.

But Sansa thought they were friends now, even if she understood that their friendship came solely from their interactions with Tyrion. And she'd been hurt more than she would like to admit by the other woman thinking Sansa had deliberately tried to-

"This one should do, I think," Shae interrupted her thoughts, and Sansa lifted her head, grateful for the distraction.

Shae was holding up one of her gowns, a light green one with no pattern and a silken neckline, which would match well with the brown shawl Sansa planned to wear as they weaved their way through the streets of King's Landing.

Sansa gave her an absent nod, and pretended the look Shae sent her in return wasn't as full of concern as she suspected it probably was.

"I won't be able to see him, Shae," Sansa whispered as Shae dressed her. "They won't allow me into the Black Cells."

Shae bit her lip, giving Sansa a long look. "I know that," she said. "But it was good of you to try."

Sansa sighed, shoulders sagging. "It was what any truly faithful wife would do," she whispered hoarsely. "The bare minimum. I did not even hesitate with my father, and here I was, thinking that even if I ought to for the sake of my own reputation, I did not want to risk setting Joffrey off."

Shae shrugged. "There was that risk," she said carefully, moving behind Sansa and plaiting her hair down her back, "But even the Queen thought it a small one, compared to not making the attempt. It is all right, Sansa. I will find another way to get word of his condition down there."

Sansa nodded miserably. It had been Sansa's idea, after all. She and Margaery had lain together in Sansa's husband’s great bed, and Sansa had tentatively suggested backing up her own words, even if all of the court knew they were probably lies.

Margaery had thought it was a wonderful idea, and would paint her as a penitent, dutiful wife rather than a woman fleeing her husband's family, not even batting an eye as she said the words, despite Sansa's violent flinch.

Sometimes, Sansa wondered how Margaery could so easily set aside her feelings, when she played so well at the image she gave those around her.

Sansa swallowed, pulling on her shawl just as a knock came to the door. "I hope so." She paused, glanced sideways at Shae. "Will you tell me what it is, as well?"

Shae's eyes widened minutely. "I will," she promised finally, and Sansa gave her a wan smile as the other woman moved to open the door.

Sansa took a wary step backwards at the sight of Lancel Lannister on the other side of it, balking at the sight of him.

Lancel, Ser Lancel now, she reminded herself, looked just as enthusiastic to see Sansa as she felt to see him, though she wondered why. It was not as if Sansa's presence had ever caused him great physical pain. He had always seemed to relish her "punishments" as much as Joffrey had, in the past.

Sansa lifted her chin. "Yes, what is it, Ser Lancel?"

Lancel didn't meet her eyes, tapped his fingers against his thigh. "The King sent me to escort you to the Sept of Baelor for your prayers," he told her.

Sansa closed her eyes, breathed out slowly through her nose. "I see," she said finally. Then, "Shall we go, then?"

Lancel waved a hand toward the corridor, and Sansa squared her shoulders, reaching out and taking Shae's hand almost instinctively.

Shae sent her an odd look, though she gave Sansa's hand a short squeeze and didn't let go, and then they were moving again, down the corridor and out of the Keep.

There were several Lannister guards waiting at the doors of the Keep for them, and Sansa sagged a little at the sight of them, even if she understood the need for them. Even if they were also her jailors, they would be her only protectors against the smallfolk no doubt rioting outside these doors, and Sansa would take what she could get.

She ignored the brittle look Shae sent in the direction of the guards, not wanting to deal with the other woman's tongue in this moment on top of everything else.

When the doors to the Keep swung open before them, Lancel was the first to move, pushing his way past Sansa without once glancing in her direction. Sansa felt rather than saw Shae sending her a sympathetic look, and closed her eyes, letting go of Shae's hand as she did so.

A deep breath. And then another.

Sansa opened her eyes, followed Lancel down the steps of the Keep, ignoring the swarming crows of smallfolk that always seemed to be congregated outside of the Keep, waiting for a glimpse of the nobles who lived within.

Or, she supposed Margaery would say, hoping for a bit of food and kindness.

Lancel lifted his arms, one hand threateningly resting on the hilt of his sword as he pushed through the swarm with the other, and Sansa had a small moment of panic as she considered that Lancel Lannister probably wouldn't defend her against these people if the need arose. The Lannister guards had formed a circle around her and Shae, but Sansa hardly felt safe with them, now or when they were dragging her before Joffrey for another beating.

She reached back, felt Shae's hand moving through the air behind her, and latched onto it with the sort of desperation that had Shae walking by her side again rather than behind her within seconds, the other woman giving her a questioning look.

Sansa tried not to think of the last time she had been without Margaery and surrounded by the smallfolk, of how the mob had nearly gotten her killed or worse, and she shuddered, pulling a little closer to Shae.

"We can turn back, if you like," Shae reminded her, voice soft and yet somehow loud enough to hear over the crowd. "No one would blame you."

This was all for show, after all, and Sansa needn't go through with it.

For a moment, Sansa almost took her up on the offer. She had no wish to be paraded out before all of the smallfolk like this, didn't particularly wish to go to the Sept of Baelor anyway, and the mindless smallfolk were as good of an excuse as any not to do so.

Margaery had gone through with the show of marrying Joffrey, Sansa reminded herself. And if she could do that every day, then Sansa could do this. "No," she said, giving Shae's hand a reassuring squeeze. "No, I'd like to go on."

She didn't need Margaery Tyrell to protect her from the smallfolk. She could do this. She had to do this, now that she was stuck in King's Landing for good.

For Sansa had no more delusions that she would ever escape this place again, not after the lengths the Lannisters had gone to in keeping her here. She was probably going to die here, and that thought had her walking a little faster, for if Sansa was going to one day die as a prisoner of the Lannisters, she was not going to die trampled by the residents of Flea Bottom.

Still, she didn't breathe until the septons were welcoming them into the Sept of Baelor, and Sansa suspected, though Shae looked far less grey than she felt, that neither did Shae.

"Lady Sansa," one of the septons greeted her immediately, as if she were the queen and therefore worthy of their addresses, when they had never bothered her before.

Sansa wondered what that said about her own position in King's Landing, that she was gaining more notice by the septons now that her husband was suspected of killing the Hand of the King than she had as merely Sansa Lannister.

Sansa Lannister. Sansa shivered at the thought, gave the septon her full attention.

"We were told that you would be coming," the septon informed her, and Sansa wondered who had managed to get that message to them, so quickly. Probably Margaery.

Sansa nodded. "I only require a quiet place to make my petitions to the Father," she told the septon, and then nodded to her guards. "The King wishes that I be accompanied, of course."

The septon eyed her companions, eyes narrowing as they landed on Shae. "Of course. If you will follow me."

And then he was leading them through the relatively empty halls of the Sept, and Sansa dropped Shae's hand, thought of how even now Tyrion was languishing in a cell in the levels below the Keep's throne room.

Sansa'd had no real desire to go to the Sept and pray to the Seven, but Sansa had known it would look ill of her, not to suggest it after talking about her wish for spiritual penance, and so she went.

Sansa eyed Lancel, where he stood just to the side of her, as they came to a stop in a smaller chamber, where Sansa might presumably have the privacy to conduct her prayers.

The septon blessed her with a short prayer and a hand to her forehead, and, with another dark look in Shae's direction, left them in peace.

The moment he was gone, Shae made no attempt to hide her own lack of faith, sliding down the wall to sit on the ground and giving the image of the Father on the far side of the room a dark look. The Lannister guards fanned out around the back of the room, and Sansa looked away from them, pretended they weren't present at all.

She almost managed to convince herself, save for Lancel beside her, looking as though he had come here for his own benefit as much as Sansa's.

Lancel wasn't looking at Sansa, however; he was staring up at the image of the Father, with all of the devotion on his face of a truly faithful man, and, she thought, a torn one.

The Father stared back at Lancel with an impassive expression sketched into his golden, bearded face, one arm outstretched while the other held up a pair of uneven scales.

He might as well have been holding a sword, Sansa thought idly, dutifully, dropping to her knees and clasping her hands before her in an attempt to look as though she was praying.

She wondered how long she should remain here, to look dutiful enough to her husband. Everything about this place made Sansa want to flee, even if it meant walking back through the throng of smallfolk.

She shouldn't have made the journey at all, no matter what she and Margaery and Shae had agreed to. A small part of her felt that it was dangerous to be here, even if she couldn't explain why.

Sansa turned her head just a little, glanced in Lancel Lannister's direction out of the corner of her eye once more, because there was something about the young man that was prompting these thoughts, and she was unsure if it was just her own unease, or something more.

And Sansa was tired of being afraid. Tired enough to take notice when she felt this sort of wariness.

She didn't like the look on Lancel's face at all. It reminded Sansa all too much of the days when he had shouted at her for Robb's war, for every victory her brother achieved against the Lannisters, shouting which usually ended in her being beaten by some member of the Kingsguard or another.

And now Lancel was a member of the Kingsguard, himself.

She knew that Lancel had been badly injured during the Battle of Blackwater. There had been rumors that he was close to death for long after the battle, lying injured and shut away in his chambers, much in the same way that Sansa's lord husband had been while Tywin Lannister took control of the city once more.

The High Septon himself had spent quite some time with Lancel, praying over him in his fevered sleep until he recovered. Sansa wondered, for a brief moment, before reminding herself that he was a Lannister once more, he had been affected by it.

She still did not understand her own mixed feelings on the Seven, on the old gods and the new. She had told Margaery she worshipped the old gods - and Sansa blushed now to think of the context of that memory - with such certainty, because they were what her father's House worshipped, and Sansa very much wanted to feel like a Stark.

But she had gone to pray to the old gods before the heart tree in the King's forest, and had felt nothing then, and had prayed many times to the Seven in the Sept while her father's life lay on the line, and Sansa could not definitively say she found one more comforting than the other.

She supposed it was nice that some did, then.

Lancel glanced up at her then, as if he had felt her eyes on him for so long, and Sansa flushed, turned back to her contemplation of the image of the Father, having effectively tuned out the whispers of those around her by now.

"I think...I am ready to go, now," Sansa said after a few more moments of restless silence, and Lancel let out a little sigh, as if he had been expecting this, before moving to help her to her feet and climbing to his own, still not meeting her eyes.

Sansa took his hand, felt as if she had been burned by the very touch of it after he pulled her to her feet and let her go abruptly, and Sansa blinked up at him, noticed the way his eyes shifted away from her.

She wondered if he felt guilty, for the way he had pushed for her to be treated in the past, now that he may very well be treating her that way with his own two hands.

Ah well, she thought, as he led the way out of the Sept and back to the Keep, it was not as if she was going to start caring for the feelings of the likes of Lancel Lannister now.

It was bad enough, she thought idly, looking over her shoulder and seeing the stern face of the Father behind her that she cared so much about Tyrion Lannister's.


	128. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who else is tired of the roman numerals?

Sansa could remember the only other time she had been invited to the room where the Small Council held their meetings with rather vivid clarity, on any day. Could remember how easily duped she had been then, sitting before Cersei and Lord Baelish and Varys and the Grandmaester, as they bade her write a letter to her brother and pretended to have only the best of intentions at heart.

She had been such a stupid little girl then, and Sansa liked to think she had learned much since then, but as she walked into the room and saw the members of the Small Council already seated, watching her like vultures ready to strike at any moment, Sansa swallowed hard.

Not even Margaery's encouraging smile, where the other girl sat beside Joffrey at the head of the table, was enough to make her feel better, and Sansa dipped into a curtsey so that she didn't have to look at any of them.

She did not know why she had been called here, in the early morning, escorted by Ser Boros Blount, as she had been the first time she had come here, and the lack of knowledge more than anything terrified her.

Joffrey, after all, was unpredictable at the best of times, and the empty seat of the Hand of the King drove home in Sansa's mind how even more dangerous he could be now. The rest of these seats, from Lord Mace, where he sat leaning against the table, hands folded, to Lord Varys, with his customary blank expression, meant nothing while Joffrey was here, and so Sansa did not look to any of them for a clue for her summoning.

"Lady Sansa," Joffrey greeted her, and Sansa, realizing she had delayed looking at any of them long enough, finally lifted her head. He gestured to one of the empty chairs at the table, and Sansa stepped forward hesitantly, took a seat and tried to ignore the fact that everyone in the room had eyes on her.

Joffrey was eying her with a strangely serious expression, though his lips slowly pulled into a sneer as he spoke. "With my lord grandfather's violent passing," he said coldly, addressing her as if she weren't the girl he'd been tormenting for years and rather any other courtier, and Sansa almost took solace in that, "the titles and lands belonging to the Lord of Casterly Rock must pass on to his eligible heir."

Sansa swallowed thickly. "My lord?"

Joffrey looked disgusted, though she could not understand why until he spoke his next words, her own thoughts muddied in this room. "That heir would have been my uncle Jaime, were he not the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. As such, the title falls to my uncle Tyrion, unless, of course, he is condemned for killing my grandfather.”

Sansa sucked in a breath. "Your Grace..."

"It is a disgusting dilemma," Joffrey informed her, "But I have unfortunately been informed that this is the law on inheritance, because my lord grandfather had not named a successor before his death. He will not lose his claim to Casterly Rock unless he is found guilty of the murder, a foregone conclusion at this point."

Sansa was beginning to wonder; from the way that Joffrey kept repeating that, if it really was a foregone conclusion.

For a moment, she let herself imagine a life where Tyrion was found innocent of these charges, where she and Tyrion and Shae could retire to Casterly Rock which now belonged to him, before shaking the thought from her mind.

She had imagined such a life before, and now good people were going to die in a war, and Sansa was a fool to imagine any other scenario where she might escape this place.

Margaery reached out, placing a hand over Joffrey's. "We don't know that for certain, my love," she reminded him, tone gentle in a way Sansa had not thought she would dare to make it, around Joffrey.

Joffrey snorted. "You are far too kind, my lady," he said, and made it sound more like an accusation than a compliment. Margaery fell abruptly silent, and Joffrey turned his full attention on Sansa once more.

Sansa wasn't certain what he was expecting her to say, but couldn't help but think that the way he was looking at her meant he expected her to have caught on by now. All she could hear, however, was white noise.

The Lady of Casterly Rock.

It sounded like such a lovely title, when Sansa could not imagine responding to it without choking up bile.

Joffrey sighed. "Or if..." he gave her a long, knowing look. Sansa's mind took until that moment to catch up, but when it did, her eyes widened.

It seemed even now, he was too much of a coward to say the words himself. To dare, lest it be found out by anyone, even if they likely wouldn't care, that he had ordered her into doing this.

It had to be her idea.

"Forgive me, Your Grace," she said quietly, "But I am only the dutiful wife of Lord Tyrion. Surely I am not able to-"

"Your pardon, my lady," Lord Mace interrupted at that point, lowering his hands beneath the table, "But, as the Lady of Casterly Rock, you have inherited a position which comes with certain privileges and honors. The previous Lady of Casterly Rock exercised many such privileges in her husband's name, and as the wife of its new Lord, while he remains imprisoned for such a crime, you would be able to forfeit Casterly Rock to its next eligible inheritor in his name, as you have given your husband no heirs to make that decision for themselves."

Sansa stared at Lord Mace, noticed the almost guilty look in his eyes, though she doubted he felt much guilt. She knew that he, like most of the Tyrells save for Margaery and Lord Garlan, had lost interest in her after her marriage to Lord Tyrion.

No doubt, in his mind, this was justice for losing the North.

Sansa licked her lips, focused on Joffrey once more. "To be clear," she said carefully, because she remembered the last time she had been duped into signing something for the Lannisters in the Small Council chambers, "I would simply be able to sign away my husband's right to Casterly Rock in his name? I..."

Lord Mace nodded. "Because of his imprisonment, he would be deemed unable to make such a legal decision for himself. And because he is no doubt to be found guilty at his trial, House Lannister wishes to avoid the...embarrassment of Casterly Rock moving down to the next inheritor, and to have Westeros believe it is because of the decency of such a vile man as your husband that he gave it up himself. We would, of course, be able to protect you from your husband’s wrath, in the unlikely scenario that he survives the trial and is willing to disparage the family name in such a way that he would demand his birthright."

Sansa swallowed as she heard those words, heard the meaning behind them that she had not heard the last time she had been brought in here. While Lord Tyrion would lose his new lands and titles the moment he was found guilty of murder, something Sansa had no doubt Joffrey would move mountains to see happen, the very fact that she had been summoned here and asked to hand them over in her husband's name, before the trial had even occurred, was hint enough that perhaps they did not have as much evidence against her husband as they claimed.

And they wanted to ensure that, if, for some reason, Tyrion was not found guilty at his trial, he would still have been robbed of his holdings and title, without the Crown looking to have forced it from his hands and made him into some sort of victim.

Because of Sansa.

Sansa swallowed. "I see," she said finally, glanced at Margaery and saw the almost sickly look on the other woman's face, before she hid it once more. Wondered what that expression had meant. "And if I do this, Casterly Rock would go to..."

Joffrey smiled thinly. "My mother, and then to Tommen."

That answer hardly reassured Sansa. Her eyes flicked to Margaery once more, and then away, though she thought that Lord Varys had noticed, nonetheless, from the way he sat a little straighter in his chair.

"Your Grace, much as I would wish to please you," she said, and noticed the dark look passing over Joffrey's face, hurried on, "and despite our months' marriage together, I do not believe that I know my husband's mind well enough to make such a decision on his behalf. If Your Grace would allow me to speak to him-"

"Are you refusing me, lady aunt?" Joffrey demanded, standing to his feet and glaring down the table at her.

Sansa swallowed thickly, looked down at her hands where they clutched each other, white as a sheet, in her lap. "No, Your Grace. I understand the embarrassment that this might cause House Lannister, I only ask that you give me a few days to think it over."

Joffrey's eyes narrowed, but he sat back in his chair, looking more amused now than angry. "I see. I've learned some interesting things about you recently it would seem, lady aunt. First, you are devout, and now you are conniving." He leaned forward, grinned. "Remember the offer I have made you for some months now, have you?"

Sansa stared at him blankly for a few moments, before she paled in realization of what Joffrey was implying. Of what Joffrey had been offering her since her wedding day.

"N-No, Your Grace," she stammered out. "I only meant..."

"Oh, be gone!" Joffrey snapped, waving a hand. "Have your day to think it over, and then make sure you have made the right decision."

Sansa nodded, stumbled to her feet, almost kicking over her chair in the process, and, with one more curtsey, hurried out the door.

She was not expecting Margaery to sweep out after her, moments later, and take her hand, dragging Sansa into the nearest shadowed corner. Sansa's back slammed against the wall with a force that was almost painful before Margaery's face filled her vision.

It was only then that she realized how badly she was shaking, pressed against Margaery's still body.

"You cannot make that decision, Sansa," Margaery whispered, after glancing over her shoulder to ensure they were alone.

Sansa blinked at the other woman, could think only of her own refusal leading to Joffrey firmly believing that she wished to carry his child. "I know that it would crush Lord Tyrion," she said carefully, "but your expression in the council chambers..."

Margaery shook her head, the motion near frantic. "Sansa, what Joffrey implied..."

Sansa hugged herself. "I can't let him do that," she whispered hoarsely. "I know that Lord Tyrion wants that title, those lands, but I cannot allow that to sway me when Joffrey might so easily..."

"Joffrey might do it anyway, if you give them up," Margaery warned her, and Sansa's teeth clicked shut. Margaery sighed, reaching up and brushing the hair out of her eyes. "Sansa, the moment you hand over Casterly Rock, you will lose what little bargaining chip you have left at court. The seat at Casterly Rock holds power and prestige throughout the Westerlands, and people will take you seriously in a way that they have not since Joffrey started this war."

Sansa's throat felt suddenly dry. She licked her lips, pretended not to notice the way that Margaery glanced down at them in this moment of severity. "What...what are you talking about? I don't care about people looking at me the way they do you," she said, honestly. "I don't-"

Margaery sighed, shaking her head. "You told me once that you and Lord Tyrion had not been...intimate," she stated, and Sansa flushed at the words. "Is that still the case?"

Sansa swallowed. "Of course it is. I wouldn't..."

She wouldn't do that to Margaery, even if the other woman didn't seem to mind, when she had kicked up such a fuss about Elinor.

A small smile touched Margaery's lips, before she hurried on, "Then we must find a way to remedy that. My mother knows potions and remedies that can be used to help induce a pregnancy, and I am certain that-"

"Margaery, what are you talking about?" Sansa demanded, not liking the turn of this conversation at all.

Margaery pinched the bridge of her nose. "The moment Tyrion is found guilty for the murder of his father; you will no longer have a husband to protect you from Joffrey, nor a purpose for remaining in King's Landing."

"Beyond that of a prisoner, you mean," Sansa muttered bitterly, but Margaery didn't even seem to hear her. "Let him take it from Tyrion, after he is found guilty of the murder," she said dismissively, because she knew that even if the Crown felt it was going through a setback there now, they would find Tyrion guilty because Joffrey wanted him to be. "I have no want for it."

Margaery reached out, grabbing Sansa by the shoulders and shaking her. "Sansa, did you not see that no one reacted to Joffrey's threats to impregnate you in there?"

Sansa felt suddenly ill. "Surely they just didn't understand-"

"If you lose Casterly Rock, you would lose your position at court entirely. Joffrey would keep you here as a...captive, of course, but there would be nothing keeping him from coming up with another...nefarious purpose for your presence here."

Sansa shivered. "As his whore, you mean," she whispered, and Margaery looked away before nodding.

"I cannot protect you from him forever, much as I would wish to," Margaery said quietly, and Sansa felt something in her melt before she understood what Margaery was saying.

"But if Lord Tyrion is found guilty anyway, all of my resistance will be for nothing," she said, brows narrowing. "You mean to have me sleep with-"

Margaery glanced around, despite the empty corridor, and placed a hand over Sansa's mouth, stared hard at her until Sansa's eyes dropped and she nodded.

Margaery lowered her arm. "You need a child, for as much as the thought of keeping Casterly Rock is abhorrent to you, that seat will protect you better than Tyrion and I ever could, because it would mean that you would not have to remain in King's Landing. And it cannot be Joffrey's child. I have...certain acquaintances..." she looked away.

Sansa stared at her. "I am not going to...to give myself over to any number of acquaintances until I become pregnant," she said incredulously, reaching out and taking Margaery's hand in her own. "I knew the merits of having a child with Tyrion when he first suggested it, but it wasn't worth lying with him to produce one. Not for me. Nor is it worth doing so now."

Margaery opened her mouth, closed it, stared at her with wide eyes, and Sansa hated looking into them and thinking that the other girl didn't even recognize her.

"And besides," Sansa continued hastily, not wanting to be taken in by Margaery's silver tongue for all that she loved it, "The moment I have a child, I will no longer be so important to keep alive for the Lannisters to have the North. Joffrey could kill me whenever he pleased. What you're suggesting is only a temporary solution."

"And what you'd be doing isn't a solution at all!" Margaery burst out, before sighing, running her hand through her long hair, down today. "Sansa, I understand not wanting to...be with a man, believe me, I do. There was a long time where I felt the same way. But I overcame it, and I can tell you that it won't be the evil thing you are imagining, with one that I could find for you." She glanced at Sansa earnestly. "It will be that with Joffrey, though."

Sansa bit her lip, looked away. "I...give me some time to think about it," she whispered, and, after a moment's hesitation, Margaery leaned down and pecked her gently on the lips.

There was no heat in the gesture, but Sansa appreciated it all the same.

"You do that," Margaery told her, tone serious, and then she turned and walked down the hall, away from the Small Council chambers, and away from Sansa.


	129. SANSA

Sansa sighed, pulling open the door to her husband's chambers, even if it had been days since he had inhabited them now, tiredly. Her hand fumbled on the door latch, and she reached up, scrubbing at her eyes.

She had spent hours in the library, learning what she could of inheritance law, and understanding precious little of it. She was no maester, and soon enough, the words had jumbled wetly before her eyes.

She remembered overhearing her husband complaining to his brother, when he did not think she was around to overhear it, of how he was never going to inherit Casterly Rock, despite being its heir. Had even heard Jaime Lannister's sympathy toward the matter, where she had not thought to. She knew how important that title was to her husband, even if he pretended otherwise when in public.

And Tywin Lannister had never named an heir, which meant that Tyrion should be next in line, if only Sansa could find a way to keep it for him in the unlikely chance that he made it out of his trial alive.

She snorted; who was she kidding? Even if Tyrion survived the trial, which she doubted, despite Joffrey's desperation to take Casterly Rock away from him just in case, what she could understand of the inheritance laws had been very clear.

Only a child could keep the lands safe for now, and she and Tyrion were painfully lacking in that area currently.

Margaery's suggestion flared painfully at the back of her mind, but Sansa brushed it aside stubbornly. Whatever the other girl had suggested, the very thought of being with another man when she had barely been able to stomach the thought of her own husband had Sansa sick to her stomach.

And having a child with that man, a child who would be nothing more than a pawn in Sansa's game, as she had so painfully been in the Lannisters'...Sansa shuddered.

There had to be another way. There simply had to be.

She opened the door, resolved to talk to Shae about it, when she had not been able to meet the other woman's eyes earlier when Shae had fed her a meager breakfast and sent her on her way to the library. The other woman had seemed on edge then, tense, and hadn't asked Sansa about what the Small Council wanted from her, which Sansa might have found strange at the time if she weren't so wrapped up in her own troubles.

But Shae would have an idea. Had to have an idea.

Sansa paused when she saw Shae, the other woman wilted on the edge of Sansa's bed, face in one hand, the other fisting one of Tyrion's shirts, which Sansa was supposed to stitch as his wife and which she had never found the time to do.

"Shae?" Sansa asked softly, cautious at the thought of approaching the other woman in her current state.

Shae glanced up, sniffed suspiciously and set the shirt aside.

It was strange to see her like this. Strange to see the woman who had always seemed so strong in Sansa's mind, courting a lion and happy to stand up to anyone who got in Sansa's way as her lady, breaking apart like this.

She knew that Shae had been planning to find out some information about Tyrion today, about how he was faring in the Black Cells, when no one seemed to know beyond Joffrey, and that was a troubling thought, and Sansa suddenly very much wanted information about his condition.

It might help her to make a decision about her own.

"Have you...found out anything?" Sansa asked, already suspecting the answer by the look on Shae's face, as she cautiously neared the other woman, reached out to her.

She didn't know what she was going to do about the demand that Joffrey had placed on her shoulders, but if she could only see Tyrion, explain it to him beforehand, then perhaps she might be able to make a decision.

Shae didn't deserve to have all of this dumped on her shoulders at the moment, however. Sansa knew how Shae felt about Tyrion, knew that if it had been Margaery thrown into the Black Cells in this moment, she wouldn't have wanted that burden, either.

"There is nothing," Shae said, with a little sigh, reaching up and brushing the hair out of her eyes. Sansa thought her eyes looked rather red, but she didn't dare comment on that. "Tyrion is kept under close guard, with only the guards allowed to come in and deliver his food and take away his chamber pot, and I could not get close enough to one of them to-" she sent Sansa an errant look which Sansa decided to ignore.

"I don't understand why the Lannisters are suspicious of only Tyrion, and not the Martells," Sansa said finally, leaning into Shae. "When they supposedly kidnapped me and took me from the city on the same day as his death." It hurt to say that lie, somehow, in a way that Sansa felt it probably shouldn't, not after Ellaria had tried to cut her throat, however helpful the woman had thought the gesture. "The knife is almost too obvious."

Shae shook her head, sighing and scrubbing at her nose. "They think it passing strange that the Martells would kill Tywin, and so guiltily flee if they were responsible. And..." she hesitated. "They can't find anything to pin to the Martells yet, or they would have done so already. There are rumors that the King wished to send Prince Oberyn and his retinue back to Dorne, anyway, and that Lord Tywin convinced him to make Prince Oberyn stay. He was glad that they were leaving, and this no doubt skews his judgment."

Sansa swallowed hard. "But they can't possibly think that Tyrion would actually-" she cut herself off, knowing that her husband hated his family almost as much as she did, even if he would not openly act against them.

And Joffrey wanted to make sure that he was either dead on a murder charge or homeless and without the fortune that Sansa knew was so important to him.

She almost opened her mouth to say those words, for she knew that Shae had been worried when the Small Council had summoned her, and thought the other woman could help her decide what to do, but Shae spoke first.

Shae laughed tiredly. "This is the King we are speaking of, Sansa," she reminded the other girl. "He may think what he will with no logic to it."

The words were dangerously close to treason, and Sansa found herself looking up at the closed door to their chambers in the worry that someone behind it might overhear.

"And you know how he hates Tyrion, just as his mother does," Shae continued bitterly. "There are some servants saying that he will see no other reason but that Tyrion killed him."

"What do the servants say?" Sansa asked, when the silence grew too long, her decision to ask Shae's advice pushed to a later date.

Shae may have been older than she, and wiser, in some ways, but even Sansa could tell that she wasn't capable of thinking of that in this moment.

"They say that Stannis Baratheon heard of Lord Tywin's plans to march North, and sent a demon to kill him as he did Renly Baratheon," Shae said, words coming faster as she continued. "They say that Tyrion grew enraged, like the animal he has always been, and killed his father. They say that Oberyn Martell did so, and then stole you away to start a war. That Tyrion did it and then worked with the Martells to have you taken away." Shae shook her head, resting her hands on her knees. "It does not matter, what the servants say."

Sansa swallowed, leaned forward. "Are you all right?" she asked, and Shae eyed her, lower lip wobbling for but a moment before she put on the brave face that Sansa so often found herself wearing. She had wondered what it looked like.

"I will be fine," Shae promised Sansa, "because you will be fine, yes?"

Sansa reached out, taking Shae's hand and squeezing it, gratified when, after a moment's pause, the other woman squeezed back.

"I've not forgotten what you told me," Sansa promised the older woman. "And I won't. We're entwined in this game more than any of us may have wished; I see that now. And we shall stick together, now."

Shae gave her an odd look, and it occurred to Sansa that it was not often that she was comforting the other woman.

"I'm worried about him," Shae admitted, sniffing. "I know that he is stronger than he looks, because everyone underestimates him just like I once did, like you do, but I...All alone, in those cells...I just wish they would let me see him."

Sansa swallowed, reaching out and wrapping her arm awkwardly around the other woman, pulling her in for an embrace. Shae stiffened into the touch, and then fell into Sansa's arms, not crying, simply leaning against her, eyes closed.

Her hair felt as soft as butter as Sansa's fingers ran through it, and Sansa closed her eyes as well, holding the other woman but thinking of Casterly Rock.

Margaery's suggestion had merit, Sansa knew that, even as her mind and body balked at the idea of doing it. While she feared what would happen to her once the child was born, it was a better temporary solution than giving up Casterly Rock.

But Sansa hated that idea more than she hated the idea of giving up Casterly Rock. At least then, she would not have consciously made the choice to sleep with a man who was neither her husband nor her lover for the sake of carrying a child she would never love for its use to her.

These thoughts swirled around Sansa's mind until she shook her head, eyes squeezed shut as she pulled back from Shae, in desperate need of a distraction.

"Hey," Sansa said softly, "Would you like to go and look at the ships with me?"

Shae pulled back. "That was a dumb game," she told Sansa bluntly, startling a laugh out of the younger woman, "And I doubt the Lannisters will let you near another ship again."

Sansa huffed out a laugh, reaching up and wiping at her eyes. "No," she admitted. "Probably not. Well. We could try the kitchens, and then go out to the parapets."

The ones where they don't keep the heads, she added silently to herself, sniffing a little, because neither of them needed to see that.

Shae looked at her for a moment, before nodding. "All right," she agreed. "To the kitchens, then."

Shae led her way out of the door, and Sansa smiled slightly before following her, wondering again how Shae and Tyrion had met. She knew little of that; only what Shae had confided in her the other day, in her pique over her lover's imprisonment.

Shae was the sort of woman who ought to be the Lady of Casterly Rock, Sansa thought absently. Even if she would be just as overwhelmed in making the decision that Joffrey wanted Sansa to make, at least she would know the decision Tyrion would want made, unlike Sansa.

By the time they had made their way to the kitchens, it was midmorning, and Sansa had a second's thought that she was surprised Joffrey had bothered to wake up this morning, though she suspected that had been more about startling her than because of his own preferences, before Shae was ushering her into the bustling kitchen.

Sansa had never actually been inside the kitchens before, and she followed a little closely behind Shae, not ashamed to admit that she practically hung from the other woman's skirts the moment the other servants in the kitchens noticed her presence.

They went silent, food left unattended for a few moments, their rushing falling into stillness, and Sansa took a step back from Shae, feeling a bit silly.

Shae cleared her throat, not seeming to notice the reaction to the supposed kinslayer's presence. Instead, she called out to one of the workers, a young man around Sansa's age already half covered in flour.

"We need some cakes and fruit," Shae informed him, and the young man gave her a wry smile as the other kitchen servants set back to work.

The boy nodded. "Lady Shae. Lady Sansa," he nodded to Sansa, and she eyed him, was glad to see not a trace of judgment in his eyes, for all she knew that this would likely change the moment she turned her back. "I could have some honeyed milk drawn up, too?" he asked, and, after a moment's hesitation, and another glance at Sansa, Shae nodded.

"Yes. We're taking them out to the parapets, though, so we'll need a basket."

Sansa blinked at Shae so casually announcing their location like that, though she supposed there was no harm in doing so, not when everyone in the Keep always knew where their captive Stark was.

But it seemed that Sansa was not the only one surprised.

On hearing that, there was a commotion at the back of the kitchens, and Sansa turned in surprise, blinked when she saw Lady Rosamund, one of Margaery's ladies, nearly fall over the wood stove there.

Shae glanced up at the noise as well as half of the kitchen, and Sansa blinked when she saw Shae's eyes narrow in what was almost anger upon spotting Lady Rosamund.

Lady Rosamund flushed all of the way down her neck, before gathering up a platter of food from one of the other kitchen servants, which Sansa belatedly realized she was likely taking to Margaery, and hurrying out the back door before her stumbling could be acknowledged.

Sansa raised a brow, and then shrugged, taking one of the proffered baskets that Shae had wrangled out of the kitchen boy when it was pushed into her hands, and following the other woman out of the kitchens, pretending that Lady Rosamund's reaction didn't raise the hairs on the back of her neck.


	130. MARGAERY

The stench of Lord Tywin's body filled the hall of the Sept, and Margaery grimaced, lifting her willowy sleeve to her nose, grimacing in sympathy when Tommen turned green, moments after entering the room.

The Silent Sisters had done the best that they could with the smell, Margaery understood, as well as with cleaning up the body for a formal burial, but even they could not work miracles.

The septons ought to know better than to leave the body on display in such a way, whatever their religion demanded, for so long; Margaery had been around dead bodies before, remembered intimately the long hours she and Loras had spent around Renly's, but it had not smelled so foul. But Lord Tywin's body should have been embalmed.

The wound from Lord Tywin's stabbing had been covered by the new clothing he had been dressed in by the Silent Sisters, as they prepared his body to be buried beneath the Sept, as Joffrey wished it to be. Margaery knew there had been some talk of returning it to Casterly Rock, but she understood now why there was a certain concern that the body would not survive the journey.

She almost found it ironic, that he was to be buried in the Sept as a good and faithful servant of the Crown, right next to Elia Martell and her children.

It was almost as if the body had been decomposing long before Lord Tywin's untimely death, and Margaery wondered if he had been hiding an illness that none had known about.

But, despite the smell, Lord Tywin looked almost as if he were merely sleeping, as still as a statue, but dignified even in repose, with those stones placed upon his eyelids, and his hands clutching his sword.

As stiff and cold as he had been in life, and Margaery almost expected him to sit up off the table and turn on them, tell Joffrey off for the many foolish things he had done since the man's death, not the least of which being declaring a war on Dorne for Sansa's kidnapping.

Oh, Margaery knew that had been the sensible thing to do. The thing that would save their face, should it ever be theorized that Sansa had attempted to go to Dorne on her own, but she couldn't help but think that it was a mistake, nonetheless.

Prince Oberyn had seemed all too happy to claim that he had taken Sansa against her will, and Joffrey was all too happy to declare war on those two testimonies alone, however weak Sansa's had been, despite days earlier promising the Dornish that war would be averted, and there was something about all of this that worried her.

And Margaery could pretend it had everything to do with the fact that there were more Reach soldiers marching on Dorne than there were Lannisters, but she had a funny feeling that wasn't it at all.

And besides all of that, Princess Myrcella remained in Dorne, a hostage of Prince Doran. Joffrey had not even bothered to demand the release of his sister when his fleet had arrived in Dorne, another reminder of his shortsightedness, Margaery couldn't help but think. Nor had he seemed particularly concerned about inviting Myrcella to the funeral, and Margaery was rather relieved that he seemed to have forgotten about the girl, for they hardly needed Joffrey throwing a tantrum over that on top of everything else, just now.

Not for the first time, Margaery wondered what it would have been like, growing up alongside Joffrey. Her own brothers were so vastly different from Joffrey that she couldn't imagine it, and she wondered if, aside from the war, Myrcella Baratheon was pleased enough to remain in Dorne.

Beside Joffrey, Tommen made a sudden noise of distress, and Margaery eyed the little boy, watched as his face turned rather green. In all fairness to him, they had been standing here for some minutes, and Margaery had not expected him to last even this long without some sort of reaction.

But he bravely remained for a few more moments, sniffing and eyes watering. Margaery was not surprised when he turned away from the body altogether, gasping and holding a hand over his mouth.

"Little idiot," Joffrey muttered as the little boy ran from the wide, domed room, one hand lifted to cover his mouth, chubby little feet flying out behind him as one of his nannies chased after him, calling Tommen's name in concern.

In all honesty, she was surprised a boy of Tommen's age had been able to remain as long as he had, without reacting like that. She doubted some of her ladies would have had the fortitude to remain impassive around the smell, and Tommen was still very much a child in ways that even they had grown out of.

She knew that the boy had grown rather close to his grandfather, out of all of the Lannisters forced to interact with him, if, indeed, close was the appropriate word. Cersei's influence abated, what with her exile to Highgarden, Tywin Lannister had finally had the opportunity to forge the perfect heir.

He seemed almost normal, out of all of the Lannisters, and Margaery wondered if that was down to Lord Tywin's surprisingly patient tutelage, or the fact that he had been raised more by servants than his own family.

It almost made Margaery wonder if Cersei was the one responsible for the man's death, though she doubted even Cersei would be stupid enough, no matter how she loved her children.

Margaery forced herself not to react to Joffrey's words, beyond more than a noncommittal sound and a nod to Ser Boros to follow after the boy. She trusted to the knight's discretion that he would not allow the boy to leave the Sept. It was far too dangerous to do so with so many of the smallfolk clamoring outside its walls, and Tommen was far too young to be out on his own for long, anyway. Margaery had been worried enough when Sansa had gone to the Sept on her own.

There was a rumor spreading about Flea Bottom that Tywin's funeral was to be an ostentatious, expensive affair, rivaling the King's own wedding, and the smallfolk were seconds away from revolting over the news.

No amount of assurances from the Crown that Tywin Lannister was to be buried modestly, given the current state of the Crown's coffers when it wasn't being pumped full of Tyrell funds, seemed to satisfy them. There had been almost a riot traveling here from the Keep, and only the fact that Margaery's ladies had been passing out coins as they walked had kept that riot from occurring, from the way Loras had held his sword halfway out of his sheath the whole journey.

"My uncle Jaime has written to us that he is returning to King's Landing to help bury my lord grandfather," Joffrey said suddenly, into the silence that followed Tommen's exit, broken only by the murmuring of the of the septons at their prayers behind them, and Margaery forced on a pleasant expression. "One of his children ought to be here, after all, and my mother seems to be taking her time." He paused, mused, "I wonder if it's because she's pregnant."

He didn't sound enthused by the thought, as he always did when it was mentioned in reference to Sansa. Margaery almost reassured him that he had nothing to worry about, given the state of Cersei's marriage according to her grandmother, but found her thoughts drifting in another direction, instead.

Cersei had been the one to write to her son, urging him to look into the laws surrounding Sansa being able to give up Casterly Rock in her husband's name. Margaery did not know if it was out of sheer pettiness at the thought of her dwarven brother inheriting that land, or to reestablish her own strength throughout the realm, but Cersei was, as usual, a persistent thorn in Margaery's side.

And, of course, Joffrey had been all too eager to do as his mother asked, in this instance; anything to cut down the Imp.

She remembered her talk with Sansa, the decision Margaery wished didn't have to be thrust upon her but which Sansa seemed to be resolutely avoiding.

That avoidance seemed to have crept into their interactions, as well. Margaery knew that Joffrey was growing impatient with Sansa's lack of an answer, and she had tried to push the other girl because of this, but she knew that Sansa didn't appreciate it.

Margaery wasn't even certain if Sansa had noticed the distance which had grown between them of late, in her current distress, and not just because Sansa was refusing to make a decision that Margaery wished she did not have to. Margaery had invited Sansa to sew with her and Elinor and Alla, the two of Margaery's ladies whom she thought Sansa was the most comfortable around, and had felt as if she were sewing with Cersei Lannister, instead, for all the talking that was actually done.

That had been the first time she had noticed there was something...off about the other girl, and now Margaery couldn't help but notice it in their every interaction.

The way Sansa stood slightly more apart from her, when they walked together, or how stilted their conversations had become of late. The fact that she hardly ate more than two bites of food in Margaery's presence, when Margaery used to be able to coax her into at least half of a meal.

She missed the Sansa of before, even if she had been glad enough to give her up to the Dornish at the time.

Margaery blinked, realized that Joffrey was waiting for a response. She couldn't bring her eyes off Lord Tywin's body, couldn't get the stench of it out of her nostrils long enough to formulate that response.

Margaery smiled. "That is good news, my love. It must mean that the fight against the Iron Islands is going well."

Joffrey shrugged, though his expression turned dark. "It had better be. They've gone long enough. I can't afford to have so many commanders off on the other side of Westeros because a couple of sea pirates think this is a good time to rebel."

Margaery snorted, reached out and took Joffrey's hand in her own. He stared down at their entwined fingers, as he always did when Margaery initiated some sort of intimacy between them, as if the very act confused him, and Margaery thought it might have been sweet if he wasn't a madman.

"I'm certain that between my brother and your uncle, my love, they'll have routed the lot of these sea pirates," she told him, and Joffrey seemed relieved by her reassurances, even if they were empty platitudes.

Joffrey nodded, and then reached up to cover his nose with the sleeve of his left arm, gesturing for one of the septons.

The man came forward, leaving behind his sacred rituals, and gave Joffrey a shallow bow. "Your Grace."

Joffrey gestured toward the body. "I've seen enough. It will be buried in the Sept once you are done preparing it, whether or not my uncle and mother have arrived in King's Landing. With all of the usual expenses met, but nothing ostentatious." He eyed his grandfather's corpse. "My grandfather was not an ostentatious man, after all."

Margaery almost snorted as she thought of the time Lord Tywin had ridden into the throne room on a horse, but kept silent.

The septon looked hesitant at the King's words, opened his mouth as if to protest them for a moment, before his lips pressed shut. "As Your Grace wishes, but it is customary for all of the living family to view the body before-"

Joffrey rounded on the man. "Is that a law of the Faith?" he demanded, in a voice that implied that if it was, he wasn't going to abide by it, anyway.

The septon pulled back, seemed to realize just which battles to lose. "No, Your Grace. I shall oversee the preparations, and inform the High Septon of your decision."

Joffrey nodded. "Good. And," he glanced over the body dispassionately, "do something about the smell."

A pause. Margaery had a feeling that the man was going to argue, but he finally dipped into another bow. "Yes, Your Grace."


	131. SANSA

There was no talk of making heirs for Casterly Rock today. No talk of young men that Margaery could find who wouldn't mind sleeping with Sansa and keeping their mouths shut about it, nothing about what Joffrey might do to her if he was but given the chance.

Just Margaery, walking at Sansa's side for a while in the gardens, Sansa lost in thought so deeply that she hardly noticed the other girl's growing boredom until Margaery was handing her a red rose and brushing the hair out of Sansa's eyes.

Sansa flushed, taking the rose and pretending not to notice the way that, just up the path, Elinor pretended not to notice their actions.

"Sansa," Margaery said, voice rather melodious in the warm sun, "Have you been listening to anything I've said since we finished tea?"

Sansa flushed crimson now, though for another reason. "I..." she licked her lips, noticed the way that Margaery's eyes were drawn to the action. "I'm sorry," she said finally. "I..."

The truth was, she hadn't been able to concentrate on much of anything since her throat had been cut open, not on Margaery's silver tongue, nor on why she should keep Casterly Rock, nor on the very real danger she remained in.

It was if Sansa's mind had been reduced to white noise since her return, as if Ellaria had sliced at her head instead of her throat, with only the occasional topic finding its way in regardless of the noise.

Sansa welcomed the feeling, but she could see that, from the look of concern on Margaery's face, the other girl did not.

"I have an idea," Margaery said, glancing over at Elinor, who gave her a discreet nod. "Why don't we...go back to my chambers and..." her voice was unnecessarily loud, but Sansa supposed that was for the other scores of people in the garden, all here to stare at the girl who would never escape the Lannisters. "Look at dresses?"

Sansa very much doubted that was what Margaery had in mind for an activity, and she almost turned the other girl down, but then she saw the look of hope in Margaery's eyes, and sighed.

"I...that sounds like a lovely idea," she lied, and Margaery beamed at her, linking her arm through Sansa's once more and practically dragging her from the gardens, Elinor and Loras not far behind them.

Of course, once they reached the Maidenvault Elinor made herself scarce, and Loras closed the door to Margaery's chambers behind them. Sansa couldn't really remember why she had been so bothered by his presence there in the past, before Dorne.

Of course someone needed to protect Margaery at all times, especially when she was fucking someone who wasn't her husband.

Margaery didn't give her much time to dwell on that, reaching out and running her fingers down Sansa's front, playing with the ties of her rather faded gown. Sansa reached up to begin untying it, but Margaery batted her hands away.

"I did say we were going to look at dresses, didn't I?" Margaery teased, and Sansa tried to smile back at her as Margaery's hands roamed the gown as if Sansa was not wearing it, pressing down her stomach and fluttering at the skirts, before pulling them up around Sansa's waist and pushing her toward the bed in one fluid motion.

Sansa gasped a little as the gown bunched up around her hips, as Margaery climbed up onto the bed behind her and straddled the younger girl, their hips brushing together and then apart as Margaery made short work of the rest of her gown, in between bouts of shoving her tongue down Sansa's throat with a desperation Sansa doubted she ever showed Joffrey, even in act.

Sansa leaned up into the kisses, reached around Margaery to divest the other girl of her gown, ran her hands up and down Margaery's ribs in feather light touches before Margaery's kisses grew more adventurous, taking her mouth and then her chin, her ear.

Sansa balked a little as Margaery's lips brushed against her scar on their way down her throat, and she pulled back, saw the look of confusion on Margaery's face and swallowed hard.

"You don't..." Sansa bit her lip. "You don't think it's ugly, do you?"

Margaery blinked at her in confusion, and then made a quiet noise of distress, bending down and kissing Sansa's lips. "Oh, Sansa..."

"No," Sansa sat up abruptly, their lovemaking forgotten. "I'm serious. Is it?" she reached up, fingers unconsciously twitching away from the scar marring her neck even as she tried to touch it.

Margaery's cheek twitched, and she sighed, reaching out to trace her own fingers along the scar. Sansa stiffened at the touch, as if Margaery's touch should burn at her throat in the same way that Ellaria's knife had, but nothing happened.

She was only hyper aware of the feeling of soft finger pads against the hardened, raised skin, still a little numb (deadened, one of the maesters had said) these days, but capable of feeling that touch nonetheless.

Margaery's face remained impassive as her fingers moved from where Ellaria had first begun cutting, the scar lightest there, just below Sansa's right ear, down the curved line that stretched to the hollow of Sansa's throat, where the cut had reached deepest, and up to where it had tapered off just beyond that.

It had felt so much worse, at the time. Like Ellaria was slicing her whole head off, decapitating her as the Lannisters had decapitated her father but, beyond the gruesome sight it presented in the mirror, Sansa could acknowledge that the scar was not as large as she had feared it would be. Not as large as her mother's had no doubt been.

Finally, Margaery spoke. "I don't think it's ugly," she said, voice quiet, serious, as Sansa had asked her to be. "It's beautiful."

Sansa scoffed, tried to pull away, but Margaery held her still, moved, catlike as she pressed her lips to Sansa's scar, where it sat in the hollow of her throat.

Sansa sucked in a breath, felt tears stinging at the corners of her eyes at the thought of Margaery touching her like that, there, after what this scar had almost meant for Sansa. "Margaery..."

Margaery's kisses moved up, gently sucking until Sansa squirmed, gasped a little at the sensation she had not thought to feel there again.

She didn't understand why Margaery was forcing herself to do this. Didn't understand why, as she was starting to suspect but couldn't quite believe, Margaery found that part of her, that ridged, deadened part, arousing enough to kiss like tha-

Her hips jerked a little as Margaery's tongue flicked out of her mouth, licking along the length of Sansa's scar in a slow, torturous rhythm.

"Margaery," she murmured again, hands reaching out and tangling in the shoulders of Margaery's gown, but the other girl ignored her, pressing more incessant kisses to Sansa's scar, up and down the thick line of it, sucking at it until Sansa was certain that she wouldn't be able to pass off the bruises as a mere inflammation when Shae checked on her neck later.

And Sansa definitely didn't want to think about Shae while Margaery was doing that to her neck.

"Margaery, wh-"

Margaery's free hands reached down, tracing along Sansa's chest, then down her naked stomach, to the tuft of red hair between her thighs, but Sansa hardly noticed, too entranced by the odd feeling of Margaery sucking at her neck with such intensity, and yet somehow remembering to be gentle, lest she pull apart the patient stitches of the maesters.

It shouldn't have been as exciting as it was, with that thought as a risk.

Sansa really needed to stop thinking while Margaery did this.

A moment later, when Margaery's fingers started petting at the lids of her womanhood, Sansa did.

Margaery moved a little, putting herself on top of Sansa once more and pushing the other girl down into the bed sheets, and Sansa went, falling pliable onto the sheets and closing her eyes as Margaery sucked at that place just below her ear once more.

It was when Margaery's lips wrapped around a vein on Sansa's neck, teeth grazing it lightly as her fingers dipped between Sansa's folds that Sansa lost all thought completely, her body spasming from the force of her orgasm around Margaery's fingers, and Margaery's lips stubbornly remaining attached to Sansa's neck.

When Sansa could think once more, her thoughts muddled and foggy all the same, Margaery had pulled herself away from Sansa's throat, was laying her head on Sansa's chest.

"Beautiful," she whispered again, before Sansa could say a word, and Sansa's eyes felt glassy, though she didn't feel close to crying, this time.

"I know you don't believe that," Margaery continued, still facing away from Sansa, one hand still tangling in Sansa's pubic hair, "And I don't know that I will ever be able to convince you, but it's true. It's beautiful, because it's a part of you now."

Sansa felt a flush creep from her face down to her neck far too quickly. Had Margaery always been this poetic? She seemed to remember such times, but that had been before, when the Tyrells wanted to marry Willas to Sansa. "Margaery..."

Margaery sat up a little, kissed her lips. "Just...don't try to think about it too hard, Sansa. That's all I ask. I know how you do that. Think about things until they lose their shine to you, or gain it because you want them to so badly. So just...know that it's beautiful, all right?"

Sansa sniffed a little. "I...All right," she whispered hoarsely, and Margaery beamed at her, kissed her again, wetly this time.

"Now," Margaery said playfully, "Where were we?"

Sansa stared at her unintelligibly. "I..."

"Oh yes," Margaery murmured. "I believe this was the part where I was going to eat your cunny until you screamed into my pillow."

Sansa felt a spark of lust low in her belly at the words, wasn't even certain how that was possible, so quickly after the last.


	132. MARGAERY

Joffrey was thumping his fingers against the table.

It had not bothered Margaery at first. The sound had been a slightly unpleasant tic at the back of her ear when it started, alluding to Joffrey's boredom as the members of the Small Council droned on about the prospective duties of the Crown to their king now that Lord Tywin was not around to drone on to instead.

There were the preparations for Lord Tywin's burial to attend to, talk of the fact that Stannis Baratheon seemed to be camped outside of Winterfell with no indication that he planned to attack it any time soon, had instead sent a delegation to the Wall for unknown purposes, and the Iron Bank was still refusing to finance the King as long as the Crown could not pay off its debts.

And then the tapping had grown more insistent, those fingers tapping faster, then almost desperately, the sound growing with the increase of speed, and Margaery could feel a migraine starting at the back of her head.

The other members of the Small Council, however, seemed to have the good sense to sit at the opposite end of the table than their king, rather than practically in his lap, and it clearly was not having the same effect on them. Lord Varys, where he sat closest to them out of everyone, merely looked amused.

She was beginning to wonder if Lord Varys had become something other than human, when his manhood had been stolen from him. She had been Joffrey's queen for only a short time in comparison to this man's work in King's Landing, and already she was exhausted to the bone, as if she had aged a hundred years in a few months.

At the end of the table, her father took over the droning commentary without it breaking stride once the Grandmaester had finished, and Margaery's eyes narrowed. She was beginning to wonder if the Small Council had allied together to bore Joffrey to death, or at least into finding himself a new Hand of the King.

He'd been all too silent on that issue, the few times it had been broached. Margaery knew that he had both hated and feared his grandfather, and she wondered if Joffrey planned on naming another Hand of the King at all, rather than simply thinking he could take over that responsibility himself.

She almost shuddered at the thought, and then remembered where she was and perked up a little. The reminder came not a moment too soon; she felt Joffrey's fingers ghost against her thigh beneath the table, and she pasted on a smile, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.

Joffrey looked as bored as before, save for the light flash of pleasure in his eyes, and Margaery was a little relieved that she could still inspire that in him.

She knew that he hadn't been fucking anyone else in the weeks since Lord Tywin had imposed his rules that Joffrey not be allowed to fuck Margaery, after what had happened to Sansa, even if Joffrey had been managing to fuck Margaery a little on the sly. It was just nice to know that he still wanted her as much as she wanted his crown.

"And, of course, there is the matter of the Crown's policy of dealing with foreign merchants needing to be readdressed as long as we are at war with Dorne, as well as-"

"Something needs to be done about that dragon girl across the sea," Joffrey interrupted suddenly, leaning forward in his seat and looking engaged for the first time since the Small Council session had begun. Speaking for the first time since the Small Council session had begun, his finger tapping forgotten in lieu of this sudden obsessive thought. "My lord grandfather was a shrewd man, but there were some things his eye did not extend far enough to." He rounded on Varys. "You're the Master of Whispers, or whatever it is they call you and those little street urchins you employ. What news of the girl and her dragons?"

Varys cleared his throat, glanced at Lord Mace, who had the grace to look completely blank at the interruption, before speaking. "Your Grace, perhaps the matter of the Martells carries more importance-"

"What news?" Joffrey demanded.

Lord Varys nodded. He looked bored for the first time since the Small Council meeting had begun. "The Targaryen girl is rumored to have three fully grown dragons now, Your Grace-"

"I know that," Joffrey swept his hand at the man impatiently. "We should have done something about it long ago. And I know that she has an army of those eunuch warriors, because no man would follow a woman queen otherwise."

Margaery coughed lightly into her sleeve, but no one looked in her direction.

"And that she thinks my throne belongs to her because her mad father sat upon it for a time, and because she's likely as mad as he is," Joffrey continued, heedless. "But where is she now? And does she pose a threat to us?"

Lord Varys' eyes skitted to the other members of the Small Council, fell on Margaery for a long moment, before he spoke again. "The Targaryen girl has taken Mereen, and fights slavers in the East, according to my whisperers, Your Grace," he said. "She seems to have entrenched herself there, and lost sight of Westeros for the time being. I even hear that she seeks a marriage with one of the locals there, to secure her reign."

Joffrey's eyes flashed. "To have an heir, no doubt, as she failed in that regard with her barbarian of a first husband," he said, and Margaery swallowed as she felt Lord Varys' eyes turn to her, as the words Joffrey spoke felt more prophetic of her own situation than of some rumored Targaryen across the sea.

Margaery shivered, noticed Joffrey's eyes on her now, as well. "It's a bit chilly in here, my love," she pointed out, and Joffrey held still for a moment, shrugged.

"The moment we have finished with the Martells and the Greyjoys, I want that cunt across the Narrow Sea destroyed. Before she can have an heir, before she can raise her army of eunuchs and dragons against us. I don't care how it's done, but," Joffrey licked his lips. "I want her head."

Margaery tried not to be disturbed by the way his hand squeezed her thigh beneath the table as he said those words.

Lord Varys dipped his head. "I will endeavor to meet Your Grace's demands."

Joffrey sniffed. "That reminds me. Has my bitch of an aunt made up her mind about Casterly Rock yet?"

The table fell silent.

"Well?" Joffrey demanded.

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "I could ask her for you, my love," she murmured. "It has only been a couple of days, and she is notoriously unable to make up her mind, but I will put the pressure of the Queen on her."

Joffrey nodded. "Why is it that my wife appears to be the only person here sensible enough to do as her king demands?" he spat at the table at large, then, "Get out, the lot of you."

The members of the Small Council sent each other unreadable looks, standing to their feet and bowing almost as one to their king, before making their exit and leaving Margaery and Joffrey alone in the room.

Margaery let out a breath of relief as the door shut behind them.

It was strange; she didn't enjoy sex with Joffrey, nor being alone with him for other purposes, as she suspected Sansa thought she must have, to be able to play him so well, but it was a relief to be alone with him rather than in front of so many people who could either see through her act or hate her for it.

When she was alone with Joffrey, she could simply be what he wanted her to be, and didn't have to worry about the perception she was putting out to others, as well.

She felt Joffrey's hand creeping down her thigh, looked at her husband with wide, lustful eyes and a lopsided smile.

"We haven't had the chance to try for an heir since before your lord grandfather's passing, my love," Margaery murmured knowingly, entwining his fingers in her own and pulling his hand toward her waist, her other hand reaching to pull up her skirts.

Joffrey gave her an impish smile. "Are you afraid you're out of practice, my queen?" he asked her, and Margaery smirked.

"No, Your Grace," she said, and heard his breath hitch in the next moment, "I'm simply ever so impatient."

Joffrey's mouth worked for a few moments, opening and closing in silence, and then he glanced around the room once more, assessing.

"Can you make it back to my chambers, my lady?" he asked, voice a low drawl.

Margaery's smirk widened into a smile, and her hips jerked upward invitingly. "I don't think so. It's been..." she closed her eyes, let her breath out slowly, and heard his breath hitching some more as a finger moved inside of her. "So long, my love."

And that was really all of the invitation Joffrey needed to defile the Small Council table for good in Margaery's mind.

At least, she thought in some amusement as he spilled inside of her, he would never get bored during another Small Council meeting again, for she was going to make certain that he continued going to them as faithfully as ever even if Cersei Lannister deigned to return to King's Landing.


	133. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thought I'd get something out before tomorrow.

Coming to Margaery's chambers had been an impulsive decision, and Sansa stood outside the door to her private chambers for a few awkward moments, gathering up her wits before knocking.

She knew that Margaery had been caught up in quite a few affairs of state, not to mention keeping Joffrey occupied, since Lord Tywin's death, but they had found time for these things before, and Sansa wanted to find time for them now.

It seemed like the only time she could escape the white noise in her head was when she found herself in Margaery's bed, when Margaery pulled her out of it with sweet kisses and soft bites. When Margaery made her scream.

Sansa flushed even thinking about their last bout of lovemaking, of how Margaery had practically made her come from sucking on her scarred neck alone.

There wasn't a chance to think about the life she'd almost had, safe in Dorne, when Margaery was pulling prayers from her mouth.

The door to Margaery's chambers opened abruptly, and Lady Elinor, arms full of bundles of sheets, blinked in surprise to see Sansa on the other side of it.

"Lady Sansa," she didn't sound annoyed, and Sansa felt a sharp spark of relief at that, even if she couldn't say why.

"Lady Elinor," she greeted, and then nodded to the chambers within. "I know that Margaery is at a meeting of the Small Council with Joffrey, but I was wondering..." she blushed a little more, and Elinor's eyes widened, though she looked more amused than anything.

It was the first time the two of them had interacted since Margaery had stopped seeing Elinor for Sansa, and Sansa was all too keenly aware of that fact as she struggled with what words were appropriate when asking to be let into Margaery's bedchambers in order to make love to her when she returned.

Elinor didn't seem to notice, pushing the door open further with her hip in invitation, and Sansa stepped nimbly around her and into the room.

"She told me she would be out not long from now when she left this morning," Elinor told her, with a cheeky smile. "If you wanted to get ready for her." And that blush refused to die now that it was here.

Sansa nodded jerkily, and then realized what Elinor was saying, felt too high spots of crimson on her cheeks as she found herself unable to meet the other girl's eyes completely.

Elinor seemed to take pity on her, then, even if her eyes still sparked with amusement. "There's some iced tea on the table for her, though you can help yourself, and there should be some fruit there as well. Margaery always has a voracious appetite, when those meetings are over."

Sansa nodded again, and, after a pregnant pause, Elinor's lips twitched. "I'll just be sending these down to be washed," she told Sansa. "I'm quite certain I should take some time of it."

And then the door closed behind her, leaving Sansa in the room alone.

She almost sighed with relief once the other girl was gone, but didn't quite dare. She wasn't entirely certain why Elinor was happy enough at the prospect of leaving her alone with Margaery, but she found it passing strange, and didn't much want to contemplate the other girl's motives, anyway.

It only stingingly reminded her of the fact that Elinor had grown up at Margaery's side, had grown up in the other girl's bed, according to Margaery, and that the two of them shared that bond even here while Sansa only shared with Margaery a bond of misery caused by Joffrey.

Glancing around, eager to be rid of such thoughts, Sansa noticed _that_ book still on the shelf, the one it had so confused her to see earlier, Sansa moved over to the sofa, pouring herself some of the iced tea into a cup and taking a small drink.

The white noise seemed to recede, though only barely.

Elinor had been right, though, about Margaery not being much longer. Not a few moments later, the door to Margaery's chambers flew open, and Margaery, accompanied by a gaggle of her ladies, burst into the room.

Sansa's heart sank to see so many of them at once, but she hoped none of it showed on her face as she set down the iced tea and stood to her feet, alerting them to her presence.

Margaery froze when she saw Sansa, and then smiled. Her smile was genuine, but looked rather tired nonetheless. "Sansa," she said, "I didn't know you were in here."

Sansa felt suddenly foolish, though she was relieved that at least she had not taken Elinor's advice, to get ready, and found herself naked and half wet when all of these flowers had burst into the room.

Elinor was not among the ladies bustling around the room, Sansa noticed; no doubt the other girl was still taking her time about the laundry delivery, though clearly none of these other girls had been alerted to the plan of staying away. Sansa sagged a little at the thought, for that likely meant they had all been around Margaery, where she had just come from, while Sansa had been in here, waiting.

"Oh," Sansa said intelligently, and then cleared her throat. "I was just..." she trailed off, not certain how many of these girls knew what was going on between the two of them and all too aware of how dangerous that could be.

Margaery's eyes crinkled around the corners, but then she was swept up in the flurry of girls pulling her behind a divider, armed with another gown and several other accessories, and Sansa was left to stand awkwardly before the divider and pretend she did not know that body far more than any of the girls currently stripping and redressing it.

And then Margaery reappeared, a smile on her face as she clapped white kid gloves against one another, hair pulled back into an elaborate coif, tucked with silver clasps, to complement the black gown she was now wearing, as opposed to the lighter gown she had been wearing earlier.

Sansa licked her lips and felt heat pooling in her gut, just looking at it.

She hardly noticed when Margaery's ladies filtered discreetly from the room, only noticed after blinking once that they were all gone, the door shut behind them with only the sound of giggles in their wake and the iced tea taken away as well, leaving Margaery and Sansa to their own devices.

Sansa was moving forward before she even realized what her feet were doing, stopping in front of Margaery and drinking in the sight of her. She looked different, Sansa reflected, than she had before Sansa's failed escape to Dorne, even if it was only in Sansa's mind that she was so. Brighter, somehow, and Sansa couldn't tell if that was good or bad, but she enjoyed drinking it in nonetheless.

Margaery groaned a little then, reaching a hand up to her forehead and turning slightly away from Sansa. The moment dead, and Sansa bit back a sigh before her brows knit in concern. That feeling in her stomach that had just a moment ago been lust now turned to dread. "Are you all right?"

"No, I'm fine. It's just a bit of a headache," Margaery said, rubbing at her temples and turning slightly away from Sansa. "Joffrey can be such a bother, sometimes."

Sansa reached out, trailing her fingers down Margaery's front teasingly, her own cunny beginning to ache at the need sweeping through her once more. "I can think of something that might take your mind off of him," she proposed, and blinked when Margaery did not immediately respond, as she normally would.

"Gods, between the two of you, I'll grow sick of sex altogether," Margaery said with a little huff of laughter, and Sansa blinked at her, not much liking the comparison between herself and Joffrey.

She leaned forward, breathing hot against Margaery's neck. "I'm sure I can make a better off than him, though," she murmured, attempting to sound seductive but rather more worried that she was only sounding needy.

"I...I can't, this afternoon," Margaery said, not meeting Sansa's eyes as she gently pushed Sansa's roaming hands away. "Joffrey, he...I don't think I should leave him to his own devices for very long. We have to meet with some nobles coming from the Westerlands to pay homage to Lord Tywin's death, and..." she trailed off, looking at Sansa with wide eyes.

Sansa swallowed, teeth clicking shut. "Right."

Margaery reached a hand out toward her. "Sansa..."

"It's fine," Sansa told her, smiling too brightly. "We'll find some time later. Tomorrow, perhaps."

Margaery sighed. "Joffrey wants to go hunting tomorrow, and you know how he is when he hunts."

It was the sort of excursion which took the whole day, Sansa knew, and, when he returned, had his blood pumping in the sort of way that caused the whole Keep to hear Margaery's screams from the King's bedchambers, and she bit back another sigh.

"I can...feign illness, tomorrow, and come to see you after he's gone?" Margaery said, her tone almost hopeful, and something in Sansa rebelled at the sound.

"No," she refused, and sent Margaery a smile that she was almost certain the other girl would call her out on. Margaery did not. "It will be fine, and you shouldn't endanger yourself by pulling away from him. I'll go to the libraries tomorrow."

She could find a story that didn't fit into the realm of song that she had so adored as a child, and perhaps it would wake her up, she thought idly.

Some of what she was feeling must have shown on her face, or else Margaery simply knew her enough by now to understand it, and wasn't that a strange feeling, when no one else in King's Landing seemed to bother, besides Shae, because Margaery moved closer, brushed her thumb over Sansa's lips.

"If you need someone to read with, most of my ladies are probably staying behind tomorrow. Evidently, they found some sort of...sex book in the libraries that has piqued their interest," she suggested, tone conciliatory, and Sansa could not withhold a snort.

"Thanks," she said, rather stiffly, and Margaery's face fell, "but I don't need someone's hand to hold all of the time."

Margaery's mouth opened and closed, eyes wide. "Sansa, I didn't mean..."

Sansa reached out, clasping both of Margaery's hands in her own. "I'll be fine," she told the other girl. "And if I'm not, I'll go and find one of your ladies, like you said."

Margaery gave her a long look, and then moved forward, kissing Sansa lightly on the lips. "I have to go," she murmured apologetically, and then turned and swept from the room, leaving Sansa standing alone in the Maidenvault.

Sansa sighed, reaching up and rubbing at her red cheeks, the weight of the world falling on her shoulders now that Margaery was gone. And it felt like snow, traveling through her mind, turning everything else to white.


	134. MARGAERY

Margaery was still bothered by her interaction with Sansa when she woke the next morning, one arm around Joffrey's waist and the other clutching to the bed sheets beneath them. The light was streaming in through the open window of Joffrey's chambers, and she blinked a little as the brightness assaulted her, pulling slightly away from her husband and cursing inwardly at his waking groan.

She'd known at the time that Sansa would be hurt by Margaery brushing her off like that, and yet, Margaery truly hadn't been up for anything at that time, not by the time Joffrey was finished fucking her over the Small Council table.

She knew that it was hard, for Sansa to "share" her with Joffrey, even if the other girl didn't admit it often.

But she wished that Sansa would realize that it was just as difficult for Margaery to move between two people, two relationships which expected so much of her, albeit in different ways.

Elinor had been easy, because Elinor expected nothing of her at all. But, of course, Elinor was gone now.

Joffrey squeezed her arm as he sat up, naked as the day he was born and reaching hastily for his red outer robe, where it hung on one of their bedposts. She had noticed that, while he liked to talk up his prowess to anyone within hearing distance, and certainly loved to make her scream in the bedchamber as often as possible (and certainly never noticed how often she forced one out for him), he was remarkably shy about his modesty.

He shrugged into his robe, not meeting Margaery's eyes until he had done so and then climbing to his feet and rubbing at his bare stomach.

"Are you hungry, my lady?" he asked her, as Margaery sat up, sheets clutched around her breast as she yawned and ran a hand through her hair, hopelessly tangled from the night before.

Unlike Sansa, Joffrey had no interest in hearing excuses, when he wished to take her, and the hunt always put him in the taking mood, both before and after.

Margaery squinted up at her husband with hooded eyes. "Famished, my love," she panted, wondering if her expression was properly adoring. Joffrey liked that look. He especially liked it when she gave it to him after he'd done something obscene.

Joffrey squirmed a little, where he stood, and then moved through the room, finding something more suitable to wear before the servants, and Margaery sighed, shifting and placing her feet flat on the bedroom floor as she rolled her neck.

The servants arrived not long after, heralded by the King opening the door and yelling boisterously for them, and they pulled Margaery into a separate room, per her requests, the better to keep from hearing Joffrey whine and complain to the servants like a child as they dressed him, dressing her in the hunting gown she would be putting to use later in the day.

She met her husband in the small dining area allotted for the King's private breakfasts some minutes later, watched as he stood nervously, as if they were still only courting, when she entered the room, and sat only after a servant had pushed her chair in.

Joffrey could be disturbingly charming in some ways, even when he wasn't pretending.

The servants began setting out their meal, and Margaery's stomach growled a little at the sight of all of it. She wondered if they were going to that hunting cabin in the Kingswood for a picnic again, or if the only food they would be bringing on the hunt would be a small amount of snacks.

She was beginning to suspect the latter.

And Sansa's face, when she had told the other girl that they wouldn't be able to spend time together today, still would not leave her mind. She was certain she could find a way to make it up to Sansa, but she'd been forced to spend days away from Sansa before, and the other girl had never looked so crestfallen by it.

That thought was what had her knocking over the glass bowl in a servant's hands as he moved to set it in front of her, the steaming gruel within spilling out in a wet plop onto the floor moments before the glass shattered against stone.

Margaery's eyes flitted up and caught the terror in the old man's eyes as he stared from her to the bowl.

"Ah, that was my fault," Margaery murmured, almost hearing the anger growing from the other side of the table. "Lost in thought."

The servant looked relieved at her save, gave her a small, short bow and a half smile that, from across the table, Joffrey was unable to see.

"Yes, of course, it was my queen's fault that you were clumsy enough to drop her breakfast," Joffrey snorted, and Margaery felt another migraine coming on behind her eyes as she closed them for a moment, turned to her husband with a small smile.

"It's nothing, my love, truly-" she began, but Joffrey would have none of that.

He'd been in a strange mood all morning, angry in a way that he wasn't normally on the day of a hunt, and it had left Margaery feeling as though she were walking on shards of glass around him already.

Perhaps he was bored, without Lord Tywin around to keep him in line.

She glanced down at the floor, wondered how long it would take the servants to clean up the mess as the little pieces of broken glass looked easy enough to cut her nearly bare feet on.

"Apologize to my queen," Joffrey snapped at the man, and the servant dropped to his knees before Margaery instantly; Margaery felt a pang of sympathy as she realized that, while most of the people in King's Landing could avoid the King's madness at the best of times, his servants would always know his true nature.

"My deepest apologies, Your Grace," he murmured. "I was...clumsy, and I shall fetch you another immediately," he snapped his fingers as he spoke to one of the serving girls standing trembling in the corner of the room, and she obediently hurried from the room to carry out her task.

Margaery forced herself to smile down at the poor man. "It's all right," she told him, and then, with a look at Joffrey, "as long as this food is as good as the last. As I said, it was likely my fault anyway."

Joffrey snorted. "Do you think that's enough?" he snapped.

The man swallowed thickly. "Your Grace-"

"My love," Margaery started.

Joffrey ignored her. "My queen may be a kind and generous woman, but even she will not abide this! You've dropped glass all over the floor. If she stands and is injured for it," his last words came out as a snarl, "you will pay with your life."

The man licked his lips, stood to his feet. "I will attend to it before Her Grace need stand, Your Grace, and-"

"You fucking idiot!" Joffrey shouted at the servant, as the man ordered the other servants to help him pick up the pieces. "Get on your knees and do it yourself."

"Forgive me, Your Grace..."

Joffrey stood to his feet, towering over the other man, where he knelt on the floor. "Forgive you?" he repeated, sounding incredulous, and Margaery's cheek twitched as she kept it from wincing when Joffrey kicked the other man in the side for his troubles. "Forgive you? Who are you to ask such a thing of me? I am the King!"

The servant cowered, abandoning his attempt to pick up the pieces of broken glass in order to shield his face. "Forgive me, Your Grace, I mean, my apologies-"

Margaery did wince that time, because Joffrey wasn't looking and she heard the loud crunch of snapped ribs when Joffrey kicked the fool again.

"I don't suppose you have any way of paying for the mess you've made?" Joffrey asked, smirking nastily down at the man, watching as he feebly shook his head. "No, I didn't think so. That bowl was probably worth more than you made in an entire year's wages." He laughed at the very thought. "And, however much you beg for my forgiveness, your prayers won't bring it back."

The man on the floor cried out as Joffrey landed another particularly hard strike to his midsection.

And Margaery wanted to speak out, to tell her husband that this was enough, that it was all right, the serving girl had already returned with another bowl, but she couldn't bring herself to open her mouth, the words lying thickly at the back of her throat.

Because that wasn't her place, as the King's wife. There were some things that Margaery knew she could get away with, and most that she could not. Tywin Lannister was dead, and there would be no one to oppose her husband now.

"Guards!" Joffrey screeched above the man's feeble cries, and two gold cloaks hurried into the room, bowed before the King before glancing over the damage. Ser Meryn Trant was quick behind them.

"I want to go for a hunt," Joffrey announced, not looking up from where he stood over the prone servant. "Get the dogs ready. This man here-" he nudged the servant with the toe of his boot. "What's your name?"

"I-Herdal, Your Grace," the man whimpered, voice shaking in the tense silence of the room.

Joffrey grinned. "Give Herdal here a head start. That shall be my punishment to him, for being such a clumsy fool, and destroying something which belonged to the King." He smirked at Margaery, and she schooled her face just in time to hide the horror she felt at her husband's words. "Then, maybe, we can still find some pheasant. Would you like that, my love?"

Margaery's lips twisted into a smile that didn't seem to belong to her face. "As long as we don't eat foolish Herdal here, my love," she murmured, and Joffrey guffawed at the words, gestured for the serving girl who had brought the bowl of steaming oats into the room.

The girl moved forward, placing it before Margaery, and Margaery was good enough to pretend not to notice how badly the servant's hands were shaking as she picked up her spoon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How about that premiere, guys?


	135. MARGAERY

The hunting trip had gone just as badly as Margaery had expected it to, she thought, as she burst into her rooms in the Maidenvault and began stripping off her leather gloves and riding habit.

Her ladies flocked around her, silent as they worked; they seemed to recognize the darkness that had followed her through the door.

Margaery reached up, rubbing at her temples again as Alla stripped her out of the corset she was wearing, one more designed toward comfort while riding than beauty, and reached for a replacement.

The servant, Herdal, had been forced to run alongside the dogs, running for his life through the Kingswood as Joffrey's arrows chased after him. He hadn't died, of course; Joffrey could be a monster about many things, but sometimes, Margaery had noticed, he seemed to draw a line.

Herdal had been sent away with only what he was wearing on his back, exiled from the Keep as "the worst servant" Joffrey'd ever seen, no matter how many times he begged the King to be merciful, because any job in the palace was better than living on the streets when one had two children to feed.

Joffrey was not known for his mercy, however, and Herdal seemed to realize that just in time to save his own hide, running off into the woods.

Hunting pheasant and deer, after that, had seemed so easy. Margaery had even been the one to bring down the deer that would tomorrow grace their supper table. Joffrey had looked as proud as she imagined he would on the day she brought his child into the world.

Margaery's hands tremored at her sides, and she glanced down at them, felt suddenly as if all of the air had been sucked from her lungs.

"Dammit, are you trying to strangle me to death?" Margaery snapped, when, behind her Alla began tightening the drawstrings of her corset.

Alla's breath stuttered; she was young, Margaery reminded herself, annoyed at her own behavior, and had probably never been shouted at by her own parents, the way they had raised her.

"Sorry," she murmured, but Alla only sniffed, and a moment later Margaery heard Elinor murmuring to the younger girl to go and fetch some iced tea from the kitchens.

Margaery felt a pang of guilt as the girl slipped out of the room, leaving the rest of Margaery's ladies to dress her in silence. She would just as soon have sent them all away, as well, and finished dressing herself alone.

Elinor moved behind Margaery to finish with her corset, and then a gown was being tossed over her head; the thing shimmered beautifully in the light, all silk and little else to it, highlighting the corset beneath rather purposefully.

Joffrey would love it.

"Come, my lady," Elinor practically dragged her over to the vanity in the corner of the room, plopping Margaery down before it and picking up a brush the moment she was dressed. "Almost done."

As if Margaery was a small child in need of reassurance to be patient while others waited on her.

"Are you all right?" Elinor asked gently, as she ran a brush through Margaery's hair. Beside her, Megga was silent, eyes wide from what Margaery could see of them in the mirror as she picked through a few clasps for Margaery's hair to wear to supper.

A supper that she would have to share with Joffrey, while he bragged about all of his successes during the hunt.

Margaery's temples throbbed again. She glanced down at her hands; saw the way that they were trembling where they clasped whitely at each other in her lap.

"Fine," she gritted out, ignoring the look that Elinor and Megga sent one another above her head.

But then Alla was returning with the iced tea, her face whiter than usual as she came back into the room, and Margaery sighed, stood to her feet, smoothing down the gown she wore.

Alla placed the silver platter down on Margaery's day table as Margaery took a seat on the sofa, and Margaery sighed again when she saw the way the younger girl's hands were trembling, far worse than her own.

"Come here, Alla," she murmured, and Alla practically tumbled unto the sofa beside Margaery, wrapping her arms around Margaery in a stranglehold that was at least twice as tight as the corset had been.

Margaery sighed, running her fingers through the girl's baby soft blonde hair. She was about to open her mouth to apologize when Alla surprised her by speaking first, lifting her head to meet Margaery's eyes.

"Is he really so horrible?" she whispered hoarsely, and Margaery found she couldn't meet the other girl's eyes when she answered that question. She glanced away, fixed her eyes on the pitcher of iced tea sitting on the table when she answered.

"He isn't so bad," she murmured. "He was at first, but not so any more."

Alla only sniffed at that, and Margaery looked up, bit the inside of her cheek at the look Elinor was sending her way, from across the table. The other girl, however, didn't call her out on the lie, only leaned forward to pour them all some tea.

"But everything that is going on now, with Lord Tywin's death and the instability it has brought with Dorne," Margaery continued in that soft voice, "We must all be very brave, eh?"

Alla nodded, sat up a little and wiped at her face. "Yes, of course. You don't have to...you don't have to rally me, Marg. I'm sorry."

Margaery smiled, chucking her chin. "I'll keep that in mind for next time." She picked up one of the glasses, raising it to her mouth and taking a sip of the sweet tea, then another.

"Have any of you seen Lady Sansa today?" she asked as they drank with her, and Margaery was a little disappointed to see all of her ladies shake their heads.

She had known it was unlikely to happen, even when she had suggested spending time with her ladies to Sansa, but still. She wished that Sansa would see that she needn't be so alone here, that there were others besides Shae and Margaery whom she could attempt to trust.

And while Margaery knew that Reanna had not been a good example of that trust in Sansa's mind, even if Reanna had truly been working for Margaery the entire time, any of her ladies were better than the Lannister Sansa seemed to have tied herself to, even if Tyrion Lannister seemed kind enough to his little wife.

Once she finished her tea, Margaery stood to her feet. "Come, girls," she said. "We're going to the library. I need a small reprieve, before I'm forced into Joffrey's company once more."

The girls giggled at that, and then Margaery was leading them down to the library, ignoring Loras where he walked behind them, silent and as stony as Margaery felt on the inside, having witnessed the entire hunt himself.

It had been Loras who tried to wipe the blood out of Margaery's hunting dress before they rode back, of course, looking just as angry as if he had been wiping Margaery's own blood off of it rather than that deer's.

When they reached the library, Margaery's ladies pouring into it before her, Margaery looked around immediately for Sansa, ignoring her ladies as they poured around a book that Megga claimed to have found in here the other day, a book that rather graphically displayed the art of lovemaking throughout Westeros, by some troubadour wanting to scandalize mothers.

"Sansa," Margaery burst out, relieved to see the other girl more than she'd expected to be, after the events of the morning, when she finally caught sight of her. "I was hoping I would find you here."

Sansa glanced up from where she sat on the window ledge, nose buried in a book, her face unreadable for the first time since Margaery had met the other girl. Margaery blinked at the old, leather bound cover, but didn't recognize the title.

She felt a spark of irritation, even if she was trying to be understanding of the disappointment Sansa must be feeling. Truly, she herself was disappointed that Sansa had not made it to Dorne as she'd wanted her to, but it wasn't as if Sansa had just spent her morning and afternoon watching things be killed.

Margaery gestured toward the other girls, now giggling rather immaturely; she couldn't help but think, even if she smiled fondly at their antics. "Would you like to join us?" she asked. "I don't have much time until I'm certain Joffrey will be sending for me again, but it might be amusing."

Another high pitched giggle. Sansa's book slapped shut in her lap, and she set it onto the window ledge, sliding off of it and sending Margaery's ladies a cursory glance.

"I...Shae, my lady, she's taking my lord husband's arrest rather hard," Sansa told her, and Margaery's heart sank a little at the half lie she thought she saw in the other girl's eyes. "One of the servants got her some news of him, and apparently he isn't faring well, in the Cells. I really should be with her. I was just taking a little break because she asked to be alone."

"Oh," Margaery said, and tried to hide the disappointment in her own voice. "Of course. I shouldn't have assumed..."

"I'll," Sansa swept her loose hair behind her ears. Margaery had noticed that she wore it down all the time now, as if she thought to cover her scar with it. "I can come and see you later."

She made it sound almost like an obligation, and Margaery felt a stirring of pride at the tone. "It's fine," she said, forcing a smile. "I understand. Go and be with Lady Shae. And let her know that she has my condolences."

Sansa gave her an odd look, as if judging Margaery's sincerity, before nodding and moving down the hall.

Margaery's eyes followed her silently as her hands continued to shake by her sides.


	136. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Homosexuality isn't a religious crime in the books, so we're going with that 'verse here, just so you don't get confused with what happened to Loras on the show. That said, warnings for period typical homophobia.

"Your Grace," the High Septon greeted as he moved forward at the King's demand, sweeping into a low bow before the King with his usual flair for showmanship.

Margaery drummed her fingers along her thigh, still not sure why the man was here at all and wondering why Joffrey had felt the need to summon half the court for it. She knew that her husband was not the religious type, and did not go to the Sept of Baelor unless it was for a funeral or a wedding, but it was rather crass to summon the gods' representation of the Seven in Westeros here, she couldn't help but think.

Not that it was the first time Joffrey had ever been crass, and Margaery did not delude herself to think that it would be the last.

She wondered if the High Septon had found himself in a spot of trouble again. The last scandal he had been involved in had rippled through King's Landing like wildfire, and she doubted that the King would be as understanding now as he was then.

Joffrey seemed to hold his officers to a much higher standard than he had ever held himself, after all.

"Is there anything that Your Grace wishes of me?" The High Septon asked when the silence in the throne room grew almost stifling, which in Margaery's opinion was just wishing for trouble.

"I hear that the sparrows still shout their lies about you, though they have quieted now," Joffrey said, tone almost conversational.

Margaery watched as a layer of sweat grew on the High Septon's forehead. "They are a vile and fickle bunch, Your Grace. Give them time, and they shall find a new target for their slander."

Joffrey nodded. "Yes, yes. But their words have given me something to think about," he said, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek.

For Joffrey, thinking was a dangerous pastime.

The poor man was almost shaking, now. "Your Grace?"

"Tell me, High Septon," Joffrey said, leaning back in his throne and steepling his fingers, "What is the punishment for sodomy, as dictated by the Holy Writ?"

Margaery jerked a little where she sat, bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood at the stupidity of giving herself away so easily to anyone watching, even as her eyes flicked of their own accord to where Loras stood, near the back of the throne room, one hand on the hilt of his sword, like any other member of the Kingsguard.

She had no idea why Joffrey was suddenly asking questions like this, but the pit in her stomach slowly rose up her throat, even as blood flooded into her mouth.

The High Septon hesitated, eyes flitting from the King to his surprised counselors, even as they attempted to hide that surprise. Margaery had a terrible feeling that they did a better job than she. "There is no punishment for such fleshly lusts, Your Grace, as such," he proclaimed, and Joffrey stared at him.

"No punishment?" he repeated incredulously. "For a perversion which threatens to destroy the very civilization of our kingdom?"

The High Septon looked a little taken aback by the King's vehemence. "Certainly, there are passages within the Holy Writ," he began, "which condemn such fleshly gluttony, Your Grace. The sole purpose of a woman is to provide heirs for her husband, and the sole purpose of the fleshly pleasures to produce those heirs." A pause, and Margaery wondered if the man had noticed that Joffrey was beginning to grow bored. "But for those who indulge in fleshly lusts that have not to do with procreation, simply confessing their sins to the Mother for Mercy and atoning for them, which is often done through purifying themselves for many days, is sufficient in cleansing them before the Seven."

Joffrey stared at him. "And why is this not enforced?"

The High Septon looked bemused, glancing from Joffrey to the Small Council and then back again. "Your Grace?"

Margaery herself was a little bemused. She knew that Joffrey did not care a whit about the Faith unless they were giving him money, and she couldn't help but think that wherever this new fascination with the words of the Holy Writ came from, it heralded nothing good.

"If the Holy Writ demands such, then why does the Faith not enforce atonement for...sodomists?"

The High Septon blinked rapidly several times, mouth opening and closing. He looked rather like a fish, glancing around with bugged eyes at the crowd.

"Your Grace, it is not the duty of the Faith to enforce the Holy Writ," he said finally, carefully, "but to guide the people toward the life of purity and piety to which the Holy Writ counsels them. The Father judges us all, and if there are those who will not seek atonement for disobeying certain sacraments of the Faith, then they will face the Father's judgment for it."

Margaery had to admit, the High Septon, for all of his corruption and gluttony which he preached so strongly against, seemed to know his scriptures.

She could see Loras sweating from across the room. Sansa, where she stood up on the balcony, merely looked bemused, and Margaery noticed the exact moment when it sunk in for her, that she was just as damned as Loras or any member of Lord Baelish's brothel by the green tint that entered her face.

Joffrey was bored again, clearly not in the mood to be lectured like a student, and interrupted the High Septon before he could move into another round of it.

"I've a wish to make that dreaded perversion illegal in the eyes of the Crown, if the Faith cannot enforce such doctrines as belong in its own sacraments. My resources, after all, vastly outweigh that of the Faith, and the perversion is one which is vile for more than just it’s tarnishing of the soul, I dare say," Joffrey said, and the High Septon stared at him with hooded, bemused eyes as Margaery felt her insides curdle.

She knew, as most of King's Landing had learned recently, about the High Septon's own perversions. Margaery remembered hearing about his time in Littlefinger's brothels with the boy that Loras had become so fascinated with recently. Everyone had heard about it. Apparently, he'd had several whores dressing up as the different facets of the Seven, and Olyvar as the Father himself.

The Sparrows, no longer able to openly speak out against the King without fear of repercussion, screamed about this High Septon's indulgences from the streets almost daily these days, though they had not the power to do anything about them. The one time they had tried, terrorizing the High Septon as he left one of Littlefinger's brothels, the High Septon had gone to the King about it, and the King had sent out the proclamation, under Tywin's order, two days before the Hand's untimely death, that if they dared physically attack the Faith's mouthpiece again, they would all be slaughtered without a trial.

They had grown only slightly less bold, after that, and the High Septon had become slightly more discreet in his indulgences. Margaery had thought this was working out for everyone, but here Joffrey was, unpredictable in his plotting yet again.

What in the seven hells had given him the idea to finally go about something like this when he had spoken to Margaery about it months ago, before they were even wed, and had yet to bring it up since?

Margaery felt cold as her eyes skitted to Loras, where he stood at the edge of the throne room, straight backed and meeting no one's eyes, though several eyes were skitting in his direction.

Seven, if he had done something stupid, if anyone had seen him and that boy of his from Lord Baelish's brothel, she was going to kill him herself.

She bit the inside of her cheek when she realized the irony of that thought a moment later.

"That is a...noble cause, Your Grace," the High Septon assured him, glancing tiredly out at the King's silent advisors. When he found no assistance amongst them, he went valiantly on, "I had no idea that you were so knowledgeable of the Faith's views on-"

"Yes, yes," Joffrey waved a hand impatiently. "And it is a perversion which has long since been neglected by the law, which I will remedy."

The High Septon cleared his throat, straightening a little where he stood. "The perversions of the flesh mar our souls, Your Grace," he tried, clearing his throat again. "And are matters that are better left within the hands of the Faith. Surely the King has more important matters to attend to, such as the current war in Dorne-"

"I am the King!" Joffrey shouted at him, and the hall fell silent. "I am the King," Joffrey repeated, "And what I wish to attend to is my own concern, not that of a septon's, and I will say what it is a King's duty to attend to. There has been a terrible out breaking of this perversion in my kingdom; it is the reason kings have stood against me."

Margaery shivered, thought of Renly for a moment, before her eyes narrowed, and she wondered how deeply Joffrey wished to enforce the ridding of any sexual perversions.

Incest, after all, was considered by the Holy Writ to be just as wicked of a sin as sodomy, even if the Targaryens of old had forced the Faith to bless their own incestuous marriages.

"Such perversions will be tracked down by the Crown, and handled by the Crown, because they offend my very eyes, not because a few stuffy septons say that someone is guilty of a crime."

Margaery was beginning to sweat, beneath her own clothes. She and Sansa had done nothing since Sansa's return to King's Landing, those stolen kisses in Sansa's own chambers. And one of her ladies would have told her if Loras had been flaunting his relationship with that boy from Baelish's brothels, she knew.

Whatever Joffrey had seen, for those words were damning in themselves, she could only pray, feverishly and as she never had before, that it had nothing to do with herself or her brother.

The High Septon blinked at him. "Such words are dangerously close to blasphemy, Your Grace," he said finally, gaining a spine for the first time since Margaery had known him, and she felt as if the collective breaths of everyone in the Throne Room had vanished, in that moment.

Joffrey leaned forward almost lazily in his chair. "Are they?"

Margaery swallowed thickly, moved forward to lay a hand on her husband's arm. "I am so glad that you and the Faith are able to see eye to eye on this issue, my love," she told him, tone lilting even as she forced the words past the bile in her throat, even as she forced herself not to make eye contact with Loras at all. "But perhaps-"

Joffrey shook her off. "I am only doing what is right by my people," he informed her.

The High Septon eyed him. "Is there anything you require of the Faith in assistance for this, Your Grace?"

As it turned out, Joffrey did. Margaery was hardly surprised.

"As the crime is one of the flesh, not of the letter of the law, for the time being I would like your permission to house...discovered degenerates in the cells beneath the Sept of Baelor, rather than in the Black Cells."

This meant, Margaery realized with sickening clarity, that Joffrey planned on ‘housing’ far more of them than would fit in the Black Cells. It was not as if he was thinking about the fact that the cells in the Sept were far more comfortable for their lack of use in recent years, after all.

"Ah, house them, Your Grace?" the High Septon questioned, almost timidly.

Joffrey nodded. "Before their trials. I would also like you to advise me on how to go about a trial, and what the Faith believes the Crown should punish such perversions with, when the matter has always been seen as one under the jurisdiction of the Faith, in the past."

The High Septon still looked as bemused as Margaery felt. "Your Grace does not wish for them to be...tried by the Faith?"

Margaery couldn't tell if he looked relieved or bothered by that.

Joffrey snorted. "The Faith has proven its inability to be strict about enforcing such things. Now that the Crown will enforce the prohibition of such...degenerate behavior, the Crown should also be in charge of such a trial, don't you think?"

"Your Grace-"

"You are dismissed, High Septon," Joffrey told him. "Run back to your Sept, and make sure its rooms are clean."

The man bowed, once, then again, seeming to have lost all of the bravery of a moment before. "Yes, Your Grace."

The room cleared of its occupants soon after that, some of them looking less than innocent, most of them merely looking surprised, tittering amongst one another about what might have caused the King to so suddenly and vehemently make such a decision.

Margaery barely heard any of them beyond the ringing in her own ears as she made her excuses to Joffrey while Lord Varys stressed that the King should speak to his counselors in a meeting of the Small Council. Small wonder.

And then she found herself pushing past the different courtiers in the throne room, unable to breathe until she had found her way out of that horrid place, into the corridor which was hardly less crowded.

She saw Sansa standing just beyond the streaming crowd, and walked over to the other girl unthinkingly.

"This is bad, isn't it?" Sansa hissed in her direction, as the crowd filtered out of the throne room and Margaery caught up with the other girl, pushed into a small alcove in the corridor.

Margaery pinched the bridge of her nose. "Very. I...I had no idea he was going to do something this...extreme." She shook her head. "I had no idea he was going to do something like this at all. I thought that he was distracted enough with the Martells not to do anything..."

Insane. That was the word she wished to use, but it clogged in her throat, and Margaery fell silent.

The Faith did not enforce this issue because it was considered an aged and errant thought of the olden days, when things were far stiffer and more traditional, and because it was not part of the most Holy Sacraments, just as the Faith did not enforce the Writ's demands that women experiencing their moonblood should be locked away within their chambers until its end.

And now Joffrey wanted to enforce a small line of text that Margaery doubted he had even known was in the Holy Writ with soldiers and punishing laws, something so antiquated even the High Septon had broken it. Multiple times.

And to do so when there were so many other things to be worried about, like the Dornish fighting along the Pass with the Tyrells, the Dornish fleet fighting the lords of the Stormlands...that was madness that had Margaery's hands shaking, by her sides.

And she could only hope that Loras would take solace in the words she had just spoken to Sansa as well, when she told them to him, much as she doubted that would be the case.

Loras. Who was a member of the Kingsguard, sleeping with a boy from Lord Baelish's brothel.

And he didn't stand to lose nearly as much as the wife of the King did, if it got out that she was sodomizing the king's aunt by marriage.

Margaery went a little weak at the knees at the realization, the blood flooding from her face as she wondered yet again just what had finally pushed Joffrey into making such a decision, if there was anything she or Sansa had done recently to cause him to suspect them. If she mistrusted any of her ladies, or if there was anything Lady Shae could have done.

Margaery had of course thought of the dangers, of committing adultery behind the King's back. Queens had been killed for less, though some kings simply didn't care what their queens got up to once they had an heir, and Margaery did not even have that.

She only had herself, without even the intelligence to commit adultery with a _man_. If Joffrey's new and improved plans for dealing with people like herself ever led back to her, a beheading was the least Joffrey could do to her.

And what he might do to Sansa...

Apparently Sansa had reached the same conclusion, for her next words were a hastily bit out, "Aren't you spending time with him so that he won't do things like this?"

Margaery balked a little at her tone, even if she knew she deserved it a bit, that this tone came from fear more than anything. "I'm hardly one of the Seven, Sansa, able to work miracles," she muttered under her breath, teeth gritting. "And there is only so much that I'm able to stop him from doing with pretty smiles and half-thought of alternative suggestions."

Sansa sighed, rubbed at her forehead. "You're right," she said, remembering her own time as Joffrey's betrothed. "I shouldn't have snapped like that. He just...scares me, sometimes."

Margaery reached out, squeezing her hand for a few seconds before letting go. While they were speaking in low enough tones not to be overheard, they were still surrounded by courtiers gossiping about their new king or watching their queen for any signs of discomfort with what Joffrey had just ordered, and Sansa knew she couldn't afford more than that.

"I know," Margaery murmured. "And I am trying, Sansa. Believe me. I didn't know he was going to do something like this."

"Well, that's rather the point of him," Sansa muttered, and then looked away. "I'm sorry. I've been...I haven't been sleeping well lately. My brother used to say that when I hadn't slept enough I-" she cut off abruptly, because what did it matter what Robb used to say about her, now that he was dead?

Margaery's face twisted in sympathy. "It's been...trying, everything that has happened recently," she supplied the words Sansa needed, and Sansa nodded along with them, glad for the excuse.

"Sansa," Margaery continued, and Sansa looked up at her. "I don't know where Joffrey suddenly got the idea to pull something like this, but I will protect you, no matter what happens, all right? He won't find out about..."

Sansa blinked owlishly at her. "Find out..." she swallowed hard. "We've been careless," she said finally. "Stupid. I wasn't even thinking..."

Margaery hushed her. "I wasn't either," she admitted. "I..." she swallowed thickly. "I need to go and speak with my brother."

"Margaery-" Sansa started, but Margaery cut her off.

"Just...be careful, Sansa," Margaery murmured. "Trust no one around us. And by the gods, next time we meet one another, be as discreet as you can manage."

Sansa had been loitering around Margaery's bedchambers in the Maidenvault for hours while she had been off with Joffrey, Margaery remembered, with a sickening clarity. Any number of servants not already in the know about herself and Margaery might have walked by and noticed that.

Margaery held up a hand to forestall anything Sansa might say, ignoring for now the hurt look that flashed across Sansa's face as she did so, and hurrying to find her brother.


	137. SANSA

Sansa groaned, throwing the cover to the most recent tome she had been pouring through shut and laying her head in her hands on top of it a moment later.

There were no laws allowing a woman to take control of the Rock on her own before her husband had done so, and Tyrion was in no position to look over his holdings in a cell. The only laws that might give Sansa the sort of control she would need to keep Casterly Rock were those that allowed her to become regent to a child owning it, which of course she had already known.

If she had a child, she could keep the Rock for Tyrion whether or not he came out of the Black Cells. Other than that, it looked as if may just have to give it up, whether she did so now at Joffrey's command or when Tyrion was found guilty of murdering his father.

Of course, there were no laws saying that she must give it up because Joffrey had asked her to do so. If it had been a command, she'd have no choice, but the Small Council had been very careful not to phrase their request in that manner.

And if she held onto it, Joffrey would think it was because she wanted to carry his child.

Sansa reached up and rubbed at her temples, seeing double for a moment.

At the start of this, she had been less than hopeful, of course. Joffrey's glee when he asked her to give up Casterly Rock had been a rather large hint that there was nothing she would be able to do to get out of it, unless, of course, she agreed to his offer.

Sansa shivered at the very thought of that offer, stomach churning.

She rather hoped that her terror at that thought had not shown on her face when she tried to reject Margaery's offer of finding someone to fill her with a child, but she didn't think she'd succeeded, what with Margaery's lack of needling lately.

Margaery knew she was going to cave on this matter, that it was only a matter of time which Sansa didn't have much of to begin with, because anything was preferable to having Joffrey fuck her.

And so Margaery wasn't trying to pressure her about it at all. Because she knew that, however disgusted Sansa would be with herself at choosing to fuck another man, she would be far more disgusted in herself for letting Joffrey fuck her against her will.

She just didn't understand how she was supposed to know that she would have a child, just because another man slept with her. Margaery had been married to Joffrey for months now, and there seemed to be no talk of a child yet.

Unless Margaery planned on having Sansa sleep with a man until she did, and Sansa almost found the idea of sleeping with Joffrey preferable to _that_.

Sansa made a noise low in her throat, tossing her arm out onto the table she was sitting at and upending several of the ancient tomes onto the floor.

"I always find those dusty old law books a pain, as well," a voice said, and Sansa straightened, turned around to see Rosamund Tyrell walking primly into the library.

Now that she thought of it, Sansa realized it had been rather foolish to work with her back to the main door. She flushed, but Lady Rosamund didn't seem to notice.

"Yes, well," Sansa said, tone scratchy. She hadn't had breakfast that morning, choosing instead to come directly here, and her throat wasn't thanking her for the lack of water, either. "Not all of us can afford to just read the songs."

Lady Rosamund smiled thinly. "I assume that is because I am a lady to the Queen," she said, glancing idly down at her nails. "But the songs aren't really where I put my interest, either."

Sansa raised a brow. "Oh?"

Lady Rosamund moved further into the library, running her fingers along the spines of several books as she walked. "I rather prefer history books," she told Sansa.

Sansa rubbed at her forehead. She was hardly in the mood for the games of court after digging through all of these old books, but then, she supposed, it wasn't as if she had thought she would escape them even here.

"Um, which ones in particular?" she asked, since Lady Rosamund was giving no sign of leaving.

Lady Rosamund moved out from behind the shelf she had disappeared into, giving Sansa a faint smile. She cradled a book in her arms, and Sansa squinted, but couldn't see the title beyond the golden lettering it was written in.

"Margaery has taken an interest in the Dance of Dragons," Rosamund said. "That was never where I found interest, either, until recently. Far too many bloody battles and dying women." She gave Sansa a grim smile. "There are enough dying women in life that to read about them is merely redundant."

Sansa hummed. "Until recently?"

Rosamund nodded, gesturing to the chair on the other side of Sansa's table before taking a seat. "Have you ever heard of the Lady Johanna Lannister?"

Sansa blinked. "Lord Tyrion's mother?" she asked, because that woman's name seemed to be coming up quite a bit lately.

Rosamund laughed. "No, Lady Johanna was the wife of the Lord of Casterly Rock during the Dance of Dragons," she corrected. "While her husband fought in the war, she remained in Casterly Rock, and when the Greyjoys attacked, she barred the gates of Casterly Rock against them, and saved it from being taken, where the rest of Lannisport was."

Sansa squinted as the other girl set her book down on the table. One of the histories of House Lannister, Sansa noted, though there were dozens of those.

"And then she negotiated with the Reach lords," Rosamund continued, practically petting the book, now. "Allied with Lord Costayne to invade the Iron Islands before they could take the Rock. They won, of course. And she was seen as a hero for it. She even kept one of the sons of the Red Kracken as her son's fool, during the war."

"An interesting story," Sansa said, reaching for the book. Rosamund dutifully handed it over. "I had never heard of her."

Rosamund laughed hotly. "That is because, my dear lady, women are often forgotten in the history books. This one has scarcely more than a paragraph on her, and yet I found that paragraph more interesting than half the book itself."

Sansa chuckled. "That was always my problem with the histories, as well," she confided, and Rosamund beamed at her. "But why are you sharing her tale with me now?"

The smile on the other girl's face faded. "Well, you are the new Lady of Casterly Rock now," she pointed out. "I thought you ought to know the history of its ladies."

Sansa narrowed her eyes. No, that wasn't it, she thought. Lady Rosamund might think herself a good liar, but she was hardly on par with Margaery, and it seemed like Sansa could tell now when Margaery was lying.

"Well, thank you," she said idly. "For pointing her tale out. I think I should start with that one."

Rosamund smiled and nodded, handing over the book. "I dare say it will make for a more compelling read than those, though," she said, motioning to the books laying out over Sansa's table.

Sansa flushed. "I...dare say you may be right, about that."

Rosamund gave her a gentle smile. "I...it may be too forward of me to say so, but then, Queen Margaery is very concerned about you, I think. I hope you find what it is you're looking for soon."

Sansa's head jerked up. "Queen Margaery has been talking about my situation to you?" she asked suspiciously.

Rosamund shrugged. "Not in so many words. But I've been Margaery's lady since I was a young girl. Not as young as Lady Elinor, of course, but long enough to pick up some things about her behavior. I...she seems worried, lately."

"And the only thing she could be worried about is me," Sansa almost bit the words out, not liking the change in conversation at all.

She knew how worried Margaery had been about what had happened with the High Septon. That she was keeping Loras close by her side at all times now, and hadn't called Sansa to her chambers since that day.

And while Sansa understood that worry, shared in it, she also knew that Margaery was the King's wife, and he was so enamored with her that he had killed one of his own Kingsguard without ever questioning whether or not the man had truly raped his wife.

And Sansa was safe enough as well, as long as she was a useful captive to the Lannisters. Casterly Rock was a much more worrying situation, but Rosamund oughtn't have known that.

Rosamund tilted her head. "I suppose what happened the other day was concerning as well, if only because the people of King's Landing didn't like it. There've been no more than three riots over the matter, I've heard."

"Of course," Sansa said, smoothing out her expression.

"But the situation with you and Casterly Rock is a far more pressing one," Rosamund said, and, at Sansa's alarmed expression, "I've heard the rumors. I hope you find your way out of it. If Lord Tyrion is innocent of the charges against him, it would be a sad thing indeed to lose his home."

Sansa squinted at her. "You might be the first person who has indicated to me that Lord Tyrion might be innocent," she said then.

A blush crept up Lady Rosamund's neck, and Sansa raised a brow. Margaery, of course, had told her that to many women, Lord Tyrion would be quite a catch, especially given the more than rumors about his experience. She had not truly believed the other girl until now.

"I...Well, of course I don't know, and the gods will judge him as they see fit," Rosamund said, forcing a smile. "I suppose I ought to be going now," she said. "Queen Margaery will be looking for me."

"Yes," Sansa said, giving her the same sort of pinched smile. "It was good to speak with you, Lady Rosamund."

Rosamund looked pleased. "I confess, I haven't been very sociable since arriving in King's Landing. When I lived at Highgarden, I felt like a completely different woman. I'd like to move back toward that woman, if I can."

Sansa nodded, pulling Rosamund's book toward her, opening it to the page that, she realized belatedly, Rosamund must have marked to remember its place. She hardly noticed when the other girl quietly slipped out of the room, deep in thought as she read through the paragraph on Lady Johanna.

She hated court games; Sansa still couldn't tell if Rosamund had some other reason for approaching her; had a crush on Tyrion and wanted to know how deeply in trouble he was, as if Sansa knew that more than anyone else, or if it had been something to do with Margaery's concern for her, and ferreting out information there.

But as she read through the paragraph on the cunning Johanna Lannister a second time, Sansa reminded herself that Lady Rosamund's machinations were the least of her problems.

And she just may have found a solution to one of them.


	138. SANSA

"You wish to visit the Rock?" Joffrey asked incredulously, leaning forward in his chari and staring at her as if he could peer into her very soul.

Sansa wondered how it would feel, if he did so. If he ever felt anything beyond the raw, primal emotion of fear.

Sansa forced herself to smile and nod. "My lord husband has always been a cautious and detail oriented man, Your Grace," she informed him, "And I feel that I would be remiss in my duties as his wife if I did not see to it that his affairs within Casterly Rock are fully seen to before I abdicate his claim to it."

Joffrey's eyes narrowed. "And you've spoken to Lord Tyrion about this?"

Sansa shook her head. "Of course not, Your Grace. You denied me when I asked to visit him, and I would never go against your direct command."

Joffrey's lips thinned; perhaps he was smarter than she often took him for. "And I was right to do so. We don't need him around corrupting your already susceptible mind."

Sansa nodded. "That is most wise, Your Grace."

"I am afraid, Lady Sansa, that I cannot allow you to leave King's Landing," he told her primly, and Sansa thought that Margaery relaxed for the first time out of her marble stiffness since Sansa had voiced the request. Sansa tried to pretend it didn't hurt, to see Margaery didn't want her to leave when she had a chance at it, even if it didn't matter either way.

"You have not proven yourself trustworthy to me in any satisfactory way," Joffrey continued, "and I still harbor concern that you will run at the first opportunity."

Sansa lowered her head, lips thinning. "Your Grace is a wise man," she said finally, lifting her head. "And I understand that there are ways in which I might have proven myself more loyal to you. But I did not run away from Your Grace willingly; I was stolen, and the Martells have forever left me with proof of their not being my friends." She reached up, lowering her collar and gesturing to the scar there.

Joffrey grinned. "I suppose they have," he said, leaning forward in his chair.

"If Your Grace is concerned that I might attempt to run away, then by all means, have me leave with a detail ordered to watch me at all times," she said. "Surely I couldn't overpower Lannister soldiers sent to guard me."

Joffrey raised a brow, pondering, which was far more than Sansa had expected to achieve at all, with this.

"I only wish to see to my husband's affairs," she told him. "I am the Lady of Casterly Rock, and I owe him that, whatever he has been accused of. And if Your Grace will not allow me to leave, I must make my pleas to the Sept, in order that I might honor my marriage to my husband."

"Can she do that?" Joffrey demanded, turning on the members of his Small Council where they stood in the crowd. Out of all of them, Lord Varys looked the most speculative.

It was the Grandmaester who spoke up. "Lady Sansa is a captive in King's Landing, Your Grace, and it is likely unwise for her to travel to Casterly Rock, where she might pass the Riverlands and her mother's people there."

Sansa sagged a little where she stood; she had to make it look realistic. "Your Grace, I-"

"But the law does hold that it is the privilege of someone giving up their right to lands and titles to examine those things first," the Grandmaester continued, coughing into his sleeve as he did so.

Sansa closed her eyes.

Joffrey nodded, pursing his lips and glancing in Margaery's wide eyed direction before nodding again.

"My love," Margaery began, "Lady Sansa cannot possibly be expected to travel all of the way to Casterly Rock alone-"

"She does not have my permission," Joffrey interrupted his queen, ignoring the look of shock on Margaery's face and the shock on Sansa's own. He turned his eyes on Sansa once more, grinning. "You will not go to Casterly Rock, lady aunt, because I am your King, and I am above the Faith in every matter, including those between a man and his wife. And if you try to make your pleas to the Sept anyway, one of my sell swords will split you open from your scarred, ugly neck to your barren belly, and bring me your entrails. Do you understand?"

Sansa felt rather faint; she was sure that all of the blood in her body has rushed out of her. "Yes, Your Grace," she agreed pleasantly. "I am...my apologies, Your Grace."

Joffrey smirked. "You are forgiven, Lady Sansa. I understand that there is much you must think about, at the moment. And I hope that you have not forgotten my offer."

Sansa almost threw up bile on the floor of the throne room, then and there.

"My love," Margaery interrupted then, sounding rather hurt, "I hope that didn't mean what I thought it did."

Joffrey reached out, squeezing his wife's hand. "Of course not, my queen. My aunt Sansa understands what I meant. It was a private jape, only."

Margaery looked away. "Of course it was." And then she stood to her feet, smoothing down her skirts. "Well, perhaps I should leave you to it."

Joffrey stared at her. "My love?"

Margaery gave him a pinched smile, squeezed his hand again. "It is nothing, my king. Only a headache."

Joffrey hesitated, and then nodded, dismissing her, and Margaery marched from the room, followed by a torrent of her ladies. Sansa eyed them, reflected that Margaery had been off recently, and she doubted it was just because of how busy Margaery had become since Lord Tywin's death.

"I have refused you my permission, Lady Sansa," Joffrey informed her abruptly. "Be gone from my sight."

Sansa bobbed her head. "Yes, Your Grace," she said, and hurried out into the corridor.

She wondered if Margaery's words had been for show, if the other woman was intimating to Joffrey that she wanted Sansa gone because she was a rival for the King's affections, or if she truly had been hurt by the King's open interest in another woman before the whole court.

It was rather troubling that Sansa couldn't tell.

She didn't have long to wonder, though, for the moment she was out of the throne room she was accosted by the woman in question, Margaery's ladies strangely disappeared and Margaery herself staring at Sansa with a fiery expression Sansa had always been relieved in the past was never directed at her.

"What in the seven hells was that?" Margaery hissed, rounding on her and dragging Sansa into a shadowy corner of the corridor.

Sansa shrugged. "I made a request that I knew he wouldn't honor, but I had to try," she said gently, and then sighed, reaching out and taking Margaery's hands into her own. "Look, it wasn't was it looked like, I swear that to you."

"Oh, so you weren't asking Joffrey if you could leave King's Landing and return to the Rock for an unspecified amount of time?" Margaery gritted out. "If you could leave me, again?" She shook her head, reached up to rub at the back of her neck. "Did you forget how badly that went the last time you didn't tell me what the hell was going on?"

Sansa flinched back, stricken. "Margaery..."

"I..." Margaery bit her lip, wouldn't meet Sansa's eyes. "I thought we had decided not to hide things from one another anymore."

Sansa swallowed hard. "Margaery, I couldn't tell you. I..." she shook her head, looked away. "It was barely more than a plan thought out in my head, and I thought that if I gave voice to it, that would be...that everything would change."

Margaery scoffed. "That sounded like more than just a half thought out plan, Sansa."

Sansa shook her head, squeezing Margaery's hands again. "I wasn't talking about what just happened in the throne room."

Margaery bit her tongue, shook her head back and forth until it looked as if she were attempting to rattle her skull. "What is going on, Sansa? Tell me, please."

Sansa licked her lips. "I'm just trying to get my footing here, Margaery. Find some way to do the impossible; to keep the Rock for my husband and to keep myself sane at the same time."

Margaery's expression faltered. "Sansa...I'm sorry," she whispered. "I shouldn't have...that was cruel of me to say."

Sansa shrugged, letting go of her hands. "It wasn't wrong," she said.

"No," Margaery interrupted. "It was. And...I'm sorry, for all of it."

Sansa reached out, ran a hand through her hair. "It's all right, Margaery," she told the other girl gently. "It is."

Margaery shook her head. "Sansa..."

"It's all right," Sansa repeated, leaning forward and kissing the other girl on the forehead. "It doesn't matter, anyway, clearly."

Margaery's eyes narrowed. "You didn't want him to let you go," she said finally, and Sansa didn't like the speculative look the other woman was giving her. As if she weren't the woman Margaery knew, but another player of the game. "Why did you ask, then?"

Sansa shrugged. "I haven't quite figured everything out yet," she told Margaery. "But when I do, I will tell you. I promise."

Margaery hesitated. "Really?"

Sansa forced herself to nod. "Yes, truly," she promised, and wondered why it tasted like a lie when she had intended for that as much to be truthful, this time.


	139. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Period typical homophobia taken to Joffrey's extreme, implied genital mutilation...Joffrey.  
> Yeah, so...I actually went and looked up how medieval countries punished with homosexuality in Europe, and let me tell you, that was some unpleasant reading. Apparently most of the time, it was known about but never really punished, but I figured that Joffrey was about as creative as the medieval church could be when they were especially pissed off. Bleh.

"What is your name?" Joffrey demanded, and Margaery shuddered a little where she sat beside him, wondering where his obsession with knowing the names of his victims came from. Perhaps he found it sweeter to inflict his torture upon them, then.

The man cowering on the throne room floor, shirt missing and trousers torn, was covered in sweat and semen, and Margaery grimaced a little at the sight of him, straightening up in her chair and trying not to notice the looks of horror on her ladies' faces where they stood off to the side of the raised dais where her throne sat.

For gods' sake, she doubted Alla had ever even seen a man in such a state, no matter that she giggled and blushed through that sex book her ladies had found in the library.

"I...Laren, Your Grace," the man whispered down at his feet.

Joffrey snorted. "What was that? I didn't hear."

The man lifted his chin, lower lip wobbling. "My name is Laren, Your Grace."

"Laren," Joffrey repeated idly. "And you are from Flea Bottom?"

The man hesitated. "Aye, Your Grace."

"You are here because you were found sodomizing another man, Laren," Joffrey informed him, as if the half naked man did not already know why he had been brought here. "When I have explicitly announced that such a thing is now against the laws of the Crown and the traditions of the Faith. It must have cost a pretty penny, for a peasant from Flea Bottom. Why would you do it?"

Margaery took her left wrist into her right, attempting to still its trembling. She did not think it was enough for anyone to notice, but she was better safe than sorry, now that the courtiers of King's Landing had turned into rampant wolves, turning on one another if they thought it might gain them favor with the King to expose someone else's ways.

It was miracle that no one had come forward about Loras yet, but she supposed he was fortunate that he was a member of the Kingsguard and the brother of the Queen. She did not know how long that would protect him.

She did not even know that she could protect herself, now.

But she had known that this was coming today; one of the rare days when Joffrey gave her warning about what he planned to do during his time in the throne room, had warned her that they had found a man in one of Littlefinger's brothels, laying with another man.

Margaery wondered what the man who had found him had been doing.

And so, with that forewarning, Margaery had made certain that her brother would not be present in the throne room, that he would not be amongst the Kingsguard sent to collect this poor bastard from the cells beneath the Sept.

Instead, she had sent him to the harbor on the ever so important mission of collecting the new silks that had been imported for her from Pentos, claiming that her seamstresses had to have them today or the dress she wanted for the next (pretend, though she was certain she would be able to convince Joffrey to host one before Loras grew too suspicious) dance would never be ready in time.

She didn't much feel like celebrating at the moment, and she doubted that Loras would thank her for the deception, but Margaery couldn't bring herself to feel guilty about it.

She knew her brother, knew his guilty conscience that had plagued him since the death of Renly, knew that if he saw a man being persecuted by Joffrey for lying with another man, he wouldn't keep quiet about it.

And she knew that he would be right to do so.

Laren looked petrified. "Your Grace, this is all some horrible misunderstanding, I-"

"A horrible misunderstanding," Joffrey drawled. "Are you saying that I have been lied to, Laren?"

The man swallowed. "Your Grace-"

"Have I been lied to?" Joffrey repeated, voice deadly quiet.

Laren lowered his head, wouldn't look at the King. "Surely the word of a whore is not worth that of my own, Your Grace."

"Why?" Joffrey asked. "Because a fop should have more trust from his king than a whore? Aren't they one and the same?"

The court laughed at this, but the man on the ground only paled a little at his king's words. "Your Grace-"

"My uncle Renly was a perfumed ponce, just like you. And he died like one," Joffrey said, and then wrinkled his nose. "Well, I suppose you aren't perfumed. You don't even seem to have washed in your life."

More laughter from the court. Margaery was clenching her teeth so hard she thought they might crack in her mouth.

Sansa wasn't present today, but then, Margaery had not needed to engage in a deception to be rid of the other girl. Sansa had practically shut herself up in that library from the moment she had learned that the Crown desired Casterly Rock, and that did not seem to have changed since learning that she could actually go and visit Casterly Rock.

Well, Margaery thought, for anything was better than engaging in the situation in front of her, at least Sansa had taken her advice about keeping the Rock to heart.

Laren lowered his head to the floor, and Margaery could see how badly he was shaking from here. She wondered if her own hands were shaking as hard in her lap. "Your Grace, I beg of you-"

"The punishment of my new law for sodomizing another man is death, Laren," Joffrey said, almost conversational now. "Did you not know that?"

From beside the dais, Alla sucked in a loud breath. Margaery closed her eyes.

"My love," she said, in a patient tone to keep her voice from shaking, "Perhaps..." she took a deep breath, it on the tip of her tongue to ask her husband for mercy. Joffrey wasn't going to back down from this; she'd known that the moment he'd told her his plans like an excited child this morning. "Perhaps we should send the young ladies of the court out of the throne room. My ladies in particular are quite young, and...squeamish. Such talk is not for their ears."

Joffrey eyed her, then waved a hand. Margaery had never seen Alla run that fast, though, by the green tint of her cheeks, she knew where the girl was headed, and certainly didn't blame her.

If she'd been able to, she would have done the same.

"Please, Your Grace, mercy..." Laren was beginning to sob now, shaking like a leaf as he held up his clasped hands to his king. Margaery might have told him not to bother asking for mercy from Joffrey, but she suspected, from the look on his face, that Laren already knew what his king's answer was going to be to that request.

 _He promised me he would be merciful, and cut my father's head off. And he said that was mercy_ , Sansa's words from a lifetime ago, when Margaery wasn't smart enough to run back to Highgarden and bar the gates against all of the Lannisters, drifted through her mind, and her cheek twitched.

"Mercy," Joffrey repeated the words idly. "Of course. You are, after all, the first man to break this law since its institution, and perhaps you are too much of a stupid peasant to understand what the law means."

Laren nodded his head vigorously. "Yes, Your Grace. Yes, that is me, always being foolish-"

"I was going to have you drawn and quartered," Joffrey said, with a grin. "But now, I think, I'll just have my men burn your balls off before you're killed."

Laren sucked in a breath, head slamming back against the floor of the Iron Throne. "Your Grace, I beg of you..." He began a litany of pleas with Margaery could barely understand.

Two guards moved forward, grabbed Laren by the arms at the nod of the King, started to drag him from the Throne Room.

And that was when Laren from Flea Bottom began to scream for the mercy Joffrey wasn't going to give him, raising his voice to the Throne Room at large if he could not have the mercy of the King, loud wracking sobs filling the chamber as if the guards had already begun their punishment.

Margaery was only glad that it was not going to be performed in the throne room, in front of her. She was already squeamish enough that she thought she might vomit at the sight of that, and Joffrey would hardly be impressed.

It could be Margaery down there next. Or Sansa. And all because they had fallen into each other's arms when Joffrey forced her to harm the other girl.

Joffrey wouldn't care to hear that, though. He would kill Sansa or Loras in the same way that he had killed this poor bastard. Margaery might slip past such a punishment because she was a queen, but kings had killed their queens before and she deserved to be down there on the floor of the Iron Throne as much as this Laren had.

She swallowed thickly, looked at her husband's sick grin as Laren was dragged the rest of the way out of the throne room.

"I want his body displayed on the city walls," Joffrey announced. "That should let the idiots that make up the smallfolk understand what their King's words mean. They seem to be stupid enough that nothing else will decide it for them."

The captain of the city guard bowed lowly. "As you wish, Your Grace," he said, no emotions showing on his face as he turned his back on the King and began to walk away.

Joffrey grinned. "There appear to be far too many hot blooded men in the city who do not have enough women to keep their interest. Perhaps we can pass Lady Sansa around, see if she can convince them."

Laughter filtered uneasily through the courtiers, and Margaery was once again glad that Sansa wasn't present in the throne room. She leaned forward on her throne, thought for a moment that she might sick up, despite everything her grandmother had ever taught her about keeping her composure in front of others.

Joffrey reached out, grabbing Margaery by the hand, and he pulled her off balance. She stumbled to her feet, until she was standing beside his throne.

"I want to fuck you," he whispered in her ear, tone low. "Come on."


	140. SANSA

Sansa swallowed thickly as the courtier in front of her gleefully recounted to her Joffrey's threat from the throne room, trying not to let the fear she felt show on her face.

All courtiers were the same, waiting for the chance to gain favor with their King by recounting his tales of torment to Sansa if she was not present to hear them.

Vultures, the lot of them. But oddly enough, there was only one who had tried today.

Sansa nodded. "Thank you for telling me," she told the courtier, in a shaky voice, watched as the man grinned and turned on his way, before shutting the door to her husband's chambers.

She turned to where Shae stood by the bed behind her, the other woman frowning at her.

"You didn't get what you wanted," Shae said, grabbing her by the arm. "And you just heard about how Joffrey was threatening to pass you around. So why are you smiling?"

Sansa's smile didn't falter as she turned to Shae. "Because I am now the Lady of Casterly Rock, and everyone at court acknowledged it."

Shae raised a brow. "And?"

"And," Sansa continued pleasantly, "There was only one courtier, today."

Shae gave her a small smile. "Sansa..."

Sansa bit her lip. "While Casterly Rock still belongs to my husband, I am in charge of such affairs as govern Casterly Rock almost as much as he. Given that he has been imprisoned, even more so than the usual wife." Shae stared at her blankly.

"And?" she repeated.

"I got the idea from a story Lady Rosamund Tyrell directed my attention to," Sansa said conversationally, watched the way Shae's back straightened as she stood up. "It was about a Lannister lady who lived during the Dance of Dragons."

Shae's nose wrinkled, whatever tension she had because of the mention of Lady Rosamund dissipating. "A story about the Dance of Dragons?"

Sansa nodded eagerly. "She told me about a Lannister lady who locked herself inside Casterly Rock and kept it from the Iron Islanders. She was able to withstand them until the end of the war, and allied with the Reach to destroy them in the Iron Islands. That's where most of House Lannister's glory seems to stem from, in fact."

Shae raised a brow. "Don't tell me you were planning to run to Casterly Rock and shut yourself up inside," she said incredulously, a hint of anger in her tone, and Sansa's smile faded.

"No," she said. "Because, as you reminded me recently, I have people here that I care about." She moved forward, took Shae's hands into her own. "And I don't know how to get Lord Tyrion out of prison, and I don't know still how I feel about him, but I am going to do what I can to keep the Rock for him. For all of us."

Shae shook her head, moving a little closer. "And how are you going to do that?"

Sansa smiled faintly. "Lady Rosamund forgot the most interesting part of the story. After the war was over, it was Johanna Lannister who contributed much of the gold used to rebuild King's Landing. The Crown owed her greatly for it, but she never asked for a return on her investment, and Casterly Rock's finances didn't suffer for it."

Shae raised a brow. "That's nice," she agreed. "But hardly the most interesting part of that story."

"But it is," Sansa disagreed. "Joffrey wants to take Casterly Rock from us because he doesn't trust Tyrion, and because his mother told him to do it, where she's still skulking about Highgarden, and she wants to humiliate her brother." She shrugged. "But I am hardly Tyrion Lannister."

Shae's brows furrowed. "I...don't understand."

"The Crown needs Lannister gold," Sansa pointed out. "Lord Tywin became rather stingy with it after he was named Hand of the King, and the Lannisters are wary of depending too completely on the Iron Bank or the Tyrells."

Shae smirked. "Learned all of this from your book reading, did you?"

Sansa smiled. "Tyrion tells me some things, you know. Enough for me to realize the dire straits the Crown appears to be in at the moment."

"So," Shae summarized, "You want to bribe Joffrey into letting you keep the Rock by letting him think that you will always be generous with its money."

Sansa shrugged. "I know Tyrion won't thank me for it, but I am getting him the Rock. Only the Rock. I intend to drain the entirety of the Lannister mines if that is what it takes for him to keep it."

Shae stared. "That's...there's a flaw in your plan," she pointed out. "Cersei loves her children, and would gladly bankrupt the Rock as well, if it were in her hands."

Sansa nodded. "She would," she agreed tentatively. "But Cersei doesn't have the Rock yet, and she's married to Willas Tyrell. If she inherited the Rock, it would go directly to Tommen, and he would require a regent who was not his mother to watch over it for him. At the same time, he can have someone he can control more than a mother surrounded by flowers far away in Highgarden ruling Casterly Rock, funneling all of its resources to him, and me, here in the capitol still, to torment."

"Sansa..."

"I know what you're going to say," Sansa told her quietly. "I won't hear it."

Shae bit her lip. "Tyrion won't like it," she decided after a long pause in which Sansa forgot to breathe.

"I don't care," Sansa said gently. "I am getting him the Rock, but I am not going to debase myself lower than that."

"And if..." Shae swallowed. "If he dies for this? For killing Tywin, what will you do then?"

Sansa took a deep breath. "There is a precedent," she said carefully. "I finally found it. A case where the widow of a lord inherited his properties. I read about that too, in these histories books."

Shae's eyes widened. "A widow?"

Sansa nodded. "She inherited her husband's lands after his death, and will name her own successor when she dies. And she didn't have heirs of her own."

"She is still living?" Shae asked. Sansa nodded. "How did you even find that?"

Sansa shrugged. "A lot of reading. It was written only once, and in the smallest place. A wonder I found it at all."

Shae rolled her eyes, and then the gravity of the situation seemed to hit her, and she sank down onto the bed. "So," she said quietly, "you have a failsafe way of gaining the Rock even if Lord Tyrion dies."

Sansa swallowed, bent down in front of her. "I can't save Lord Tyrion, Shae. I wish I could, but even as Lady of the Rock, I don't have that power. But I can keep his inheritance from falling into Cersei's hands, and I think that's what he would want, don't you?"


	141. MARGAERY

This was the first time that the two of them had managed to find time alone since Joffrey's new and most disturbing law had been put into place, and Margaery could barely contain her nervousness as she had somehow managed to do during Laren's farce of a trial.

It had been her own idea to meet; while Sansa did not seem as terrified as she about being caught, more concerned, as Margaery supposed she needed to feel, about losing the Rock, the other girl had not pushed to meet Margaery in secret recently either.

That was more concerning to Margaery than she wanted to admit, but she hid the thought behind the rather more pertinent worry that anyone could find them, that anyone of her ladies could betray them, that...

"Sansa," she murmured, as Sansa padded silently into the room after knocking out the little pattern they had agreed upon over a cup of iced tea in the gardens, and the other girl glanced up at her, giving her a wisp of a smile before shutting the door behind her.

And then the other girl was moving forward, arms reaching out hesitantly for Margaery before Margaery pulled her in, kissing her way down Sansa's scarred neck first before pressing her lips to Sansa's, enjoying the soft, sweet feel of them.

Sansa moaned against her mouth, and Margaery felt her other hand running along the ties of Margaery's gown down her back; Margaery had already shed her outer cloak while she waited for Sansa; Alla's chambers, while the perfect place for a rendezvous because no one would suspect Alla of anything disingenuous, for, even though she was the same age as Sansa, she was not yet a maiden flowered, were also hot as seven hells.

And Margaery had been languishing in them for a quarter of an hour before Sansa had come to meet her, as had been their agreement.

As far as either of them knew, they were not suspected of doing anything to which the King's new law might object, but it was far better to be safe than sorry, as Margaery had always thought. Joffrey believed that their relationship existed at all because Margaery delighted in befriending the poor little Stark orphan, knowing that she was a prisoner here and had no other friends but Margaery, a ruse which Margaery hoped she would never have to explain to Sansa. They should be safe enough here, but something had set Joffrey off, and until Margaery knew what that was, she wasn't willing to take any chances.

She shivered, thinking of that poor bastard Joffrey'd had killed for taking just such a chance.

"Marg?" Sansa whispered against her mouth, and Margaery started a little as she realized Sansa had worked free all of the ties of Margaery's gown, her own still buttoned high.

Margaery shook her head, forcing a smile. She didn't speak, only made short work of Sansa's own gown, pulling it loose until they could grasp and clutch at each other as they made their way to Alla's divan.

Alla had drawn the line at them fucking on her bed when she had made the offer of her room earlier that day, and Margaery had been happy enough to oblige, not needing the headache that would supply.

They were still partially clothed, but Margaery couldn't bring herself to care, at this point.

She pushed Sansa down onto the sofa, giggled at the grimace on Sansa's face before she began kissing her again, pushing Sansa's long hair out of the way as her hands groped down the other girl's body, their tongues still wrapped around each other, the wet hotness of Sansa's mouth doing powerful things to Margaery's groin.

It was a bit awkward at first, kissing on Alla's divan in such an uncomfortable position, but they made do, Margaery shifting a little to accommodate the other girl, straddling Sansa's hips as one of Sansa's hands reached out to steady herself.

And then they were kissing again, and their surroundings seemed to lose importance altogether as Margaery closed her eyes and drank in the taste of her lover, the wanton sounds she was always able to produce from the other girl.

That was Margaery's favorite thing about making love to Sansa; being able to hear her moans, and then her screams, stifled as they always were into a pillow. Knowing that the quiet little bird that Sansa presented herself to the rest of the court as could be so openly loud when Margaery had her way with her.

Just the thought had Margaery's nipples hardening to painful nubs, and she pulled back a little, panting hard.

"Sansa..." she gasped out, fingers reaching out to tangle in Sansa's hair with one hand as the other swept generously down her body, as she felt Sansa's fingers tangle in the knobs of her spine, which seemed to be Sansa's favorite part of her, Margaery thought rather coyly.

Margaery pulled back again, but only slightly, to plant kisses up and down Sansa's neck, onto her chin, her ear, before reattaching her lips to Sansa's, enjoying the panting moans that elicited from the girl beneath her before she lost track of them completely as her tongue swept once more into the hot wetness of Sansa's mouth.

She fucked Sansa's mouth with her tongue, enjoyed the way Sansa's hips jutted up against her own instinctively. Margaery heard Sansa hiss out a noise that was partially pleasure and partially pain as she pulled a little too hard on the other girl's hair, and Margaery winced, letting go and running her fingers down Sansa's bare neck in apology.

Sansa didn't seem to remember the slight pain by that point, however, wiggling a little where her clothes had bunched up around her waist and thighs and gasping when Margaery's tongue brushed against her own. Margaery felt Sansa's hand slip from her spine as she leaned a little more over Sansa, pressed a little harder against her lips, whining needily until Sansa opened them further for her.

Margaery bucked a little, and not in arousal, at the feel of Sansa's hand reaching between her legs, glancing down at it as the touch burned her. She thought about Laren, about the half a dozen who had been imprisoned in the cells beneath the Sept for lesser crimes than sodomy since then. "Sansa..." she gasped a little as Sansa's hand flicked at her womanhood through her smallclothes. "Sansa, maybe, maybe we should stop."

Sansa lifted her head, but, instead of the surprise Margaery had expected in her eyes, the denial, she merely looked curious. Margaery wondered why it stung so.

"Why?" Sansa asked, reaching up to adjust her smallclothes once more and flushing a little as she pulled her hand away from Margaery's cunny. "Are you...have you and Joffrey done too much...?" she flushed a little, and Margaery tried not to find it endearing enough to kiss that blush.

Margaery shrugged. "No, not that. It's just...His new...law," she drew the word out slowly, still panting a little from how passionately things had devolved, just moments ago. She needed to breathe. She needed to remember that this wasn't just about her.

She'd never had any qualms about offending the gods in this manner, for this rule seemed more like an idea of stuffy old men rather than the gods, anyway, but she knew that Sansa had been faithful once, even if she didn't think the girl was any longer. She didn't want to offend her into thinking what they were doing was ever wrong.

"My ladies have always been discreet in the past, but now...There's even more danger in us being discovered now." She swallowed hard, pulling her legs off of Sansa and sitting cross legged on the edge of the divan furthest from the other girl as Sansa sat up slowly, still looking confused. "I couldn't bear it if something were to happen to you because of me."

Sansa raised a brow. "Didn't seem to stop you when we were both risking beheading," she pointed out; tone almost idle, and Margaery winced.

There were worse things the law could now do than kill you, worse things that Joffrey could do to you, she thought idly, but didn't dare say the words out loud.

Sansa reached for her again. "We'll just be as careful as we always are," she said in a reasonable tone, and Margaery wanted to listen to her, to believe her. Instead, she squirmed.

"Sansa, if anyone were to find out about this-"

"Are you saying you don't want this?" Sansa asked, expression hooded now.

Margaery shook her head vehemently. "Of course not! I want you, of course I do," she moved forward, kissing Sansa's lips, her forehead, her neck, tried not to worry when Sansa did not respond, especially after what she had just said. "Don't mind me. We're always careful, as you so gracefully pointed out, and we'll just be a bit more so, now. I'm only worried about you."

Sansa snorted. "You needn't be. I've been here longer than you, Margaery," she said, tone dark in a way that Margaery suddenly didn't like, and she moved forward, kissing the words off of Sansa's lips lest she be forced to hear them ring in the air around them.

Sansa was more than willing to be accommodating in that, grabbing at Margaery's shoulder and pulling the sleeve down to bare her arm. She moaned a little as Margaery's tongue licked at Sansa's lips, opened invitingly for Margaery to plunder, and then Margaery was moving down the other girl, licking at her nipples, her belly button, before she moved between Sansa's legs and pushed the rest of Sansa's gown off of her, baring her cunny.

She bent down without another thought, pressing her lips between the folds of Sansa's womanhood and licking almost desperately at the other girl's wet heat. Sansa gasped at the sensation, rutting up against Margaery, and Margaery grinned around her tongue.

A moment later, she felt Sansa's hand exploring her arse, and she lifted it a little, gasped at the sudden intrusion of Sansa's fingers inside of her, nearly losing her concentration on her adoration of Sansa completely.

She gained a bit of momentum; however, as Sansa's fingers began to sluice in and out of her, as Sansa fucked her with her fingers at a slow, loving pace that was nothing like Joffrey had ever done with her, nothing like Elinor had ever had the time to do with her.

Margaery found her tongue matching Sansa's fingers pace for pace, and she pulled a little closer to the other girl, curling her back with some effort and bending her knees to the point of pain that she wouldn't feel until later as Sansa's fingers found more leverage inside of her.

"Oh, Margaery," she heard Sansa gasp below her, and Margaery flicked her gaze upward, saw that Sansa's eyes were almost rolling back into her head, that her face was covered in sweat and a pretty blush, mouth open in a silent 'oh,' of pleasure.

It wouldn't be long now.

And then Margaery was hardly able to think about that at all, as Sansa's fingers curled in her and she saw stars around the edges of her vision. She groaned, enjoyed the feel of her own come leaking around Sansa's fingers as she felt Sansa's come flooding into her mouth, as she swallowed it greedily and without a thought.

They lay there on the divan for a few moments, catching their breath, but Sansa's curiosity from earlier had worried Margaery, and she felt that worry bleeding back into her hazy thoughts now in one form. She curled up beside Sansa on the divan, kissing lazily along the corners of Sansa's mouth until the other girl gave her an amused look and began to kiss her in return.

"You're probably right," Sansa panted into the silence that was only broken by the sounds of wet kisses and smacking of skin.

"Hmm," Margaery hummed contentedly, their previous conversation gone from her mind as she licked her lips of Sansa's sweetness. "I usually am." She glanced up at Sansa impishly. "You'll have to be more specific."

"Perhaps it is best that we are more careful," Sansa suggested slowly, eyes flashing with something Margaery couldn't name but didn't like at all. "It is dangerous, I understand. I just...There are things we could do. Be even more discreet. Don't meet as much, perhaps. You have a point." She swallowed. "I don't want to end up like..."

Margaery licked her way along the shell of Sansa's ear. "Don't want to hear what my point was," she gasped out, moving down to grasp at Sansa's smallclothes at her hip. "And you don't sound nearly as out of breath as you ought to."

Sansa laughed. "I'm surprised you get anything done, as queen," she said, and Margaery snorted.

"Don't tempt me. Now roll over."

"Yes, Your Grace."

"Don't be cheeky."

Whatever was going to be unleashed with Joffrey's new law, Margaery thought as Sansa rolled onto her back, and it wouldn't change things between them. It couldn't, because while Margaery had been agreeable with sending Sansa to Dorne for her own protection days ago, she didn't think she could let the other girl out of her sight, now.


	142. MARGAERY

"Lord Baelish has sent a report from the Eyrie, Your Grace," Lord Varys announced. "The combined forces of the Vale are yours in this fight against Stannis Baratheon, and willing and ready to be sent wherever Your Grace wishes them to be."

"I asked about that Targaryen whore the last time we had a meeting," Joffrey said, as if he hadn't heard a word of Varys' report, and Margaery glanced at her husband in idle concern. She knew that it had been her idea for him to come to so many of these Small Council meetings as he could bear, but she was beginning to find them droll in a way that she knew she could not afford. The whole purpose of convincing Joffrey to come to these was to make sure that his mother and Lord Tywin were not controlling things that Margaery could, and so that she could keep herself aware of what was going on in the Realm.

So she could not afford to be thinking instead about Sansa Stark, and whether or not the other girl was any closer to accepting Margaery's suggestion of making an heir for Casterly Rock. Margaery already had a young man in mind, a boy that she was assured would do as he was bid without question; she only needed Sansa's agreement.

But Sansa had been silent about her plans for the Rock, and, however infuriating that silence was becoming as it seemed to bleed into their every topic of conversation that did not involve sex these days, Margaery couldn't bring herself to push the other girl.

"Has anything been done about her since?" Joffrey demanded, when only silence met his words, and Margaery blinked back to the present moment.

She could worry about Sansa later, she reminded herself. While the Rock was important, it was hardly the largest priority of the Small Council, while Sansa seemed to be professing so little interest in it and they did not at the moment have need of its funds in any more pressing way than usual.

"Been done about her," Varys repeated slowly, looking bemused as he glanced from the Grandmaester to the other members of the Small Council in slow succession.

Joffrey raised a hand impatiently. "Yes. If not, I'll send the Vale to fight her across the Sea," he informed them. "Along with our other troops. We cannot afford to leave her unmolested."

Silence.

"And I want an army brought to King's Landing, as well," Joffrey continued. "These peasants don't seem to understand anything but violence, and if that is what is necessary, that is what I will give them."

"Your Grace," Lord Mace said carefully, "the Crown simply does not have the resources to be fighting in four places at once; here in King's Landing, as well as in Dorne, the North, and the Iron Islands, let alone five. As much as Your Grace's decision to defend against the perversions of the people is..." he paused, "noble, we simply cannot devote more than the token guards of the city wall to such a venture."

"Beyond that," Varys said, "the people will rise up in fear if they believe that their King has turned against them, as well as against the other kingdoms of Westeros-"

"Then I'll slaughter all of them!" Joffrey screeched, and Margaery flinched a little, where she sat beside him. He panted, face puce. "I..." He looked for a moment like a lost little boy, but Margaery couldn't bring herself to pity him. Or care much at all, as she fought not to drum her fingers on the table. "Nothing can be done?"

"The Faith has, in the past, been able to summon up soldiers to fight in its name," one of the Lannisters at the table whose name Margaery couldn't be bothered to remember pointed out then. Gods, they were going to need more members of the Small Council soon.

She had a feeling that no one was willing to bring it up when Joffrey so far refused to name a Hand of the King.

"However," the Grandmaester said, giving the Lannister a stern look, "the King has made it clear that his law has little to do with the Faith, beyond basic principle, and it is wise of him not to involve maesters where it is more than necessary."

There are still many soldiers stationed in Casterly Rock," Lord Varys pointed out then, and Margaery closed her eyes. "While the men of the Reach are here and in the Iron Islands, the soldiers of Casterly Rock number only in half, where they fight in the North."

Joffrey's eyes sparkled. "Yes," he said. "We could bring them to King's Landing, to deal with this situation, as I understand it is most apparent here."

"Ah, begging pardon, Your Grace," Grandmaester Pycelle interrupted then, "But that would leave Casterly Rock almost undefended."

"So?" Joffrey waved a hand. "It is not as if anyone is aiming for Casterly Rock, at the moment."

Lord Varys' jaw twitched; Margaery almost didn't notice, and then her eyes narrowed as she did.

"To take the men from Casterly Rock at the moment would need the acceptance of the current Lord of Casterly Rock," the Grandmaester continued, oblivious to Joffrey's darkening mood. "He would have to give his permission for his soldiers to be used in such a way, and thus leave the Rock open to invasion."

"Casterly Rock has never been invaded," Joffrey argued. "Robb Stark was not able to do it, and neither will Stannis."

"Unfortunately, such a move will still require the Lord of the Rock's consent, Your Grace," Lord Mace pointed out, speaking up again.

"Or its lady," Lord Varys said, smirking slightly, and Margaery narrowed her eyes, wondered what his interest in an undefended Casterly Rock could be.

She knew that her mother had been very interested in it in her letters to Margaery, some time ago, but she could hardly imagine that the woman still was, at the moment, with everything else going on.

And she could hardly see Lord Varys and Olenna Tyrell working in tandem.

Joffrey sneered. "Of course. Sansa will be more than happy to do as we say in her husband's name, I'm certain."

Margaery thought of how Sansa was not willing to have a child in her husband's name, and wasn't quite as sure.


	143. MARGAERY

Margaery's hands shook as Elinor gently guided her into her chambers, set her down on the nearest sofa, and ran fingers through her hair.

Margaery closed her eyes and leaned into the touch, remembering how to breathe for the first time since entering the Keep with Elinor's gentle fingers carding along her scalp. She gasped in one breath, and then another.

She had managed to hold her head up during the fraught return to the King's Landing, while her guards pressed in around them and she clutched Megga to her to keep the girl from being swept into the crowd's bloodlust.

Had managed not to shake or waver as she told Joffrey what had happened, as she dispassionately watched her husband fly into a rage over what he considered an outright attempt on his queen's life, rather than a mob driven by anger and fear lashing out at its first royal target blindly.

Had maintained control until she had returned to this horrid place, her rooms, which should have been a safe haven and were instead only another reminder of violence done against her.

"You're all right, Margaery," Elinor whispered, as if sensing the turn of her thoughts then. "You're going to be all right."

Margaery shook her head, gasped in another breath. She felt soft hands pressing a glass of wine into her fingers, and she glanced up, saw Megga staring down at her where she stood over Margaery in wide eyed concern.

Margaery gulped down the wine in two tries, handed the empty glass back to Megga without a word. And, without a word, the other girl had refilled it.

"How..." Margaery gasped out, breathed in and out, slowly, matching her breaths to Elinor's where she leaned her head against the other woman's chest.

"Your Grace?" Elinor asked quietly. "Are you with us?"

Margaery sipped at her wine, no longer feeling quite so desperate to down an entire barrel of it now, though she noticed that it was still sloshing around the cup alarmingly. Huh. Her hands were still shaking.

"What happened?" she heard Alla's sweet voice whispering from the other corner of the room, and she closed her eyes, closed it all out once more, but that only had the effect of pushing the images of the riot into her head, uninhibited now.

Megga's voice. "There was a riot in Flea Bottom, while we were out giving alms." Margaery was selfishly relieved that the other girl's voice was shaking as badly as her hands. "They're unhappy with the King's new law, about homosexuality. They..."

"Megga," Elinor's voice was gently reproving, and Megga fell silent, then.

"Come, Alla," Megga said after a moment's pause, "let's go and finish folding the laundry in another room, eh?"

Margaery opened her eyes long enough to see Megga herding a curious Alla out of the room, bundles of Margaery's gowns and towels tucked in both of their arms as Megga shut the door behind them.

Elinor pulled away from Margaery. "Are you all right now?"

Margaery swallowed hard. "I'm fine," she gritted out. "They didn't hurt me. I only..." she shook her head. "Sansa told me about the riots. Cersei warned me. About the violence, the chaos, of them. But I didn't realize..." she shook her head, glanced up at Elinor. "What is the point in my handing out alms and bread to them when Joffrey is always there on the other side, brandishing the ax and reminding them to fear, not to love?"

Elinor licked her lips. "I don't know," she said tiredly. "What we saw out there, gods, it was horrible."

Margaery glanced at her, reminded herself that she was not the only one affected by what had happened. "Come, sit down Elinor, you're shaking."

Elinor sat beside her on the sofa. "None of us were hurt," she pointed out. "I thought Megga might be, at one point, but she wasn't."

Margaery nodded. "A blessing of the Mother."

Elinor hummed. "I..." she shook her head. "They loved you, when we first came to the city."

Margaery sighed. "Because I brought them bread and hope," she said, tonelessly. "But now they begin to see that just because I am willing to feed them, does not mean that their situation will improve."

Elinor reached up and rubbed at the back of her neck. "Gods, I wish King Renly were still alive," she muttered, tone almost belligerent. "He had a way of making everyone love him."

Margaery sighed, secure enough in the safety of her chambers now that she didn't need to reprimand the other girl for speaking her mind. They had made certain altercations to the Maindenvault in recent months, to ensure such protection. Ever since Ser Osmund.

"Yes," she murmured, "Everyone here would have loved him," she agreed. "And he would have made a wonderfully loved, false king."

Elinor sent her an unimpressed look. "It's not as if he would be the only false king to sit upon the Iron Throne," she muttered, and Margaery raised an eyebrow, but didn't have the chance to respond before the door to her chamber flew open.

"Are you all right?" Loras demanded, barging into the room. He looked livid, face a mess of red and purple splotches.

Margaery sighed, reaching up to brush at her hair. It had fallen out of the elaborate style Alla had placed it in during the flight back to the Keep, she realized idly, as some of it fell into her eyes.

"I'm fine, Loras," she said tiredly. "Joffrey has already had a maester look over me." He had been quite insistent on that, even when Margaery had tried to convince her husband that she was well. He was angry enough not to listen to her, and Margaery had come to understand that there were times when she needed to pick her battles, with her husband. "Not even a scratch."

Loras scoffed. "Forgive me if I don't believe a Lannister maester," he muttered, coming forward and kneeling down in front of her, pulling at her hands with an almost bruising touch as he searched for injuries.

Margaery pulled away. "Loras..."

"Your husband is a fucking menace," Loras gritted out, turning her hands over and inspecting her palms. "It's his fault you nearly died out there, and right now he has the audacity to be screeching in the throne room about how the smallfolk should all be slaughtered for it."

Margaery stiffened. "Loras, tell me you didn't _abandon your duties to the King_ to come and find me."

Loras shot her a look. "I didn't see any Kingsguards following you worth a damn. Lancel Lannister is still skulking about in the hall, by the way."

Margaery couldn't bring herself to smile. "You shouldn't have just left like that. I'm fine."

Loras ground his teeth, eyes slanting toward Elinor, then back to Margaery. He released her hands, stood to his feet to sweep a hand through his hair. "Why did you send me to the harbor for your silks two days ago?" he blurted out, and Margaery blinked at him.

"What?"

"Why did you-"

"I heard you," Margaery interrupted patiently.

Loras made a frustrated sound.

Elinor gave her queen a concerned look, but Margaery just nodded tiredly, indicating that the girl could go. Elinor moved out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

Margaery folded her arms over her chest, collected herself as best she could, because she could tell that this was not a conversation Loras was going to let lie. "Because they had just arrived, and I told you, I needed them as quickly as possible so that the seamstresses-"

"That ship was in the harbor for a day before you suddenly had to have those gowns, and you said nothing before then," Loras snapped impatiently. "So why did you send me that day?"

"Loras-"

Loras moved further into the room. "Because I think it had something to do with the arrest of that commoner from Flea Bottom whom Joffrey had put to death for," he licked his lips, "sodomy."

Margaery flinched. Loras reached out, brushing the hair out of her eyes. "You've always been a good liar, Margaery, but don't lie to me. I thought we'd discussed this. You can keep anything from me if you like, but don't lie to me. There are enough people doing that in King's Landing at the moment."

"How did you find out about it?" Margaery asked weakly.

Loras lowered his hand. "Did you really think I wouldn't? It's all the Kingsguard will talk about-"

"I didn't know the Kingsguard gossiped like fishmongers' wives," Margaery said bitterly.

"And besides that, Olyvar wouldn't agree to meet with me today. Said it was too dangerous, and that he would have to wait for any more clients," he sneered the word, "until things had calmed down. And that was before the riot broke out. I almost had to send him a message asking what he was talking about, but I think I can hear that odd High Sparrow bellowing his condemnation of the King from here."

Margaery's forehead wrinkled. "His condemnation? I would have thought a fanatic like him would have been pleased that Joffrey is upholding that particular law."

Loras chuckled humorlessly. "Apparently, he disapproves of the King's methods, and of the fact that Joffrey isn't doing," he swallowed thickly, " _that_ , for the greater good of the Faith. He thinks that 'those caught sodomizing' should be given a chance to atone for their sin before the gods, and that the Crown should have nothing to do with the matter."

Margaery almost rolled her eyes, but then saw the look on Loras' face. She reached out, clasping her brother's elbow. "Loras, I'm sorry I didn't tell you. But I didn't want," she bit her lip, "I was afraid of how you might react."

Loras' face softened, but only slightly. "I should have been there. I should have-"

"I know," Margaery said. "I know that you should have been on the roster guarding the King that day, that you should have been in the throne room when it happened. But I was terrified for you, because I knew you wouldn't keep quiet, and I was afraid that what would happen to Laren..."

"Am I somehow more important than Laren?" Loras demanded, and Margaery fell silent, staring at him. "That I should be protected from a law that Joffrey has explicitly stated affects everyone, noble or smallfolk, when he should be-" he stopped, looking sick.

"Yes," Margaery whispered, squeezing his shoulder. "Yes, you are more important. To me."

Loras scoffed, started toward the door.

"I can't stop Joffrey from implementing this law," Margaery told him. "I don't know what's set him off, but he seems determined to see it through. But I can keep my brother safe from it, and for that, I would see a hundred men killed as Laren was."

"Gods, Margaery, do you even hear yourself?" Loras asked tiredly.

Margaery looked away. "When Joffrey and I were still courting, he mentioned once to me that Renly's...persuasions were ones that he had contemplated making illegal," she told him. "I did not think much of it at the time, because I believed that I would be able to keep him from ever implementing such a law, but he gave me no forewarning this time, Loras. You have to believe that."

Loras swallowed. "You don't think...?" he asked, suddenly looking ill.

Margaery sighed. "If he suspected me of anything, I would already be dead, Loras." She bit her lip. "I don't know what suddenly inspired Joffrey to suddenly implement a law he'd expressed nothing about for months, but something must have, for him to react so violently. For him to enforce that law when he barely enforces any of the laws he creates. Loras..."

He glanced at her. "What is it? You obviously suspect something, so tell me."

She sighed, brushing her hair back into the elaborate plaits it was beginning to fall out of. "You and Olyvar have not been exactly...subtle, in your passion for one another."

"He doesn't have any passion for me," Loras said dully. "He's just a whore, doing what he's paid to." _Unlike Renly_ , hung in the air, and Margaery felt a pang of sympathy for him, before she flinched, thought of her plans for the child Sansa could have to protect her claim to Casterly Rock.

"And you trust him?" she asked quietly, reaching out and smoothing down her brother's ragged curls.

Loras flinched away from her. "You think...you think that someone must have seen me and Olyvar...are you saying that what happened to the commoner, that was my fault?"

Margaery moved forward instantly, pulling her brother into her arms. "Of course not," she whispered. "Of course not. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have brought it up. I just...I don't understand Joffrey's sudden obsession with this. It scares me."

"He's a madman, Margaery," Loras said, sighing patiently and running his fingers through her already ruined hair. "They obsess."

Margaery closed her eyes, breathed out slowly through her nose. "I was just trying to protect you, Loras," she murmured against his chest.

She felt like she had been doing that with all of her loved ones far too much lately, thought of the resentment she sometimes saw in Sansa's eyes when the other girl thought she wasn't looking, the anger in Loras' voice when he accused her of doing it, and sighed.

"I know," she heard him whisper. "And for what it's worth, I do trust Olyvar. I know it isn't wise, when he's in the employ of Baelish, even if he's seemed nothing but helpful to our causes so far, beyond what happened with Sansa's marriage to Willas, but I do. I..."

Margaery pulled back, staring up at him. "You care about him," she breathed out.

Loras huffed out a laugh. "Against my better judgment," he informed her.

Margaery almost laughed, low in her throat. She couldn't quite bring herself to, after what she had seen today. "I know the feeling," she murmured, and Loras eyed her.

"We're going to grow strong, Margaery," he told her finally. "I know it doesn't seem like it at the moment, but things will get better because they have to, and because, between the two of us and grandmother, we're stubborn enough to make them."

Margaery hitched a laugh. "Did you just quote our House's words to me? You?"

Loras shrugged one shoulder. "I would never," he teased, and bent down, kissing Margaery on the forehead. "I'm sorry I was angry at you, Margaery. We always protect each other, I know that."

Margaery licked her lips, thought of what had happened in Flea Bottom, without her brother there to protect her. Of how the people had screamed as they threw rocks and rotten food, how they had tried to squeeze between the Kingsguards who had been present just to get a swipe at her.

They could have died. Her, Elinor, Alla. Those Kingsguard, and then no one would have been left between the smallfolk and the target of their ire.

Margaery shivered. "Always," she whispered, for she would have seen them all die if it had meant protecting any of her ladies or Loras, and she knew that now.

"But I need to know," he whispered against her hair. She lifted her head. "I know that I wasn't trustworthy with Willas' marriage, that I fucked the whole thing up. But I...I need to know when you're planning something that involves me. Please."

Margaery hesitated. "All right," she agreed quietly, and resolved to simply omit that from her next letter to her grandmother. The woman had made it quite clear what she thought of sharing anything with any of the male members of their House these days, save for Willas.

"And," Loras continued, before Margaery could convince herself he would not speak again, "I can't just sit by, if something like this happens again."

Margaery's head jerked up. "Loras..." she protested, even as she knew it was no use.

He gave her a sad smile. "I wouldn't be able to sit by if ever did anything to you, Margaery, just like I won't be able to sit by, as you feared, if he does something to someone...someone like me, for no other reason than that they are _like me_."

Margaery shivered. "I understand," she whispered, and suddenly felt a bit less regretful about her decision to send him away from the throne room in the first place. She thought some of that might have reflected on her face, by Loras' expression, but she didn't care.


	144. SANSA

"Lady Sansa," Joffrey sneered at her, as Sansa came to stand before her King, trying desperately not to look at Meryn Trant where he stood before the Iron Throne, grinning at her fiendishly with one hand on the hilt of his sword.

He looked just ready to use it.

She noticed that Margaery was not even in the throne room, and wondered why, when Margaery always made such grand attempts to be at her husband's side, whenever he was doing anything of importance.

But she knew that the riot in the city had shaken Margaery. They had spent the night together, tangled in one another's arms after Margaery had finally managed to get away from Joffrey and his plans of revenge against the commoners who dared to frighten his queen, and Sansa had seen the paleness in Margaery's face even after the moon had disappeared behind dark clouds.

She wouldn't speak of it, not to Sansa, and Sansa didn't necessarily want to ask about it, not when she knew it would remind her of her own ordeal during one of the riots, but they took comfort in each other for the night, and Sansa pretended that she did not lie awake for long hours after Margaery finally fell into a fitful sleep, wondering if there were ever such riots in Dorne.

"Your Grace," she said, dipping into a curtsey when she realized that she had left her king waiting too long, and Joffrey sent her another sneer.

"Your king has a request of you, Lady of Casterly Rock," he said, and Sansa closed her eyes, for she had known this would come soon enough, even if she was not sure in what form it would.

And she wasn't ready, she thought wildly. It was one thing to hypothesize with Shae and to pour over the books she found in the libraries, but it was quite another to do this in front of Joffrey and his entire court.

Her eyes flitted to Ser Meryn again, and she bit the inside of her cheek.

"Name it, Your Grace," she said delicately, "and I shall do what is in my power to see your request done."

Joffrey looked absurdly pleased, like a cat given cream, and Sansa suddenly wanted very much to take back her words.

It was funny; she thought idly, how, not so long ago, she had sought to please Joffrey in everything he did. After all, keeping him happy, while a difficult job to be sure, also kept her alive for so long, after her father's death. After Robb's treason.

She didn't care quite so much about keeping him happy now, and she wondered if that was because he now had a queen to do so for him, or because of the Rock.

Oh, she knew that the Rock did not make her much more powerful than she was, not truly. She was the Lady of Winterfell, and there was little she could do with that title, beyond see it as the chain that hung low around her neck.

But if there was anything that Margaery had taught her in the other girl's months as queen, it was that the image she put forth to the people was everything. Whether it be the smallfolk of Flea Bottom, rioting in the streets because they saw their king as the cruel and capricious character he was now, or the courtiers falling over themselves to gain Joffrey's favor.

"As you know, the situation at Winterfell is a dangerous one," Joffrey informed her. "Our ability to keep your homeland safe for you is under threat by that traitor Stannis," he went on, raising his voice until it boomed through the throne room, "and our men run thin. However," he went on, before Sansa could open her mouth to thank him prettily for being so protective of her homeland for her, "that also means that, because of the burden we owe to you to keep the North firmly in your hands, we are unable to fully protect ourselves here in the city. Therefore, you will send the rest of the soldiers from Casterly Rock to help deal with the current uprisings of the smallfolk. Remind them to whom they owe their allegiance."

Sansa licked her lips, waited for Joffrey to go on, was a little surprised when he did not, merely stared at her, waiting for her to meekly nod her head and agree with him that of course this was what she would do.

She was no strategist, no maester, but Sansa was also not a fool. There was a reason they were asking this of her, and not of Tyrion, in exchange for a warm blanket where he lay huddled in the Black Cells.

The moment dragged on until Sansa could hear the quiet murmuring of the courtiers around her, and she decided that she would have to speak. Her heart leapt up into her throat the moment she opened her mouth, and she closed it again, swallowing.

"I am afraid that I cannot honor your request, Your Grace," Sansa said quietly, not looking at the King but rather at the tiles before his throne.

A shocked silence followed her words, and Sansa peeked up.

"You what?" Joffrey demanded finally, seething.

Sansa lowered her head to hide her smile. "Your Grace, I have been advised," she didn't dare say by Shae, and let that merely hang in the air, "That as the Lady of Casterly Rock, and working in my husband's name, it would be foolish of me to leave Casterly Rock without a defense, if Stannis Baratheon turns his eye West instead of continuing on to Winterfell."

"Your King has need of you, and you would refuse him?" Joffrey bit off the words.

"I am not refusing Your Grace's request," Sansa corrected patiently. "I would never wish to bring Your Grace's anger upon me, and I am grateful for your protection of my home," she continued, "I am only doing what I believe to be best for the Rock, with Stannis Baratheon a stone's throw away from it."

Not a stone's throw, but she would hardly be the first courtier accused of exaggerating.

Joffrey gaped at her. "I could order you," he stammered out finally, and Sansa bit the inside of her cheek.

"You could, Your Grace," she agreed quietly, "but I would entreat you to be merciful, for the sake of our family's stronghold in the Westerlands."

Joffrey glared at her, and for a moment, Sansa thought she saw fire in his eyes. She thought perhaps that she should be more frightened, in this moment, for standing up to Joffrey. Or, at the very least, elated that she had finally managed to do so, her one foolish act before he ordered her head off.

Instead, she felt nothing at all. A numbness that settled deep over her body as she stared up at the blond occupant of the Iron Throne, and watched him stare back at her. Numb, with the only sound filling her ears the sound of her own breathing.

"But the Rock will gladly send its gold to King's Landing, to aid the King in finding sellswords to fight against your current problem within the city," she continued, when the silence grew too thick.

The silence in the throne room grew stiff and uncomfortable, and Sansa shifted on her feet, keenly aware of the half step that Meryn Trant took forward before glancing at his king.

Joffrey, for his part, appeared frozen where he sat on the throne, one hand still lifted out to her, as if he were going to order her head taken from her shoulders, mouth parted in silent surprise.

She wondered if this was what she had looked like, when he had ordered her father's head after promising to be merciful to him.

"Keep your men then," he gritted out finally, and Sansa remembered to breathe once more. "And be gone from my sight."

Sansa curtseyed lowly before the throne. "I shall see about the gold at once, Your Gr-"

"Yes, yes," Joffrey snapped irritably, and before Sansa had managed to turn around she could hear him muttering to Lord Mace in a subdued voice, demanding to know if the Tyrells had more men to spare from the Reach.

Shae was waiting for Sansa at the edge of the throne room, next to one of the doors that Sansa quickly made her escape through, before Joffrey called her back and demanded retribution for her refusal.

"Are you certain that was wise?" Shae asked quietly.

Sansa eyed her. She knew what Shae was worried about. Joffrey would not doubt hold a grudge against Sansa for refusing him, and making him look like such a helpless fool in front of his entire court, and would want revenge for it.

Sansa straightened, remembered how shaken Margaery had been last night, and wondered if there was another reason Margaery had not been present today. Wondered if perhaps, somehow, Margaery had known that Sansa would refuse her king, and did not want to be present to earn her king's ire for witnessing such a thing.

"Margaery warned me that Joffrey is making contingency plans to take the Rock for his mother, if I do not hand it over to him soon," she told Shae through clenched teeth as they walked out of the throne room.

Shae stopped, stumbled after her a beat later. "Is he that concerned that Tyrion may walk free?" she asked, hope bleeding into her voice.

She didn't voice the thought that the King did not have the right to simply take the Rock by force because he didn't like the person in charge of it.

The last time a royal had taken what did not belong to him, civil war had broken out throughout Westeros, and Joffrey Baratheon was far less loved than Rhaegar Targaryen had been.

Sansa shrugged one shoulder. "I don't know. Margaery thinks he's just paranoid, but she also told me that there is precious little information tying Tyrion to Tywin's death, beyond the knife, and the fact that he was in King's Landing, that night."

"Anyone could have planted that knife," Shae said softly, sounding wondrous.

"I don't know," Sansa breathed out. "Margaery doesn't even have all of the information, I think. But whatever is going on, Joffrey does seem...paranoid. I promised myself I would try to keep the Rock for Tyrion, and I will. Even if that means making Joffrey angry."

Shae gave her a worried look. "Good," she said finally, and Sansa offered her an awkward smile.


	145. MARGAERY

Joffrey was in a foul mood.

Margaery had been expecting it, of course; the riot against her in Flea Bottom, alongside the damning words of the sparrows as they spoke out unmolested against the King in the streets, was slowly setting him off into the sort of tantrum that Margaery wished she could travel to Highgarden to avoid.

And, of course, there was the business of Sansa refusing to send the Rock's soldiers to assist Joffrey against those riots, in front of his entire court.

Margaery would have been proud of the girl if she wasn't terrified of what Joffrey's retribution against her would look like, once he got around to it.

In the mean time, Joffrey was taking his anger out on unsuspecting smallfolk, which was hardly a mercy, but at least kept him from doing anything monumentally stupid.

She stiffened, wondered if Loras was right about her, that she truly did prioritize the lives of the nobles above the smallfolk. Once, it hadn't been like that, she thought idly. Once, she had truly heeded her dear mother's words and thought that they were not better than the smallfolk, because the smallfolk allowed them to be their rulers, and could change their minds about that at any time.

But she would choose Sansa and Loras over any member of the smallfolk on any day, and she would choose to placate a king rather than save a poor man's life in the same breath, and Margaery was not at all certain what that said about her, now.

The young man who had been dragged before the king moments ago bowed and scraped his way out of the throne room, no doubt thanking the gods for his good fortune at being allowed to keep his head, if not his home and his wages as a blacksmith in the city, and Margaery pursed her lips, turned to her husband.

"Oughtn't we retire for something to eat, my love?" she asked, giving him a lust-filled glance that had nothing to do with food, and everything to do with distracting him from the next poor bastard to be brought before him.

Joffrey eyed her, looked contemplative, and then reached out and squeezed her hand, ever the doting lover.

"After this next one, my queen," he whispered in her ear, forcing her to lean forward to hear him. "This one made me think of you."

Margaery licked her lips, tried not to be worried about whatever in the seven hells that meant.

"All right, Your Grace," she murmured back at him, keenly aware that they were whispering like children in front of the people whose lives they held in their hands, "but don't leave it too long, eh? I'm famished."

And she was. Her womb was irritatingly empty, and she needed to fill it as soon as she was able.

Joffrey sent her a smirk in response, before waving his hand for the guards to bring forward his next distraction.

"What's next?" Joffrey asked his herald, as Margaery's stomach roiled where she sat beside him.

The herald looked a bit nervous, calling up the next girl, a dirty, flea bitten girl from Flea Bottom, eyes lowered down to her bare feet and clothes hanging raggedly off her body.

Margaery straightened a little in her seat, glancing at her king out of the corner of her eye as she tried to think of how this shell of a child had reminded Joffrey of her.

The girl dipped into one of the worst curtseys Margaery had ever seen, and she heard Joffrey sigh, beside her.

"Do you know why you're here?" Joffrey asked, and the young woman glanced up at the king shakily. He sent her a nasty smirk when it took her too long to answer him.

"N-No sir. Your Grace."

Joffrey raised a brow. "Don't you?"

Her lower lip began to wobble. "I...didn't mean no harm, Your Grace," she stammered out. "I...didn't know the riots were going to get so bad, I swear to the gods. I just...We just wanted some food, in my home, and the new laws-"

Joffrey sniffed, interrupting the girl before she could burst into tears. "Look at my wife."

The girl did so, wide, terrified eyes turning to Margaery, and the words Margaery had thought to say, the ones discouraging her husband from hurting this girl, died in her throat at the raw terror in the young girl's face.

"Would you not argue that my lady wife is beautiful?" he asked, and, clearly at a loss, the girl nodded.

"V-very beautiful, Your Grace," she stammered out, looking back at the King's boots once more.

"But you're not," Joffrey told her bluntly. "You're ugly. You're ugly, and I had to spend my time looking at you while you blocked the road back to the Keep from the fucking Sept, distracted from looking at my queen because you're so fucking hideous."

The girl sniffed loudly enough that everyone in the throne room could hear it, and Margaery closed her eyes, turned away. It was too late for the girl now. Joffrey had smelt blood, and like a rabid dog, nothing would stop him from converging upon it.

"Do you know that it is a crime to riot against your king?" Joffrey demanded, leaning forward in his chair. "To endanger his life with your petty grievances taking up the road?"

The girl shivered, still not daring to look up at the throne. "I am sorry, Your Grace. So sorry, I-"

"I don't care about your fucking apologies!" Joffrey screeched, and the girl fell silent, body shaking so badly that Margaery worried she would fall over, in the next moment. "Do you hear me?"

The girl bit her lip, and Margaery saw two tears slip down her cheeks, saw the trickle of liquid dripping down her bare legs, and the grimaces of the courtiers nearest to where she was standing.

"I'm going to make ugliness a crime against the Crown," Joffrey announced to the audience of courtiers watching him stand to his feet in shocked silence. "It offends your King's eyes, and has no place in a dazzling, victorious city which stood so strong against Stannis Baratheon."

The silence of the throne room lasted only a few short moments, before someone cleared their throat and everyone began to tentatively clap at the king's newest ultimatum.

Margaery closed her eyes, and wished that she had not mentioned how famished for her king she was, mere moments ago. She had been rather put off the very thought of it, just now.

"My love," she began, in a quiet, but not timid, tone, and waited until Joffrey had turned to look at her. "In light of this new law being announced only after the stupid girl's offense, perhaps you could be merciful?" she batted her eyes at him. "For my sake, at the very least. I did not know that I was competing with anyone for your affections, after all, and now that I do, I shall have to work far harder at charming you."

Joffrey stared at her for a moment, before his lips pulled into a grin. "You wouldn't need to compete with anyone, my lady. The little bitch was just irritating me, with her rioting that day."

Margaery nodded carefully. The second riot in seven days. Something needed to be done, and that meant not killing little girls for being ugly, starving creatures.

And if it were true that she need not compete with anyone, Margaery thought, a touch bitterly, Sansa Stark would not so often occupy her husband's thoughts.

After a moment, her husband sighed, and turned his attention back to the girl. "But my wife is a merciful queen," he informed her, "and has reminded me in our short months of marriage together that mercy is an equal motivator to the fear that the smallfolk ought to have for their king, and that there is no competition for her in my heart, and thus you are not worth the trouble of dealing with." He waved a hand. "Be gone from my sight, girl, and by the gods, clean yourself up somehow."

That inspired laughter from the courtiers, and Margaery leaned over, kissing her husband on the cheek.

"Now, can we retire, my love?" she whispered against his skin, voice needling.

He laughed slowly. "I knew I would sate your appetite, my love," he told her, and Margaery sent him a wide grin.

"You needn't worry about that, Your Grace," she told him airily. "It's been so long since we've had a bit of fun together, I'm ready for anything."

For a desperate moment, Margaery wished the words were true.


	146. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have just one thing to say, after seeing that finale; in this fic we respect and love Elia Martell. Carry on to the porn.

"Did anyone see you?" Margaery asked carefully, pulling the door shut behind Sansa and pulling the redhead into her arms.

Sansa sent her a wry look. "Of course not. And they won't. We've been very careful, recently."

Margaery nodded tiredly, pulling back and giving Sansa a onceover. "Of course we have," she murmured, "but still, that is no reason to get cocky now."

Sansa grimaced, looked away, and an uncomfortable silence fell between the two of them.

Margaery sighed, reaching out and lifting Sansa's chin. "I worry," she explained quietly. "Can you blame me?"

Sansa moved forward, kissing her gently on the lips. Then, more passionately, until Margaery stumbled back into the bed behind her, Alla's bed again, poor dear, but at least Alla had complained about nothing the last time they had met in this room.

The backs of Margaery's knees knocked against the bed, and she fell down onto it, pulling Sansa down with her a moment later, moaning as her lips parted, and inviting Sansa's tongue.

For this moment, she could forget that they were in Alla's bedchamber instead of her own, could forget that the world was ending around them in fire and there was very little she felt she could do about it, because Sansa was here, and if she closed her eyes, Sansa was always the only one there.

She felt Sansa's tongue jab against her gag reflex, and Margaery grimaced, pulling away a little, but then Sansa's hands were roaming down her body, stripping her of each article of clothing with painful slowness, and Margaery closed her eyes, pushed up into Sansa's mouth desperately as she ripped Sansa's clothes from her body with just enough gentleness to keep them nice as they fell from her.

Sansa seemed to match her desperation the moment Margaery's smallclothes were gone from her body, littering the floor beside the bed, and Margaery half turned on the bed, pushing Sansa into the lush blankets and staring down at her breathlessly for a moment.

It occurred to her then, with painful clarity, that she had almost lost all of this. Sansa had almost made it Dorne, a free woman and a guest of the Martells, and there was a good chance that Margaery would have never seen her again.

And now Joffrey threatened to take it from her again, with his new, horrid law.

It only made Margaery want to cling to Sansa more tightly, she thought, fingers reaching out to brush along the curves of Sansa's buttocks, to pull at them when she felt like Sansa was not close enough to her, until their bodies pressed together, Sansa's heat hitting Margaery abruptly.

Margaery did not remember the last time she had came untouched. She remembered the first time Sansa had done so with stunning clarity, Margaery's fingers wrapped around her nipples, Margaery's lips against hers, but Margaery must have been quite young when it last happened.

Even with Joffrey, these days, she found herself faking an orgasm far more than she found herself genuinely enjoying the things he did to her, and when she did, it was usually because she had one finger up inside her cunny alongside her husband's cock, massaging herself to ecstasy when the thought of the man who was fucking her ruined her chances of doing so on his cock alone.

When she came, Sansa's fingers nowhere near her cunny and the sheets below her wetting with the unmistakable proof of it, Margaery threw back her head and gasped, three fingers still knuckle deep in Sansa as she pulled away from their kiss.

Sansa was coming a moment later, almost as affected as Margaery, she thought through the pleasant haze settling over her, but not quite, and they collapsed unto the bed together, a tangle of limbs and pants that filled the whole of Margaery's world for a few short moments.

She found herself staring into Sansa's eyes, the other girl unblinking, and she thought they were the most beautiful blue she had ever seen, in that moment. She could get lost in eyes like those forever.

"I heard he ordered a girl killed for being ugly," Sansa blurted out, and Margaery shifted onto her back on the bed, grimacing.

"He didn't kill her," Margaery whispered, not meeting Sansa's eyes. "I managed to convince him to send her home, and send her home with some bread and dried meats."

But it was a near thing, far nearer than Margaery truly wanted to admit.

And to think, she had nearly said nothing at all, and the girl would have died, when Margaery could have so easily prevented it.

She grimaced, thinking of the way Joffrey had repaid her for distracting him from the suffering of those beneath him in the bedchamber after that, of the soreness that still clung to her body as she ate Sansa's cunt and deferred doing anything more, pretending not to notice the annoyance in Sansa's eyes when she brushed off Sansa's thinly veiled attempts at doing more.

"Funny," Sansa said idly, brushing the hair out her own, "That I once thought that beauty was all that was required to make someone beautiful."

Margaery turned, gave Sansa a wan smile. "You ought to be a bard, with those types of poems."

Sansa laughed, though the sound rang too loud in the gardens. "I would make a terrible bard," she said. "I'm afraid that all of my songs would have a common theme."

Margaery almost wanted to ask what that theme would be, even if she had some clue, but she resisted. Sansa had been oddly recalcitrant since returning to King's Landing, and Margaery had no desire to push her. She knew what that escape must have meant to Sansa, and the other girl ought to have the time to mourn her chance at it, if she so wanted.

The gods knew that Margaery likely would have reacted in the same manner, if not worse, to have all of her hope swept out from under her feet so quickly.

"Well," Margaery said, sitting up a little on the bed and licking down Sansa's neck, where she had left a rather impressive mark with her tongue, if she did say so herself. "I think all of my songs of late would have a familiar theme as well,” she said, trying to lift the mood.

Sansa snorted, batting at her with her arm. "Gods, with everything Joffrey has been doing lately, it's a wonder all of our songs are not dirges."

“Oh,” Margaery said, realization as to why Sansa was so moody today hitting her. “Sansa, you mustn’t think what almost happened to the girl was your fault.”

Sansa pulled back. "My fault?" she asked, confusion filling her features. "Why should it be my fault?"

And there Margaery went again, putting her foot in her mouth where clearly it was unwanted. "...Nothing," Margaery said, waving a hand. "Never mind me."

Sansa's eyes narrowed. "No," she said. "Why would it be my fault?" At Margaery's further hesitation, "Weren't you the one who insisted we not keep things from each other?"

Margaery sagged, a little hurt that the other girl had brought that up, but she supposed she deserved it, anyway. "I only meant...because Joffrey was angry with you. Over the soldiers. That is all. You know how he gets; it could have been anything. I only meant that you should not feel it was your fault because of that anger. There is no reasoning with him."

Sansa squinted at her, pulling back abruptly on the bed. "But you don't think he was angry about something else," she surmised. "You think he was angry about me refusing him, so he took it out on an innocent, ugly girl."

Margaery winced. "Sansa..." she bit her lip. "I didn't say that."

Sansa shook her head, tearing off the sheets and reaching for her clothes where they lay in a heap on the floor.

"Sansa," Margaery cried incredulously as the redhead began to slip back into them.

"I need..." Sansa turned back to her, sighed at the expression on Margaery's face, whatever it was. She bent forward, kissing Margaery gently on the lips, but there was no passion in it. "I need to think, Margaery. I...I just need to think. It was foolish of me, to not think of the repercussions..." she shook her head, pushing her arms through the sleeves of her gown.

Margaery tutted, reaching out for her, hurt when Sansa pulled away but understanding all the same. "You can't be responsible for everyone else, Sansa," she told the other girl gently. "You can only be responsible for you."

Sansa sighed, pinched the bridge of her nose. "No one else dies because of me when I give Joffrey what he wants," she said tightly. "No one dies because of you."

Margaery lifted her chin. "You think so? Sansa, there are days when I'm not sure I can endure the thought of his touch, knowing that something I said set him off, even if I did not intend for it to do so, even if it was the most innocuous of things. Everything anyone says could set him off, and you can't blame yourself when it does, or you will go mad. It is no one's fault but his own. Well, perhaps his parents'."

God knows, if he hadn't been the child of incest, he might not have been insane, Margaery thought, and resolutely did not contemplate the thought of a sane husband.

Sansa just stared at her, wiped at her face. "I really need to go," she said. "Shae might be looking for me."

They both knew that Shae would not be looking for her, that Shae already knew where she was, but Margaery did not call the other girl out on the lie. She merely sighed, pulling the sheets off her own naked form and reaching for her small clothes, getting one more peck on Sansa's cheek before the other girl escaped out the door of Alla's chambers.

Margaery sighed at her back, at the door swinging shut behind her. Wished that she had not opened her mouth, that she could have shielded Sansa from one more thing.


	147. MARGAERY

"Margaery," her father's voice interrupted the low hum of chatter around her, and Margaery lifted her head, forcing a smile as her father entered her quarters.

Her ladies abruptly quieted, all standing to curtsey to Margaery first and Lord Mace second before filtering out of the room, Alla shutting the door behind them silently to leave father and daughter alone in privacy.

Her father looked strangely out of place in Margaery's chambers, and Margaery realized with a start that she did not think he had ever been in them, not since her arrival in King's Landing.

"Father," she stood to her feet, giving him a small curtsey and setting aside her knitting. "What can I do for you?"

Her usually jovial father stepped forward, kissing her cheek in an action that was almost per functionary and reminded her far too much of the way Sansa and kissed her goodbye the day before, practically fleeing Alla's chambers. A shadow passed over her face, and she forced it away, forced herself to keep smiling.

Her father was not smiling as he took a seat on the divan across from her. "We need to talk about your husband," he told her; the words Margaery had not realized she was dreading until this moment.

"I've been doing everything a wife can to...induce carrying a child, papa," she told him, blushing through it where she did not blush about far dirtier things with anyone else, and her papa blushed as well, looking just as uncomfortable as she.

But then he waved away the words. "I know you are, my little rose," he told her, and Margaery lifted a brow, confused about why he had come now. "But I am not here to talk to you about that."

"What, then?" Margaery asked, folding her hands in her lap.

"Your husband is out of control," her father reprimanded after a long, uncomfortable pause, as if this were down to a personal failure on Margaery's part, and Margaery blinked up at him, saw that his usually jovial face lacked all the warmth she had come to expect in her childhood.

She didn't know why her father was approaching her today, of all days; Joffrey had only had one bard killed today, rather than stringing up thirty sailors by their necks because the latest ship full of sweetmeat had come into the harbor rotten, she thought nastily, and instantly chastised herself at the thought.

If there was one thing she hated most about being Joffrey's wife, it was the casual way she viewed death now, far more so than ever she had in the past.

"This is about the position of Hand of the King, isn't it?" she asked tiredly, sighed and rubbed at her temples when her father did not deny it.

She knew that her father had ambitions toward becoming the new Hand of the King, now that Lord Tywin was dead, knew that he could very well get the position as well, considering their current power at court and the fact that Kevan Lannister remained in Casterly Rock, not yet arrived.

But Joffrey had made no announcements about replacing the Hand of the King since Lord Tywin's death, and with his current bouts of rage, Margaery did not dare to bring it up, lest she unintentionally sentence the entire city to death because Joffrey decided that they had all had some part in his lord grandfather's demise.

"I told you, papa, I can't make Joffrey choose you as his new Hand."

Her father hesitated; she would take that to mean that even he understood the full offense of his next words, though that did not stop him from saying them. "Can't you...convince him, with your...powers of persuasion?"

Margaery felt a headache growing at the back of her head. "If I do, papa, the Lannisters will claim that we are taking advantage of their time of grief, and then we will be in far dire straits."

Her father sighed. "I understood that you had a better hold on your husband than this," he said finally, and Margaery stiffened at the accusation in his voice. "That it was not just Tywin Lannister keeping him to heel."

Her mouth opened and closed. She was trying her best, she wanted to say. In the beginning, it had been so much easier, and she did not know if that was because Joffrey had been humoring her more than he did now that he expected her to be just like him, or because it had been easier, manipulating him when she did not know how much of a monster he could be.

But her father was not here to hear excuses, nor did he want to hear how difficult it was to keep a handle on his goodson.

He may know some things about Joffrey, things it was impossible to hide, such as that he was a monster capable of mass murdering an entire city full of his father's bastards, but Mace Tyrell was still sold on the ambition of his daughter being the King's wife, still preferred, in many ways, to believe the fairy tale that he had granted his daughter by getting the throne for her was real.

She bowed her head, so that she did not have to meet her father's eyes. "I am sorry, papa," she whispered.

Her father let out a long sigh, and Margaery lifted her head, wondered for a brief moment if it was her grandmother who had sent her father to speak with her like this, rather than her father's own ambitions.

But Olenna would have sent a letter detailing her disappointment, Margaery reminded herself, and somehow, it was far easier to be a disappointment to her father than to her grandmother.

"Joffrey just sent a nobleman to the Sept for sodomy," her father said, expression full of distaste, and Margaery's head jerked up where she sat beside him.

This was the first nobleman so far, she thought idly. Mostly, Joffrey had been going after smallfolk from Flea Bottom, people who would no more be defended than they would be missed.

"Who?" she rasped out.

Her father gave her a long look. "One of the lords from the Stormlands' sons," he said, and Margaery sucked in a breath, suddenly understanding his concern.

There were so few lords from the Stormlands who had offered their support to Joffrey instead of to Stannis, divided when Renly and Stannis both claimed the throne but going over to Stannis more than Joffrey once Renly was dead.

The Crown could not afford to antagonize a single one of them, while Stannis Baratheon stood poised over Winterfell.

"It appears there was some sort of land dispute," Mace went on, though Margaery could hardly focus on the words. "Of course, your husband refused to hear reason on the matter from his counselors, as he always does. I cautioned His Grace to only hold the man for a time, and was nearly accused of sedition."

Margaery sucked in a breath, a moment away from agreeing with her husband. "Will the father retaliate?"

Mace was silent for a moment. When he next spoke, it was not about whatever unfortunate was now locked away in the Sept.

"Your brother insists upon a lifestyle he thinks he keeps hidden, though if he ever bothered to be discreet about the things he does in the bedchamber, half of King's Landing would not know of his predilections," Mace said suddenly, and Margaery blinked at the abrupt change in topic. "And it does not help that he does nothing to discourage the rumors about him and Renly Baratheon."

Or perhaps, not as abrupt as she initially thought. She should have known that this was about Loras, about the law Joffrey had signed into effect recently.

She knew that her father had known about Loras for some time now. Knew that Loras had not exactly been subtle, in his whirlwind romance with Renly Baratheon.

She wondered what her father would say if he knew the truth about Margaery, as well. He didn't much seem to care about Loras' preferences one way or another, when they weren't getting in the way of his politics.

"Do you think they won't speak up, the moment Joffrey asks, to save their own sons and daughters?" Her father shook his head. "This is a witch hunt, Margaery, not a game."

Margaery jerked. "Papa..." she whispered, hoarse. Then, squaring her shoulders, "I will do what I can with Joffrey. I swear."

For Loras, though, not for you, she thought nastily, as her father sent her a wide smile, and Margaery nearly jerked at the thought.

She had always loved her papa, as a child. He was her favorite of her parents, not at all due to her grandmother's influence, for Olenna would have her believing both of them rubbish fools if she could help it, and he had adored her despite the fact that she was a girl, or perhaps because of it. His only rose, he used to call her.

And then she had grown up, and fallen under Olenna's tutelage, and now Margaery was thinking such uncharitable thoughts toward her own father when they shared the same ambitious nature.

It was not his fault that he was not as wise as Olenna wished him to be, and Margaery shouldn't begrudge him that, either. Not when he was right, about her needing to rein Joffrey in here, however she managed it.

Margaery sighed, reaching out and taking her father's hand. "I will see to it Papa," she promised again, and he nodded in gratitude.

"That's my girl," he told her, cupping her cheek and giving it a light squeeze, and Margaery forced herself to smile.


	148. MARGAERY

Margaery almost remembered when sleeping with Sansa was something that could be taken slow, when her kisses of Sansa's cunny were rapturous and, dare she say it, enjoyed. When they could tumble into each other's bedchambers and devour one another with only the vague fear of being walked in on hanging over them.

Things seemed, in retrospect, so simple then.

Now, they existed only on hurried touches and less than gentle fucking, their movements too quick for Margaery to savor, and tinged with the fear of being caught at any moment. The fear that whatever had happened to set Joffrey off had something to do with them.

She wondered if this was what it had been like for Jaime and Cersei, during their years' long affair, and abruptly decided that she didn't want to know, for the two were hardly the same. Sansa was sweet, and good, and kind, and what they had was...

Well, it was nothing like the slow romances and gentle touches she'd experienced in Highgarden, even if things had been easier to hide, then, and certainly nothing like whatever existed between the two oldest Lannister siblings.

Besides, she disliked the comparison of herself to Cersei.

Still, she felt a bit tired today. Tired of these frenzied passions, tired of being unable to make love to Sansa instead of just fucking her.

That thought had her pulling away slightly when Sansa entered Alla's chambers, later than Margaery had been expecting, and immediately reached for her.

"I'm not so sure about that, today," Margaery told her quietly, shrugging off Sansa's probing touch. "Do you want to just...?”

But she wasn't certain that Sansa could hear her, or make sense of her words, for Sansa was already licking a steady stream up Margaery's ear, and Margaery shivered a little at the sensation, losing herself in it for a few short moments.

"Oh, I've been waiting all day," Sansa pouted, and Margaery gave in with an amused sigh, kissing Sansa gently on the lips.

"Is Joffrey being too friendly with you these days?" Sansa asked teasingly, and Margaery felt the other girl's fingers reaching out to brush at her nipples beneath the thin gown she wore, and they hardened almost instantly upon the touch.

"I..." Margaery struggled to find her train of thought once more. "He's just...with everything he's been doing lately," she gasped again, as Sansa divested her of the gown entirely, before ridding herself of her own, and the cool air of the room fluttered against her naked skin.

"Hmm?" she heard Sansa murmur against her, and she couldn't tell if the other girl was really listening to her at all. Something about that irked her, though Margaery couldn't put her finger on what, not when Sansa was licking a circle around her left areola.

"My father has asked me to intercede with Joffrey," Margaery said. "I knew it was serious, but I didn't think..."

"Margaery, you're thinking far too much," she heard Sansa murmur, and then Sansa was reaching for Margaery's hands, placing them on her shoulders, clearly convinced that Margaery was not participating actively enough.

Margaery sent the other girl a wry smile, bending down and kissing Sansa hard on the lips before pulling back, exposing her neck with a quiet gasp as Sansa moved to suck at the skin there.

"I just...he's unreasonable lately," Margaery said quietly. "I can't think about much else but whether or not he's going to do something worse than whatever he did last."

"I'm sure it will be fine, whatever you end up saying to him," Sansa assured her, voice flippant, moving her hands up and down Margaery's waist in a way that Margaery supposed would normally be tantalizing. "You always manage to get him in line, after all."

Margaery shook her head, not ready to give up the conversation just yet. It was different, talking about these sorts of things with Sansa, rather than Elinor. Elinor was a good listener, always had been, but Sansa understood in a way that Elinor, preparing to marry a young knight rather than a lord with the control of Westeros in the palm of his hand, never could.

"I don't know, this time," she confessed. "I truly...I worry that if I come off as too strong he will-"

Sansa's fingers brushed against her entrance, and Margaery gasped a little, staring at the other girl in surprise, having not realized how far down Sansa's hands had moved.

Sansa placed an open mouthed kiss to Margaery's left breast, a gentle finger pushing inside Margaery's already slick hole before she could utter her surprise.

"Sansa..."

"You'll do fine," Sansa reassured her, placing another kiss to her skin. "You're great with him."

"I am?" Margaery asked warily, a little ashamed of how high her voice rose as Sansa dipped another finger inside of her.

Sansa hummed. "You're worrying too much, for someone with my fingers up her cunny," she told Margaery, kissing her way down Margaery's chest, down to her waist, lapping at her belly button. "Am I not distracting you well enough?"

Margaery pushed back a little at that, giving Sansa a concerned look. "You're not just a distraction to me, Sansa Stark," she told the other girl, and Sansa sent her a startled, almost bashful look at the words, before hurrying back to her application of kisses short, wet kisses to Margaery's naked skin.

Her fingers began to pull in and out of Margaery's womanhood, and she let out a loud moan at the teasing sensation, before remembering that they needed to keep quiet, and biting down hard on the smooth flesh of her own arm.

And yet, she couldn't get the thought of that frightened little girl, ugly through no fault of her own but only through the king's, from her mind, and Margaery found herself voicing her frustration a moment later, when she felt another digit enter her cunny and heard Sansa moaning and gasping above her, as Margaery petted at her stomach, her breasts, her throat.

"Do you think...?"

Sansa groaned, this time not a noise of pleasure at all. "I don't want to talk about Joffrey while I'm making love to you," she said, tone almost pleading as she blinked down with doe wide eyes at Margaery. "Please?"

Margaery sighed, wished that she was more in the mood to give Sansa what she wanted, just now. "Of course," she said, leaning up to peck at Sansa's lips. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be bothering you with this, when you have so many worries of your own."

Sansa merely hummed, accepting the apology, and then tweaking her fingers inside of Margaery until the young queen saw stars, and promptly forgot about her worries about Joffrey for a little while.

When she could think again, Margaery found herself wrapping around Sansa and closing her eyes, a small smile on her face.

Sansa was right, she thought, burrowing into the warm skin of her lover. She didn't have to think about Joffrey right now. She didn't have to think about anything but the soft feel of Sansa's breasts against her head, like downy pillows, or the sweet scent of Sansa's come, still on her fingers-

Sansa shifted in her hold, the sort of squirm that Margaery recognized well, from when she lay abed with her husband and wanted nothing more than to find any excuse to leave his presence.

She bit her lip, because of course it wasn't the same, but it certainly felt like it, when Sansa next spoke.

"I really should be going," she whispered, words soft against Margaery's cheek.

Margaery sighed.

"I mean," Sansa murmured, "I don't want to go..." she bit her lip. "You pointed it out last time, the danger we're in. I don't think we should spend too much time alone together, lest anyone grow suspicious."

Margaery stifled a sigh in her arm this time, as she shifted a little for Sansa to get up. The other girl didn't move, however, merely lay there, looking just as miserable as Margaery currently felt.

She knew she was being unreasonable, but Margaery very much wanted to say in this moment that she was the King's wife, and no one would dare to impinge her honor by speaking against her. She was untouchable.

But Sansa wasn't. Loras wasn't.

She sighed again, brushing the hair out of Sansa's eyes, leaning up a bit to kiss the girl's cheek.

"You're right," she said, forcing a smile. "I'm sorry. It's just...everything with Joffrey lately...I feel so on edge."

Sansa reached out, cupped her cheek, and Margaery nuzzled into the touch, closing her eyes. "I feel the same way."

Margaery nodded, sitting up abruptly and pulling away from Sansa, ignoring the look on Sansa's face when she had been the one to suggest this first.

"You're right," Margaery repeated, giving her a slightly larger smile now. "I really ought to go and speak with Joffrey, I'm afraid. My father will give me grief until it's done, after all."

She tried not to think too hard about why that bothered her more than the thought of the innocents who would continue to suffer if she did not convince her husband to calm himself down, but Margaery suspected she already knew the answer to that.

Those innocents wouldn't be herself, or Sansa, if she didn't draw too much attention to herself and that blasted law.

And Margaery hated herself a little because of that knowledge.


	149. MARGAERY

"My love," Margaery said, laying flat on her back on the bed, and reaching up to rub at her husband's arm. "What is it?"

Joffrey grimaced, tossing the letter in his hands aside with a grown and leaning back against the plush pillows of their bed. "Another fucking useless day," he told her. "The High Septon claims that the dungeons beneath the Sept are full, though I know full well he's lying to me."

Margaery stiffened. "Why would he do that?" she asked carefully, making sure not to break the small rhythm she was rubbing into Joffrey's arm.

Joffrey gave her an unimpressed look. "Because he's just as much of a pervert as the rest of these degenerates," he told her. "He ought not to be leading the Faith at all."

Margaery raised a brow, wondered when her husband had become nearly so involved in the Faith. She had a terrible feeling it had something to do with those Sparrows, and their constant nagging of the King, the Faith, everything they could think of.

She sighed. "I am sorry to hear that, my love," she said, affecting a distracted look, and Joffrey blinked at her.

She doubted he was self-aware enough to notice when other people were troubled by something that he himself had not caused, but she liked to think that she was generally a better comforter than that, enough so for him to take notice.

Still...

"I'm sorry," she repeated again, biting her lip. "I don't mean to be a bad wife to my love, and I haven't been as attentive as I ought to be to you..."

"You're devoted to me, my wife," Joffrey interrupted her, looking annoyed, and Margaery shot him a smile.

"Thank you, my love," she murmured. As amenable as he seemed to her suggestions at times, her husband was prideful, and would not be ruled by his wife.

Soon enough, though, she told herself. The suggestion would come with this one. The King was far too busy to deal with such unimportant matters, and he had never been bothered with such trivialities when he had a Hand of the King to deal with them for him.

Margaery closed her eyes, and tried to summon up the triumph she normally felt at successfully manipulating her husband.

She felt only emptiness, instead.

"My love?" she asked quietly, and Joffrey glanced at her. She was glad that she had schooled her expression before speaking. "I was wondering...what was it that so alerted you to the problem of all of these...sodomists within the city?"

Joffrey's eyes gleamed with remembered fury. "They have been a blight upon our society long enough," he told her, and Margaery hummed.

"Of course," she agreed, "I only thought it interesting that you should bring that up now."

When they were fighting a war on several fronts, and didn't have the manpower to enforce an unpopular law, though she supposed her husband was too stupid to realize the impracticality of his decision.

Joffrey hummed, and Margaery held her breath. "My manservant," he said finally, eying her. "I hesitate to bring up such...disgusting topics before my lady," he said, reaching out to brush at her cheek, and Margaery beamed at him, "but I caught him...in a compromising position with another servant."

Margaery thought of the manservant who followed Joffrey about like a kicked puppy, head always lowered, eyes haunted on the few times Margaery had made contact with them. She thought perhaps, in those few moments when she had met his eyes and seen the fear in them at what she might see there, he hated Joffrey as much as she did.

"Ah," Margaery murmured, pulling back a little. "How disturbing."

"On my bed."

Margaery froze, head jerking up. "My love?"

Joffrey made a face. "I was just as shocked as you, my lady," he informed her. "The fool had brought his sodomite lover into my chambers, to dishonor me by fucking on my..." his hands clenched into fists, before slowly releasing. "I had Ser Meryn kill them both at once," he went on, and Margaery grimaced as she wondered if Ser Meryn had bothered to drag the two lovers off of the bed Margaery was currently sitting on before he had done so, "but I realized later that was not enough."

"I..." she bit her lip. "I did not take him for the sort of man to so obviously disrespect you, my love," she settled on finally.

Joffrey sniffed. "I believe it was a matter of wages," he muttered, and Margaery hummed her sympathy, though she doubted very much that had been the problem.

"So I felt the need to ensure that nothing like..." his face screwed up in disgust, "that, ever happened again."

Margaery nodded. "I see," she said, and did not realize she had been silent a moment too long until Joffrey was demanding, "I thought you felt the same, my lady, after our talk about that pretender Renly?"

Margaery lifted her head from the perfectly clean sheets beneath her. "Of course I do, my love," she promised him. "I just...I cannot believe he defiled our marriage bed in such a way."

Joffrey nodded emphatically. "I had everything washed, of course," he told her, and Margaery grinned.

"Then I think we ought to defile it again, my love," she told him, reaching for him with bated breath until her husband grinned as well.

And, as her husband fucked her into the bedding and Margaery faked an orgasm she was leagues away from feeling herself, Margaery bit back the relief that swept through her, at the realization that Joffrey's newest law had nothing to do with Sansa or Loras.

She shouldn't feel relieved by that, of course. But she did, nonetheless.

"My love..." Margaery said, reaching out and rubbing her fingers along her husband's flank. He glanced down at her, sated and pleased, as she knew was the best time to manipulate a man's mind.

"What is it, my lady?" he asked her.

Margaery smiled inwardly as the plan she'd had only moments to formulate appeared before her eyes. She should have done this weeks ago, when the problem had begun. But she hadn't, because she was too worried about Sansa since her return from Dorne, too worried about the other girl to remember the precariousness of the game they all played.

"Oh, you know that I spend some time with the Lady Sansa," she told him, waited for him to nod. "She is a...most amusing girl," she continued, when he had done so. "But she's been concerning me, lately."

"Oh?" Joffrey lifted a brow. "Plotting more treason?"

Margaery gave a throaty laugh. She had missed this. "No, it isn't that," she promised him. "Only...she has confessed to me, more than once, her desire to go and visit the Martells, where we are keeping them under arrest in their chambers."

"They're not under arrest," Joffrey said automatically. "Well, that bitch Ellaria Sand is, but Oberyn is merely wounded, and we're just waiting for him to heal before he is to be questioned."

He said the words as if she should believe them, as if she were as gullible as the rest of the courtiers.

"Of course," she agreed placidly, "but it still concerns me, that Sansa should want to see them at all, after what they did to her."

She felt only a small bit of guilt, uttering the words, because she knew she had betrayed Sansa's trust here, even if Sansa would never find out about it, by telling something Sansa had told her in confidence to Joffrey, of all people. And, to a lesser degree, because she was a Tyrell and had grown up on stories of how terrible the Martells were to her brother and her family, because she was throwing the Martells under Joffrey's nose, here.

But not enough to redirect Joffrey's attention. She had learned that about herself, in recent months. That she was willing to do whatever it took to protect the people she...cared about.

And she wasn't certain she liked that person, but she wasn't certain that it mattered, either.

Joffrey snorted. "You are my queen," he told her. "You know as well as I that my bitch of an aunt didn't have anything done to her by the Martells. At least," his brows furrowed, "she better not have."

Margaery definitely needed to get him off that train of thought. She sat up a little on the bed, reaching out to rub at his shoulders, not surprised when he tensed under the touch.

"I worry that is the case, my love," she agreed, "but what with the war that Dorne has now declared against the Crown, one can never be too careful."

Joffrey blinked, turning his head to look at her where she half sat behind him. "You think they will make another attempt to steal her away?" he asked.

Margaery shrugged one shoulder. "I think the Dornish are plotting something dastardly, to be so silent on their Prince's arrest, as they see it as."

"Prince Doran agreed that we were in the right to do so for the stealing of Sansa Stark," Joffrey argued. "Even if his marsh lords declared war in their prince's name when he was not returned to them to face a trial there."

Margaery nodded. "Of course. But the war with Dorne is going well for us, and I should think they would be more concerned. Or more willing to negotiate, knowing that we hold their prince."

Joffrey's brows furrowed. "They had better not be plotting more treason," he muttered. "We're wasting enough resources putting them down like the dogs they are with our ships."

With my family's ships, Margaery thought idly, though she bit back a smile. "My love, they have already demonstrated their willingness to go to war with the Crown, risking their own prince," she reminded them. "I think they might be capable of anything."

Joffrey ground his teeth, spinning away from her. "I don't have the time to deal with all of this," he muttered angrily. "Not with Stannis fucking Baratheon, or the degenerates here..."

Margaery leapt at her chance, moving forward and kissing her husband's shoulder.

"Give your attention to such matters later, my love," Margaery said, kissing her way down her husband's smooth neck, to his chest. "You are..." she moaned a little, "a great and powerful king, but even you should not be expected to be everywhere at once."

Joffrey sounded a little irritated when he responded, "This was my idea. I cannot just abandon it."

Margaery uttered soothing noises as she licked at his chest. "Of course not, my love," she said gently. "Of course not. But you would not be abandoning it. You could simply put those matters into the hands of the Faith, where they belong, and turn your head back to them when you have established the stability of your kingdom." Her hand ran up his thigh, and she moved upward, trailed kisses down his shoulder. "After all, you are the King, and just because something is your idea, does not make it something you should have to oversee yourself. Let others do that for you, as they should."

Joffrey grumbled. "The Faith has done precious little about such matters in the past. I should just let such degenerates roam about my city because we are fighting the Dornish?" he sounded miffed, and Margaery hurried to remedy the situation.

"Of course not," she assured him. "Because soon enough, you will defeat those vile Dornishmen, and be able to wreak havoc upon those citizens who have not abided your law in that time."

Joffrey's eyes gleamed at the suggestion, as Margaery had known they would.

She had been backed into a corner here, without Joffrey giving her any warning about what he was going to do, and she was working with what she had, but Margaery still felt her body trembling beneath her gown.

What she had suggested wasn't a solution, of course. She would merely need to keep Joffrey distracted, once the Martells were dealt with, however that ended.

She shook her head. One step at a time.


	150. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to clear up any confusion in this chapter, the Tommen in this fic is closer to his age in the books than he is in the show, so about ten or eleven, here.

Sansa felt a pang of guilt as she hurried out of the room that she and Margaery had just made love in, felt even guiltier the next day when she asked Shae to cover for her, in the unlikely event any of Margaery's ladies happened to ask about Shae and Sansa meeting up after...what had happened.

Gods, she was such a child, unable to even put a voice these days to what she and Margaery did together.

And here she was, avoiding Margaery like she used to avoid her sister or Rickon when they were children and seemed so much younger than she, and wanted to play some stupid game.

Sansa flushed a little at the knowledge, because it had been over a day since they'd had the chance to speak, and she knew that, unlike usually, when Joffrey kept Margaery busy and Sansa found herself resenting it a little more each time, this absence from each other's lives was because of her.

Because she'd run off, and she'd noticed Margaery's furtive, concerned looks across the hall of the throne room since. It was night now, and she was running back to her chambers to avoid an invitation because she couldn't deal with that now. Because she knew that she would accept.

She sighed, ducking into a room on the way back to her husband's chambers without looking at which room it was, resting her forehead against a pillar and breathing in deeply.

She wished she knew what was wrong with her. In some ways, she supposed, she did know, but all of her thoughts since she'd returned from Dorne were a jumbled mess, from how she felt about Margaery to why she needed so desperately to hold onto the Rock.

Her throat where Ellaria had tried to cut it ached abruptly, and Sansa winced, because she didn't think it had looked inflamed today and, according to the kindly Tyrell maester who had examined her, this sort of thing could happen, when she was reminded of her trauma.

He said it like he thought it was the sort of thing that only happened to weak willed women, citing women who had lost their children but still felt the pains of pregnancy afterwards, and Sansa hadn't really taken the words to heart.

She massaged her throat idly.

And that was when she heard the gross sound of sobbing.

Her head jerked up, and she wiped at her eyes, for a moment convinced that she was crying, but her fingers came away dry and she blinked.

She pulled back, flushing when she saw a golden mop of hair at the other end of the dimly lit room and realized whose room she had invaded. Tommen was sitting on the ledge of his balcony rather precariously, head in his lap, and Sansa could see his shoulders shaking from here.

Sansa felt another wash of guilt sweep through her; she'd been fleeing Margaery's concerned stares and usually empty promises of spending time together away from prying eyes, thinking that she had the worst of it, when here Tommen was, crying alone on a balcony because he had no one to turn to for comfort, with his mother days away in Highgarden and his brother hardly the sympathetic sort.

She wondered if she should be feeling sympathy for him at all, when his family were the ones who had brought such grief to hers, but Sansa couldn't help it. Tommen had always been sweet to her, had always seemed gentle and angelic compared to the other monsters in his family.

She hadn't interacted much with Myrcella when she had still been in King's Landing, because Myrcella seemed to think her a silly girl and Sansa thought Myrcella a silly girl of a different nature, but Tommen was always kind, and she couldn't wish harm on him even if she wanted to.

At one point, she remembered with a small, choked laugh, as she thought of how young he looked now, sitting with his knees up to his chest and back to her, she had entertained thoughts of marrying Tommen instead of Joffrey, of how much kinder a husband he would make.

She laughed now at the thought of the things she did with Margaery, the things that only lovers did, and doubted that would ever have happened between herself and Tommen. Likely they would have spent all of their time playing with cats.

At the moment, it sounded like the most wonderful marriage in the world.

"Tommen?" she called out tentatively, and the boy's head jerked up from where he sat on the ledge.

Sansa flinched a little, wishing he hadn't climbed up there on his own, feeling even more guilty when she realized that Tommen's usual nurses were nowhere in sight. She wondered what sort of life he and his sister had led, with their father uninterested in his children and their mother interested only in Joffrey.

The boy sniffed, wiping at his eyes and looking away from her. "Aunt Sansa," he whispered at her feet as she moved further into the room, and Sansa swallowed hard at the appellation.

It was the first time she'd thought of that title without Joffrey sneering it at her while he eyed her like he wanted to force her to her knees and fuck her. It was a little more alarming now, though.

"What are you doing up there?" she asked, instead of addressing it, and Tommen blinked at her with his wide green eyes.

"I..."

Sansa hurried across the room and walked out onto the balcony, blinked at the slight chill in the air, despite it being so late into the summer.

Tommen hugged himself a little closer, and Sansa reached out her arms for him instinctively. "Come down from there," she told him, and pulled him into her arms before he could protest or, even worse, pull away.

To her surprise, his little arms curled around her shoulders and he let her pull him down; let her set him on the floor without protest. She wondered if he'd been stuck up there, afraid to get down once he'd gotten up, and quickly tempered her disgust.

"Tommen?" she asked him carefully.

Tommen reached up to wipe at his nose. "I..." he sniffed loudly, shook his head. "I..."

"Tommen?" Sansa leaned a little closer in an attempt to hear him.

"He's dead," Tommen sniffed. It took Sansa a moment to realize who he was talking about; his grandfather. She stiffened.

She supposed she should have known. With everything that had been happening lately, with Joffrey, and Margaery, and the Dornish, she'd barely given thought to Lord Tywin's death even when she knew she should, beyond that he wasn't around to keep her safe from Joffrey's leering looks.

She supposed that was rather foolish of her, given the circumstances. She was a silly little girl, focusing only on keeping the Rock without thinking of the legacy it belonged to.

She flinched rather violently at that thought, at the realization that she'd been fighting so hard lately to hold onto a piece of land that belonged to her family's greatest enemies.

She felt sick. Tyrion was her...friend, her husband, and she was trying to hold onto the Rock for him, for the scant amount of extra protection it might grant her, but she'd been a little fool.

She didn't want the Rock. She didn't want anything belonging to the Lannisters. Belonging to Tywin Lannister.

"And...And, they've locked up Uncle Tyrion," Tommen sniffed again, reaching up and rubbing at his eyes. "And now Joffrey is being such a...a beast!"

Sansa snorted at that rather on point description of Joffrey, instead schooled her face into a look of sympathy as she reached out and wrapped a tentative arm around Tommen's shoulders.

Tommen practically fell against her, and Sansa adjusted, moved closer so that he might rest his chin on her shoulder as he sniffled.

"I know it seems bleak now," Sansa told him gently, "But I know a thing or two about death, and it will be all right, Tommen. You'll see."

She was lying through her teeth, but he seemed so much younger to her now than he ever had before, and she had to say something, she knew.

He pulled back, blinked up at her. "Really?" he asked quietly.

Sansa nodded. "Now, why don't we go inside and get you cleaned up," she suggested, and, after a moment's hesitation, Tommen pulled back from her and hurried inside.

Sansa bit her lip as she watched him go, and then followed.

Tommen washed his face in a basin of lukewarm water as Sansa stood awkwardly in the middle of his room, wishing she knew some excuse that could get her away from a distraught child. But even with Rickon, she had never been able to ignore a child's tears.

She supposed that was something comforting about her time at King's Landing, that that had not changed.

She felt a pang at the thought of Rickon, killed by Theon so long ago now, at the horrid thought of how he had been displayed outside of Winterfell's walls, his body destroyed beyond recognition.

Her little brother, whose tears she had never been able to ignore. She felt her eyes begin to blur, and a loud meow interrupted her thoughts.

Startled, Sansa glanced down at the large cat sitting on his hind legs at her feet, staring up at her with wide green eyes.

Tommen turned back to them, a small smile on his lips, now. "Ser Pounce!" he said, rushing over and gathering the cat into his arms.

Sansa stared in bemusement as the cat pawed at Tommen almost belligerently, before settling into his arms. She bent down, sitting on the floor with them, trying not to think of how Tommen's chambers were far nicer than Tyrion's, and scratched the cat behind the ears.

"He ran away a few days ago," Tommen said, so quietly that Sansa wondered if the words were meant for her or not. "Joffrey scared him, when I brought poor Ser Pounce to the dinner table and Joffrey said we should eat him inst-instead of the stag, because he's gotten so fat."

Sansa tutted in disgust at Joffrey's words. She could well imagine him saying them, after all. She scratched Ser Pounce's ears again. He was getting very fat. "I don't think he's so fat," she told Tommen.

Tommen sent her a grateful look. "I don't want Joffrey to take Ser Pounce away from me, too," he whispered, and Sansa's heart sank.

"I think Joffrey was just teasing you," she told him carefully. "He can be very cruel, when teasing. But he's been caught up in all sorts of more important things, and I doubt he remembers even saying anything about Ser Pounce."

Tommen's eyes widened. "Do you think so?" he asked, pulling the cat closer. The cat growled softly, and Tommen relaxed his grip.

"Tommen..." Sansa began, and then paused. "I'm sorry about you losing your grandfather," she told him, because, while she had been appreciative of the scant amount of protection Tywin Lannister had brought her when Ser Jaime found out about Joffrey's uncouth interest in her, she couldn't quite bring herself to say that she was sorry he was dead. "It's very hard, being so alone here."

She knew that well. Before she had Margaery, before Shae, she had been so very alone here.

He didn't try to argue with her words. Didn't try to convince her that he wasn't alone. Tommen just shrugged. "He was going to make sure I learned sword fighting from Ser Loras, and I was going to get a new, Lannister maester, to teach me the law," he told her, and Sansa's brows furrowed in confusion. "He...He wanted me to go back to Casterly Rock, where I could study without..." his voice lowered, and he glanced around nervously, as if afraid someone was listening in. "Without Joffrey around."

Sansa raised her eyebrows. "I see," she said carefully, though she didn't at all, not really. She wondered if Tywin had hated or feared his grandson, wondered if he feared anything, while he lived.

Wondered if her husband really had killed him, or if Oberyn Martell had done so, before leaving for Dorne with her.

"Ser Loras would probably be happy to keep teaching you sword fighting, even without your grandfather ordering it," Sansa told Tommen.

Tommen bit his lip. "I'd have to get Joffrey's permission," he told her. "He...He said that it wouldn't be any use, because I'm a pathetic swordsman, anyway."

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek, struggled not to make a comment about how Joffrey was a pathetic swordsman himself. "Perhaps if you asked him again, when he's in a better mood," she advised Tommen, who just shrugged again.

There was a knock at the door, and they both jumped. Ser Pounce scrambled away from them, disappearing into some shadowed corner, and Tommen called after him in dismay.

Sansa stood to her feet, going to answer the door. She was rather surprised to see Lady Elinor standing on the other side of it, an impish look in her eyes.

"Lady Sansa," she said, smirking. "The Queen wonders if she might have a word with you."

Sansa bit her lip, glanced back at Tommen. "I..."

Elinor leaned forward. "In Alla's chambers, if it's all the same to you."

Sansa hesitated, because, while she had been ignoring Margaery for as long as she could, she couldn't deny that she very much wanted to take up that offer, as long as there was no talking between them. No sheets, either.

She almost wished that she could stay here with Tommen and his kittens instead, but, with a sigh and a small smile in Tommen's direction, Sansa nodded.

"Of course," she said. "Whatever the Queen wishes."

Elinor gave her an odd look, and Sansa turned to say goodbye to Tommen.


	151. SANSA

"Finally," Margaery whispered against her skin. "I've almost been getting the feeling that you've been ignoring me," she said, tone almost playful.

Sansa snorted, mouthing her lips against Margaery's cunny. "And whatever gave you that idea, my busy queen?"

The words lacked the playfulness that Sansa wished she could infuse them with, however. Sansa pushed forward, kissing Margaery again, pushing her back onto Alla's bed.

"The sofa..." Margaery tried, but Sansa shook her head.

"I don't want to make love to you on a sofa," she gritted out, kissing Margaery again, enjoying the feel of Margaery's lips parting for her tongue.

Margaery moaned appreciatively, falling back onto the bed and pulling gently at Sansa's clothes until they lay in a heap on the bed beside the two girls.

Sansa moaned as Margaery's fingers skimmed her body in feather light touches, positioned herself a little closer to those fingers needily as her own grasped at Margaery's stomach, her breasts.

Margaery let out a moan as Sansa flicked at one of her nipples, and one of Margaery's fingers dipped inside Sansa's womanhood without ceremony, brushing at that spot inside her cunny that had Sansa crying out and pulling a little closer to Margaery.

"Margaery, please," Sansa gasped into Margaery's mouth, and heard Margaery chuckle gently as their lips parted for the moment it took Sansa to speak.

"Tell me what you want, Sansa," Margaery whispered, pulling back to kiss her way down Sansa's neck.

Sansa froze as Margaery's lips brushed her scar, pulled back. "I want you to fuck me with your fingers, Margaery," she gasped out, as Margaery's finger deftly curled inside of her. Margaery leaned forward to kiss her neck again. "Please, Margaery."

Margaery lifted a brow, but complied, moving her attentions solely to Sansa's cunny as she added two more fingers, and Sansa squirmed a little at the sensation, still surprised that after all of this time it could feel uncomfortable to take three fingers so quickly.

She focused her attentions on Margaery's nipples, watched them harden into tight circles and tighter nubs as she worked them, bent down and took one of Margaery's nipples into her mouth.

Margaery gasped, and another finger worked its way inside of Sansa, causing her to arch her back and nearly pull her mouth off of Margaery's nipple.

Somehow, she managed to stay attached, managed to suck and lick at Margaery like she was dying for it.

She reached down, brushing at Margaery's cunny, enjoying the way Margaery's breath quickened at the sensation, as Margaery began fucking her fingers in and out of Sansa with careful strokes.

They came at the same time, both chuckling slightly at the realization before the exhaustion of their orgasms overtook them.

Sansa collapsed back onto the bed, as Margaery fell down beside her, sending her a secret grin that Sansa was too tired to return.

"Won't your husband be looking for you?" Sansa asked impishly, and Margaery merely shrugged.

"And why should he? With Lord Tywin dead and without any Hand, he has been caught up terribly in matters of State."

Sansa sighed. She couldn't say why, but the idea of what they had just done, of making love to Margaery in this moment, with the knowledge that her husband was down in the Black Cells as they did it, made her queasy.

She didn't know why. It was not the first time they had engaged in such activities since Sansa's return to Dorne, but she suspected that those had been different; those had been caught up in the adrenaline of her return, neither even thinking as they jumped into bed together.

She missed that, suddenly, and Sansa blinked at the thought, for surely nothing had changed between the two of them, despite the fact that everything at court had changed since the failed escape.

She felt sick. She glanced over at Margaery, who had let her eyes fall closed as she lay beside Sansa on the bed, looking happy and sated.

Sansa hadn't had the urge to vomit for a while now, but as she rushed into the little room housing Alla's chambers pot and sat over it, clutching her stomach in annoyance as nothing made its way past her throat, she wondered what it would feel like.

Wondered if it would hurt, now, to force bile past her scarred throat, wondered if the knife had cut that deep.

It had hurt to eat earlier, but Sansa had not known if the feeling was there because of what Ellaria had done to her throat, or because her throat was simply sore from crying, where she had sat for so long in the Black Cells, knowing that she was going to die the moment Joffrey called for her.

Her stomach was empty, she knew that. Shae had managed to get her to eat a few torn off pieces of soaked bread this afternoon, but Sansa had been unable to take anything else, unable to eat with the knowledge that she had condemned the Martells to charges of kidnapping, that her husband was now sitting in the Black Cells because of it.

She had done that.

When the bile did come up, Sansa was almost relieved.

And it didn't hurt, to force it past her throat.

Sansa walked out of the room with the chamber pot and back into Alla's bedchambers, saw Margaery sitting on the edge of the bed, naked but no longer looking sated as she had when she had dropped off after her orgasm.

Sansa felt another spike of guilt, which manifested itself as a pain in her stomach.

"Are you feeling ill?" Margaery asked her, a knowing look on her face.

Sansa bit her lip, forced herself to smile. "My stomach was merely queasy from whatever I had at the noon meal," she told Margaery. "I'm feeling much better now."

Margaery nodded, though she didn't look completely convinced. "Well," she said, "Why don't you come sit down, and I'll talk until you fall asleep."

Everything in Sansa resisted that idea, even if she couldn't put words to why. "I..." she glanced at the door. "Shouldn't we make sure we don't fall asleep here, in case someone figures it out?"

Margaery tossed her hair. "Joffrey thinks I'm having tea with my ladies, and Alla knows where I am," she told her. "No one will notice." She pulled at Sansa's arm. "Come, Sansa," she said, and her words were almost desperate, "come sit down."

Sansa narrowed her eyes, wondered if Margaery knew more than she'd ever let on about Sansa's...whatever it was that made her so averse to the idea of food, but then, she supposed, Margaery saw every bit of her body when they made love, and she must know that Sansa was getting thinner and thinner, these days.

Her little ploy was more than transparent, but Sansa found herself sitting down, anyway. Lying down, a moment later, when Margaery pushed her back gently.

"I talked to Joffrey about...that new law," Margaery said carefully, her fingers threading gently through Sansa's hair. Sansa leaned into the sensation, enjoying it more than she expected to.

"Oh?" she asked, already feeling sleepy.

She felt Margaery nod where she was half-lying beside Sansa. "I think I managed to find a new distraction for him."

Sansa hummed, letting her eyes fall closed. "Good. He's starting to..." _Scare me_.

Margaery nodded again, as if she had heard what Sansa didn't say. "I was worried it wouldn't work, but it did, I think. It's all he's been talking about since, after all."

"You seem to be losing your touch," Sansa said, and her tone was not quite teasing as she opened her eyes and glanced up at Margaery.

"I can't control madness all of the time," Margaery spat, and then winced a little, at the way Sansa's expression settled, after a flash of surprise, into a cool indifference that Margaery knew all too well. "I'm sorry, I..."

"Margaery," Sansa reached out, taking Margaery's hands into hers. "You've been under a great deal of stress lately. You don't need to apologize."

"As have you," Margaery pointed out, lower lip jutting into a pout. "I don't see you lashing out because of it."

Sansa shrugged one shoulder, giving her a half smile. "I have my moments." She paused. "I was actually wondering...well, perhaps I shouldn't ask, if you're worried about Joffrey."

She didn't like manipulating Margaery like this, but it had been almost weeks, and she had to know, had to see them for herself.

Margaery's head jerked toward her, worried about her, eager to please when Sansa was in such a state. Sansa felt another pang of guilt. "What is it?"

"I..." Sansa paused. "I was wondering if you could convince Joffrey to let me speak to Prince Oberyn," Margaery's face darkened, "Or at least to Ellaria Sand."

Margaery's face went even harder. "She's hardly better than Oberyn, Sansa. She tried to slit your throat."

Sansa reached up, rubbed delicately at the scar the maesters said would never completely heal. She and her husband, a matched set now. Though, of course, her husband was likely on his way to his death.

But Margaery didn't understand, couldn't understand. Couldn't know that in the seconds before Ellaria had jerked the knife across her skin, Sansa had not tried to fight her.

"I know that," Sansa said, a little more snippily than she had intended. "But...I need to see things through, with this. Ask her why she did it."

Ask her whether or not Sansa had mattered to them, or whether she had just been a decoy while they possibly killed Tywin Lannister. Whether the North was all they had wanted from her.

And to see her again, because Sansa wasn't the same after that trip, knew there was something wrong with her even if she couldn't say what, and she wanted to see who Ellaria was now, too.

"Absolutely not," Margaery said, startling her. Sansa jerked her head up. Margaery looked almost...frightened. Then, softening her voice, "Sansa, I can't convince Joffrey to let you see the people who kidnapped you. He'll ask me why, and then he'll believe that you colluded with them, rather than going unwillingly."

Sansa gave her a dry look. "He knows I went with them willingly, Margaery."

Margaery flinched. "He wanted a war with Dorne, Sansa. He didn't care whether you went with them or not now that he has you here. But if you keep pushing..." she shook her head. "You said it yourself, I've lost my touch. I couldn't save that girl he thought was ugly and I won't be able to save you, if you push Joffrey hard enough."

Sansa lifted her chin. "I survived in King's Landing before you showed up, you know," she snapped, and Margaery recoiled at the vitriol in her voice.

"Sansa..."

Sansa shook her head, lifted a hand. "I'm sorry," she said. "I just...I don't like not knowing what is going to happen to them. They tried to help me, more fools they, and now they're paying for it, and I don't even know how."

Margaery sighed. "I will speak with Joffrey," she said. "But I don't think this is a good idea, Sansa, and if he lets me know he doesn't like the idea, promise me you won't push him further."

Sansa bit her lip. Then, "I promise," she whispered, and bent forward to kiss Margaery on the lips. "Thank you."


	152. SANSA

Ellaria Sand and her companions had been released from their house arrest after hours of questioning by different members of the panel which was to serve as the judges for the trial over Lord Tywin's death. She was kept apart from Prince Oberyn, who was still recovering from his injuries during the battle that had taken place aboard his ship, whatever those were, but no one was allowed to see either of them, besides their guards and the servants who brought them food.

They were not quite as vilified as Tyrion at the moment, not meriting being kept in the Black Cells due to Oberyn's injuries, but King's Landing was at war with Dorne, regardless of the fragile peace Prince Doran had tried to keep with the King when he handed over his own brother without a fight. Sansa doubted that they were being treated as better than hostages.

Sansa understood that some of the guards had been...quite rough with the Dornishwomen, and she flinched when she heard that, resolved to go and see them at the earliest opportunity.

That resolve was shot down the moment she tried, however.

"You are not permitted to see the members of the Dornish party," she was informed, by the stout Lannister guard standing outside of her door, and Sansa gaped at him.

"But...I am the aunt of the King," she tried, knowing how foolish and desperate she sounded. "And they kidnapped me. I am alive and well, and I want them to know it."

The guard gave her a look. "You are not allowed to visit the Dornish party," he told her, and Sansa sighed.

She didn't know what to do. She couldn't go and visit Margaery; Margaery had made it clear that she wouldn't understand Sansa's need to visit the woman who had nearly killed her, and Sansa didn't much feel like explaining it to her.

But, in the end, that was exactly what she had done, because she didn't have any other ideas, and Margaery held a sway with the king that disturbed her a little, but that she did admit was useful.

And Margaery had agreed to do her best to help her, which was what had Sansa standing before the Iron Throne now, making her plea to the King.

She could only hope that Margaery had managed to help...convince him, before this. She'd promised she would do her best, and while Sansa knew Margaery was not happy about it, she also knew that she would make good on that promise.

"I wish to request an audience with Ellaria Sand of Your Grace," Sansa said, her words quiet in the chamber. Joffrey seemed to hear them anyway, and he raised a hand, the chamber falling silent when he did so.

Beside him, Margaery looked rather white.

"We have been fighting the Dornish by the sea since your return to King's Landing, Lady Aunt," he told Sansa. "We have been so far unable to break into Sunspear, as the Targaryens of old were unable, but we have more grit than those old dragons, and we will manage it eventually, and wipe them off the map for their continued belligerence to the Crown."

Sansa felt a shiver run down her spine at Joffrey's words. "Of course, Your Grace. But Ellaria is here, in King's Landing, and not in Dorne..."

"I don't know why you would even want to, Lady Sansa," Joffrey interrupted her. "After all, this is the woman who kidnapped and nearly killed you."

Which was what Joffrey had done, as well, but Sansa did not see herself ridding him of her presence any time soon, not now.

"Your Grace," she explained patiently, "I merely want the chance to let Ellaria know that I live still, despite her best efforts."

Joffrey smirked. "I see," he said. Then, "You ought to be careful, Lady Aunt. Your scar is rather ugly these days, after all."

Sansa froze, dipped down into a shaky curtsey. "I am sorry, Your Grace. I do not wish to offend you with its presence. I will cover it up better, next time-"

"Everything about its presence offends me!" Joffrey shouted. "It is a reminder of your running off like a two bit whore with those Martells, of the fact that Dorne still stubbornly plays at war with us!"

Sansa's shoulders hunched and she found herself unable to meet the King's eyes as he continued to shout. And then, "Send for that Dornish bitch!" he called. "I'll question her myself, if our torturers are so inept."

Sansa's stomach sank. She'd only wanted to see Ellaria, to get an explanation for when the woman had almost killed her, and instead she'd doomed her, instead.

"Your Grace..." Margaery began, glancing at Sansa, then at Joffrey. "Perhaps..."

"Your Grace!" a herald shouted as he burst through the doors, and Sansa almost wilted with relief, even without hearing whatever news he had come to bring. He was covered in sweat, and it took Sansa a moment to realize that he was not one of the heralds usually making announcements in the throne room. "Your uncle Ser Jaime has returned from the Iron Islands!"

Joffrey's eyes widened. "Where is he?" he demanded, half sitting up in his throne.

The herald hesitated. "He took a ship from the Iron Islands to Casterly Rock, and rides towards King's Landing with a host of men one thousand strong," the herald informed him. "He has learned of the death of his father, Lord Tywin, and comes to pay his respects to the Hand of the King and learn who to bring to justice for it."

Joffrey's look was, almost startled, though Sansa couldn't imagine why. Any son would be remiss in his duties if he did not attempt to pay his respects to his dead father. That was why her brother had started a war, after all.

"Then let him come," he said, and Sansa could only be relieved that he seemed to have forgotten about Ellaria, for now. "And he'll learn that my imp of an uncle was responsible, and maybe I'll even let him swing the sword." He laughed a little at his own words, and Sansa shivered.

She knew that her husband and Ser Jaime cared about each other, after all. They were perhaps the only two members of House Lannister who did so, she couldn't help but think.

"We'll deal with the Dornish bitch another time," Joffrey promised ominously, and Sansa shivered at the pure greed in his words.

Sansa stepped to the side, hoping that if she disappeared into the crowd Joffrey would forget about her query.

It was not long before Ser Jaime and his men followed their herald. The men did not follow their commander into the throne room, but Sansa could hear the sound of clattering hoof beats and louder men riding into the grounds outside the Keep, and she shivered as she remembered the last time an army had ridden into King's Landing, Stannis Baratheon at its head.

She looked up, blinked when she realized that Lady Elinor was standing beside her. "Mind if I stand with you?" the other girl asked, and Sansa blinked again before nodding.

Ser Jaime, unlike his father had once done, had the presence of mind not to ride into the throne room itself, and it took some time before he appeared, still covered in the grim of travel and war, Sansa thought, unable to think straight at the thought. He wore his Lannister armor rather than the armor of the Kingsguard, and she wondered when that had changed, for she thought he had ridden out in Kingsguard armor to fight the Islanders.

Ser Jaime gave his king nothing more than a nod when he bowed his head, and Sansa felt a spike of jealousy toward him, that he could get away with doing so.

"Your Grace," he said calmly, and Joffrey grinned, looking like a much younger child for a moment. "I am here to pay my respects to Lord Tywin and give a report on the situation in the Iron Islands in person."

He sounded rather somber, and Sansa found herself wondering if there were perhaps two people mourning the death of the old lion.

"Ser Jaime," he said, clapping his hands together. "I presume that all went well in the Iron Islands, against those barbarians?"

Ser Jaime hesitated. "We have not finished fighting them, Your Grace, but the battle has taken a turn for the better. Garlan Tyrell is a good leader to his men," he continued, and Margaery almost preened. "And the Iron Islands are divided, and weak."

Joffrey lifted a brow. "Divided? Do some wish to renounce their foolish leader and bend the knee?"

Jaime looked almost amused at those words. "Balon Greyjoy is dead," he pronounced. "Murdered by his own brother, Euron."

Gasps filled the room. Sansa thought of Theon, and wondered if all Greyjoys were crazed murderers.

Joffrey looked disinterested, then. "And a kinslayer should not become a 'king,'" he said, "however fake the title."

Ser Jaime nodded, and Sansa doubted then that he had yet heard about his brother's imprisonment. "Balon's daughter, Yara Greyjoy, has challenged Euron for the title," he said. "The Iron Islands have divided loyalties between the two of them, and it's left them open for our army to destroy."

"Perfect," Joffrey said. "Once we've buried my grandfather, you can go back and defeat them for good, bring me the bitch and her uncle's traitorous heads, and go fight the dragon bitch across the sea."

Jaime looked a little wide eyed at that, and the man who had entered the throne room beside him, a man looking even more unkempt than Ser Jaime, snorted quietly.

"The Targaryen girl," Jaime said the words slowly, like he thought Joffrey was confused about whom he was talking.

Joffrey nodded. "She needs to be dealt with before she ever reaches Westeros," he said, tone surprisingly reasonable. "She has dragons and an army of half men to fight for her. She used to have barbarians who raped and destroyed everything in their path."

"Your Grace..." Jaime cocked his head, pausing. He looked annoyed, suddenly. "I am here to bury and avenge my father, Your Grace. Whatever commands you have for me can wait until that is done."

Joffrey looked incensed for a moment, and then grinned. "You don't have to worry about avenging him," he reassured his uncle. "We already know who the culprit is." He paused, smirked. "Uncle Tyrion."

Jaime stared at him for a long moment, and then shook his head. "No, that's ridiculous, why would he...?" he stopped abruptly, shook his head. "Has he had a trial yet?"

Joffrey's face was turning an ugly shade of puce. "Not yet," he ground out. "I wanted to wait until all the evidence had been found and Mother and you returned."

Jaime blinked. "Cersei? Is she...here?"

Sansa shivered, first at the hope in his voice, then at the terror the thought of Cersei Lannister returning to King's Landing brought on her, now that Tywin was no longer around.

She remembered all too well how cruel Cersei had been, before Tywin arrived in King's Landing to curb some of her power.

Beside Joffrey, Margaery went a little stiff, glancing at her husband in obvious surprise before she buried that surprise deep.

Joffrey shook his head. "She's been unavoidably detained in Highgarden, she wrote to me," Joffrey told him, and Sansa bit back a breath of relief.

"I see," Jaime said finally, then turned as if to go. His shadow, which Sansa now recognized as Bronn, turned to go with him. She wondered why he had followed Ser Jaime into battle when she had thought he had retired to a manor with some rich man's wife.

"Uncle Jaime!" Tommen called excitedly, from where he stood just below the raised dais for Joffrey's throne. Sansa was a little relieved to see him in the crowd, out amongst people instead of locked away, unnoticed, in his chambers, even if the thought of him witnessing anything like the torture Joffrey had threatened on Ellaria made her sick.

Jaime turned back, offered Tommen a small smile that Sansa almost believed was genuine, and which she couldn't help but notice he hadn't offered Joffrey, and opened his mouth to greet the boy.

"I'm sure you'd like to get cleaned up before you go and visit the Sept," Joffrey interrupted, before he had the chance to speak, perhaps the first time Sansa thought he had given thought to anyone else's comfort. She wondered, for the first time, if Joffrey actually knew the truth behind the rumors about his parentage, the ones her father had died for.

Wondered if he was actually jealous of his little brother.

Jaime gave Tommen a nod, and then, after a deliberate pause, nodded to the King. "I wish to visit my brother in the Black Cells," he told Joffrey coolly.

Joffrey bared his teeth. "I am not allowing any family to visit the traitor, not even his lady wife," he said.

Jaime's eyes flicked to Sansa, as if he had known all along where she stood in the crowd. "I am the Commander of the Kingsguard," he told the King, "and it is the duty of the Kingsguard to ensure that the King is safe. If my brother killed the Hand of the King, he might not have been his only target."

Joffrey's eye twitched at that, and Sansa was almost impressed.

"Very well, Uncle Jaime," Joffrey said in a magnanimous tone, as he reached for Margaery's hand, "You may visit the traitor, see what he has to say."


	153. SANSA

She finally had a report on Casterly Rock, sent to her directly after she had sent out her request for it by a raven delivering it from a maester in Casterly Rock. The man had not been happy to give it to a mere woman, he wrote in the missive, when he doubted she would be able to understand the intricacies of it, but Sansa skipped over most of that part, skimming down to what she was looking for.

It had been difficult enough to get one, with the fluid state that her husband's claim to Casterly Rock was in, and the fluid state that her own claim to it was in, given that she was his wife.

Wives could inherit their husband's property, but she knew it would be more difficult to swing this by Joffrey when Tommen and Myrcella both lived to inherit the land that the Lannisters wanted to remain in their family, as well.

And, of course, there was that thought that had been niggling at the back of her mind since she had seen Tommen crying in his rooms, that she didn't want the Rock and didn't want to be an important member of House Lannister.

She was doing this for Tyrion, she told herself. Only for him, because he didn't want the Rock falling into the hands of his sister, and because he would be relieved that this could protect Sansa, even if she was no longer certain that it could as she had been.

The Rock was as well defended as it could be, with so many Lannister soldiers spread out over the realm, and the maester actually applauded her decision not to send out more soldiers, in an effort to keep the Rock secure. She was not expecting that, after his condescending tone in the beginning, and Sansa read on with a slightly straighter spine.

Read about the defenses in place in the Rock, read about the amount of food coming in and out, about the trade the Rock did with Lannisport.

And then she read about the state of mines that the Rock and House Lannister so depended on. She read it, and then she read it a second time, and then she flipped over the scroll and looked for some secret message on the back, some sense that the words she was reading were a lie.

And then she read them again, and scrambled for a scroll and some ink of her own, to send a response.

Shae walked into the room as Sansa was finishing writing the response, a missive asking if what she thought the writing said was true, and Shae sent her a worried look.

"Are you all right, Sansa?" she asked.

Gods, far too many people were asking her that lately.

"Fine," Sansa said, smiling too brightly and lying through her teeth.

Shae walked over to Tyrion's desk which Sansa had commandeered in his chambers, and Sansa scrambled to her feet, pushing the scrolls behind her and crossing her arms over her chest.

Now Shae's concerned look turned to one of suspicion. "Sansa," she said calmly, in the voice of one who would not be disobeyed, "What is going on?"

Sansa bit her lip, remembered how pleased Shae had been when Sansa said she was going to do everything she could to help Tyrion, and, failing that, to keep the Rock.

Sansa had thought this plan would be perfect. Had thought she could use the Lannister gold to keep Joffrey from stealing the Rock from her, because she could be generous with it and then he wouldn't care if Sansa had it or not.

Sansa chewed on her lip until Shae reached around her for the scrolls, and Sansa pulled them back, held them in her hands as she looked down at them once more.

"Sansa."

"Casterly Rock's mines," Sansa breathed out in horror, flipping the page back and forth, reading the report over and over, eyes starting to swim as she found herself unable to meet Shae's. "They're empty."

Shae stared at her for a long moment. "That's impossible," she breathed finally, blinking down at the letters as Sansa spread them out across the desk. Sansa wondered if she knew how to read. "The Lannisters shit gold; everyone knows it."

Sansa shook her head, because the report the maester of the Rock had sent her said otherwise. "No," she breathed. "No, no, this can't be happening."

It couldn't. She had promised Joffrey Lannister gold, had promised it instead of the soldiers that King's Landing desperately needed at the moment to temper the riots currently close to overtaking the city, even if it were from Joffrey's own foolishness.

And now it would look as if she were refusing the King the money he needed when she had already offered it to him freely, when everyone knew how rich the Lannisters were. Would look as if she were acting in open contempt of the King, and Joffrey would never let that stand.

She knew that lesson well enough, from when her father had learned it.

She wondered how they had managed to pretend so well, for so long, if the mines were truly as dry as the maesters claimed.

And then Sansa realized it didn't matter at all, because the much more pressing matter was what Joffrey would do once he learned that Sansa could not deliver on her promise of gold. He would take the Rock from her and give it to his mother anyway, and after she had promised Tyrion, Shae, and Margaery that she would do whatever it took to hold onto it, for her own sake if anything else.

After she had promised Tyrion that he would be able to keep his home, or that she would keep it in his name, and away from his wicked sister, if he did not survive his trial.

Sansa groaned, reaching up and rubbing at her forehead. "This can't be happening," she repeated. "This can't..." She paused, a thought suddenly occuring to her.

Shae glanced at her worriedly. "Sansa? What is it?"

Sansa pulled back, folded up the letter she had written and gave it to Shae. "Send this back to the Rock," she told Shae. "With one of the Keep's best ravens. And...please inform Ser Jaime Lannister that I need to speak with him as soon as he is able."

The wife of a traitor might not be allowed to visit him in his cell, but, as Jaime had pointed out, the Kingsguard could. And if he could, then surely he could find a way to get Sansa there as well.

She needed to speak with her husband.


	154. SANSA

"I brought you books," Sansa said, her words over bright and filling the dimly lit cell with noise as Ser Jaime held open the door for her.

Quite frankly, she was surprised that Ser Jaime had agreed to help her at all. Surprised, that is, until she met with him in Tyrion's chambers, and realized that he was furious that his brother was seen as the only suspect, furious enough to help her as long as she was helping Tyrion.

"You don't think he did it?" she asked, and then winced at the thunderous expression that overcame Jaime's face at the words. Silly girl, she thought, rubbing her stomach idly. "I mean...everyone believes he did."

Jaime hesitated. "I think my brother has always hated our father," he said carefully, expression pained, "but he's not a fool."

And Sansa had no idea what that meant, but she was happy enough to accept it if it meant that Jaime would agree to her plan.

Shae had brought her serving clothes to slip into, had plaited her hair atop her head and hidden it beneath a serving girl's hood to hide the red Tully-ness of it, and Sansa had pretended that this didn't remind her of slipping out of King's Landing with the Martells.

"There," Shae had said. "It won't fool anyone who knows your face well, so try not to be seen before you get to the Black Cells," she said, "but it should work."

And then she had taken up a tray of food, and had met Ser Jaime at the base of the Keep, where the world became dark and cold and turned into the Black Cells. He didn't greet her with words, only nodded in approval at the sight of her, and led her down the long steps to Tyrion's cell.

Sansa's heart hammered in her chest, and she expected that at any moment someone was going to discover the subterfuge, was going to realize who she was and drag her before Joffrey.

But if the Rock was as useless to her as she feared, then that was going to happen soon enough anyway, and at least at the moment, she was under the protection of a Kingslayer. That had to count for something.

Those rationalizations didn't make her feel better, though, not until she was standing outside the imposing wooden door of Tyrion's cell.

She thought it was perhaps the third bravest and third stupidest thing she had ever done.

Jaime claimed, with much false bravado to the guards, when they attempted to search her with leering expressions, that she was there to feed the prisoner food that he thought was much better for a noble prisoner to eat than his usual fare down here, and Sansa winced a little beneath her hood, at the thought that she had been eating fine foods unappreciatively while her husband was down her suffering.

The guards let her through then, and she followed behind Jaime as he stepped into the cell.

"Jaime," Tyrion's almost unfamiliar, scratchy voice spoke then, and he stood up from where he had been laying down in the back of the cell, face full of hope. It twisted in confusion at the sight of his wife, standing behind Jaime.

He looked ragged, his clothes hanging off his form despite the short length of time that he had been imprisoned so far. There were blue bags beneath his eyes, and his cheeks looked sallow, eyes wild in a way that she had not yet seen from her husband, not even when he was angry.

She wondered if this was what her father had looked like, as he languished away in his cell down here, no doubt not far from the one she was standing in now.

She grimaced, glanced down at the floor, where straw covered the grime, and looked around for a chamber pot; saw one sitting in the corner. At least they had given him that. She'd had nightmares about her father stuck down here, sitting in his own shit, as Sansa pretended to save him.

Jaime was silent for a moment, and then glanced between them. She hadn't told him why it was so urgent that she speak to his brother, only that she had to and that it was a matter of great importance, and he had been staring at her stomach since she had said those words.

Sansa felt a bitter laugh bubbling up inside her at the supposition, but she didn't dare disabuse him of the notion.

"I've come to make sure you had a decent meal," he said loudly, "this girl will see to it. And to...any other needs you have. I'll want a word with you when you've...finished," he said, before banging on the door so that the smirking guards will let him out.

Sansa felt a bright sense of relief that he wasn't going to leave her down here to the mercy of these cold cells and to the mercy of the guards, once they let her out, and then she was alone with her husband.

At which point she pulled the cloth off the tray in her hands, revealing the books she had grabbed from his study. She didn't know which ones he liked the best, because she was ashamed to admit that she hardly knew her husband, but he looked surprised and a little pleased nonetheless, taking them from her with a quiet, "thank you, Sansa."

She cleared her throat, resisted the urge to reach out and touch the bruise on the side of his face. She hadn't earned that right, after all. That was all too clear in the knowledge that Jaime Lannister had come to King's Landing and managed to see his brother within a day, while this was the first time Sansa was even visiting her husband.

"I'm sorry I couldn't come to visit you before," Sansa said honestly. "I..."

Tyrion waved this away as if her silence was not something she needed to apologize for. "Jaime told me that Joffrey wasn't allowing anyone to see me," he said. "No doubt Cersei wrote him to order that, because she doesn't want there to be a chance of the truth getting out."

Sansa blinked at him. "Cersei?" she asked carefully.

She found it so strange, now that Cersei was in Highgarden rather than here, to still learn of some of the influences that she had here.

He nodded. "This is no doubt another of her games," he said bitterly. "Our father is dead, so of course I must have killed him."

Sansa didn't have an answer for that. "Are you...do you need anything?" she asked worriedly. "I could tell Ser Jaime, because I'm not certain I could get down here again..."

The least because she was far too frightened to do so.

Tyrion gave her a long look, and then sat back down. "Just..." he waved a hand in front of his face. "Just tell me what's been going on, up there." He pointed to the ceiling of her the cell, and Sansa bit her lip.

He sounded so...despondent, as if he already had a good guess of what had been going on up there, and Sansa felt her heart lodge in her throat. For a moment, she couldn't speak, and she found herself swallowing reflexively at the sick feeling entering her stomach once more.

"I..." she shook her head, because what was going on up there was a bit too horrible to put into words on her own. "Shae misses you," she blurted, and then winced.

Tyrion, for his part, gave her a sad smile. "And I miss her, but that's not what I meant."

She knew that.

She had come here to tell him that she couldn't get him the Rock she knew he believed to be his birthright, had come to tell him that, on top of the knowledge that he was probably going to die, Cersei Lannister was going to take away his birthright.

She licked her lips.

She couldn't do it, Sansa realized, with sudden, sickening clarity. She thought of the time he had saved her from a beating at the hands of Joffrey's guards, thought of the time he had pulled back on their wedding night when he certainly didn't need to.

She couldn't deliver hope to her husband in the form of mentioning Casterly Rock only to take it away from him, only to tell him that she was a complete failure of a wife who had run away with another man during the hour in which he probably killed his own father, and that he was going to die and lose out to the sister she knew he hated.

"I can save the Rock from Cersei," she blurted, and Tyrion's head jerked up at her words, his lips parting.

"W-What?"

Sansa licked her lips, and if her heart had been hammering before, she was almost certain that it had stopped, now.

Sansa nodded. "I...I found something, in the records, about a woman who had inherited her properties from her husband," she told him. "Which means that I could hold onto it, while you've been...down here," damn it, she couldn't even say "imprisoned," "And if..." she bit her lip. "I could keep it from your sister."

Tyrion laughed thickly, reaching up and rubbing at his forehead.

"My lord?" she asked nervously.

Tyrion shook his head. "I'm sorry, I just..." he shook his head again. "I've been sitting down here, convinced that this is all some horrible mistake, but, fuck, this is really happening, and there's no one to stop Joffrey now at all, as if my father even would. And you have a plan for keeping the Rock."

Sansa flinched, more convinced than she had been before that he hadn't done this. "I'm sorry, Tyrion. I thought that you would want this. If you don't want to speak about this, we don't have to. I just thought..."

He shook his head again. "What are you thinking?" She blinked at him. "I mean, how do you think you can keep the Rock from my sister?"

She bit her lip. "By inheriting it straight from you."

It took Tyrion only a moment to put things together. "Barbrey Dustin?" he shook his head. "Sansa, she's a Northerner. Joffrey could easily claim that because she's a Northerner, the law is different..."

Sansa shook her head. "That's not..." she licked her lips. She wished she could still put faith in that plan, but the moment she'd read of the dried up accounts of the Rock, she'd known Joffrey would never believe her about them. She would need a far more solid claim. "That's not exactly what I meant, my lord."

She had thought about this long and hard. Thought about all of the different possibilities, the moment she realized the Rock was dry and that no amount of proof offered on Sansa's end was ever going to convince Joffrey that this was the truth as long as Sansa owned it, before deciding she would just have to go and deliver the bad news to her husband, as he languished away in his cell.

And now that the thought had passed her lips, rather than Margaery's, she couldn't take them back. Couldn't stop thinking about them.

He gave her a long look. And then, just as Jaime's had when Sansa mentioned a desperation to meet her husband, his eyes flitted down to her stomach. "I don't suppose that this is the best...place for that, my lady," he said finally, very carefully. "Especially when you've never..."

She had, actually, at least with Margaery, but she wasn't going to kick her husband while he was down, and she was far too nervous by far to bring it up on her own.

"I didn't mean here, my lord," she said quietly, suddenly unable to meet his eyes when this thought had been for him, anyway. When she hadn't been able to keep quiet about this for him.

Tyrion raised a brow. "I don't think I'm getting out of here any time soon, Sansa, and certainly not for that," he told her gently, and she thought that he was being rather thick for himself, or perhaps she was being terribly unclear.

And then, she saw the exact moment when he understood.

"Ah," he said, pulling back a little from her. "Sansa, I can't ask you to..."

"I wouldn't just be doing it for you," she said, snapping when she didn't mean to, and then flushing. "I'm sorry. I know this must be...terrible for you to speak of, but...it would be protecting me, as well, and Shae, and it would be a bit more safe than just inheriting when I am your wife and there are other heirs around."

And she would get to inherit a barren rock, just because she couldn't bear to let her husband die completely hopeless. Sansa bit the inside of her cheek, and waited for his response.

"Sansa," Tyrion said finally, "I'm hardly going to order you to do this," he told her, a look of guilt flashing over his features before it vanished once more. He squirmed a little where he stood. "But neither am I going to forbid you from doing it, if you believe this will keep the both of you safe. I only want to ask...who is it?"

Sansa opened her mouth, and then shut it, realizing abruptly that Margaery had never exactly given her a name when she made this suggestion, only obliquely hinted that she had someone in mind.

Which was...a little disturbing, if Sansa thought about it too hard. That Margaery had been able to think of Sansa with another man at all. That she had planned it.

Tyrion raised a hand. "You don't have to tell me," he said finally, looking like a kicked dog once more when she'd only been attempting to avoid that, "just...be careful, Sansa. I don't have to tell you how dangerous something like this could be."

Sansa nodded. "I will be," she assured him. Then, "Are you sure...?"

Tyrion gave her a long look. "If you think this is something you can do," he said finally, "and it is something that will protect you, even if it doesn't save my life, then yes, Sansa, do it."

She bit her lip. "I'm sorry I can't do more for you. I could speak to someone, to help you. You still have allies here, surely. Your brother, the Martells-"

"The Martells are currently under house arrest," Tyrion interrupted her quietly, "which is only a step up from where I am, I suppose, but not a step in the right direction for me. Sansa," he reached out with grimy hands, taking her own into his. "I don't want you to endanger yourself for me, Sansa. This isn't your fight, and what you're already planning, that's dangerous enough for you."

She pulled back, and she didn't know if it was the state of his cell, or the anger bubbling up inside of her at the thought of what she was being pushed to do, even if he wasn't trying to push her at all, because she could see the hope in his eyes that he was trying to hide, that had her blurting, "You're my husband."

Tyrion laughed. And then, at her expression, "I'm sorry, Sansa. It's just...you don't owe me anything, my dear, based on what we have, I think."

Sansa flinched. "Then I'm sorry for that, too," she said quietly, saw his eyes widen as she turned toward the door of the cell, knocked on it to signal to the men waiting outside that she was done here.

Tyrion opened his mouth as if to say one last thing to her as the door opened, and then evidently thought better of it, going silent once more as Sansa picked up the empty little tray she had brought with her and walked out of the room.

She didn't breathe again until she was no longer surrounded by the dark, dank walls of the cells beneath the Keep.


	155. SANSA

Sansa almost made it to the chamber pot back in Tyrion's chambers, Tyrion's, not her own, and she wondered what would happen to her, whether she would be moved back to her old chambers or to new ones, when he was beheaded like her father had been, before what little amount of meat she had eaten earlier came up again.

Behind her, she heard Shae rustling about, having been spurred into motion the moment Sansa entered the room, and felt, a moment later, a warm, wet cloth placed against her forehead before Shae was bodily moving her to sit on the edge of the bed, rather than kneeling before the chamber pot.

"Sansa," Shae said, voice reproving and sad at the same time, and Sansa couldn't bring herself to meet the other woman's eyes.

She felt Shae's hands carding through her hair, and leaned into the touch, grateful for the coolness of those fingers, wishing that they were her mother's and that she could close her eyes and never think of this horrid place again.

Her stomach still felt queasy, and she lifted a hand over it, bit her tongue to keep from being sick again.

She wondered if Shae wished she had been the one to go down to the Black Cells with Ser Jaime. She was, after all, a servant, and much less recognizable than Sansa, but she had not made that suggestion, when Sansa had formulated this plan.

It was just another reminder of the many ways in which Sansa was disappointing the people around her who were actually kind to her.

"I...I forgot," Sansa whispered, "How horrible it is there, down in the Black Cells," she explained, at Shae's inquisitive gaze. The other woman never pressed her, for which Sansa was grateful, but it was good to know that she could speak when she wished. "How the walls are so bleak, pushing in at you all of the time."

She hadn't even been there very long, the first time she had come down, to reason with her father to say whatever the Lannisters wanted for her sake, so long as he stayed alive.

She had been so naive, then. She wasn't actually certain how much that had changed, now.

Because that wasn't what she felt so ill about. She felt ill at the knowledge that either she had just lied to a dying man, as she had lied to her father in promising him a way out, or she had promised to keep something that was going to be far more trouble than it was worth.

She wasn't certain which was worse.

Shae swallowed. "And Tyrion? How did he seem?" She sounded so hopeful, and Sansa struggled to think of one thing that would not make her feel worse.

She knew how the last few days, weeks, had taken their toll on Shae, where she did not know all of that with Tyrion. Knew how Shae was barely holding herself together in the knowledge that her lover was on his way to his death, and no one, especially not her, was allowed to see him.

She was surprised Shae did not seem jealous that Sansa had seen him. Then again, all of this was moving so quickly. Perhaps she, as Sansa felt, was in too much of a state of shock to have that depth of emotion.

Sansa shook her head. "He seemed...he knows how to put on a brave front," Sansa said, and, as Shae's face fell, blurted, "Better than I. But he seemed...not despondent, I think. He does not truly seem to believe that he will go down for his father's murder. He thinks this is another of the Queen Mother's games, even from Highgarden."

Sansa didn't know what to think of that. She supposed it made some sense, because the Queen Mother did hate her brother, more so than she hated Margaery, more than she must have hated Tywin for sending her away from King's Landing and her children there.

But if the Queen Mother was sending letters to Joffrey, giving him advice on the goings on in King's Landing, Sansa thought Margaery would have mentioned that. She was paranoid enough, with this new law that had been passed.

More likely, this was all Joffrey and Cersei was not writing to her son at all, which certainly did not make Sansa feel better.

Shae's eyes flashed in anger, as if Tyrion's suppositions had already been confirmed in her mind. "The wicked bitch."

Sansa colored, glanced around as she saw that, while she had not shut the door, Shae must have, even as she found the corners of her lips quirking at the words. "Shae! You mustn't say such things. Someone might hear. And...she isn't even here."

She said the words as hopefully as Shae had asked how Tyrion was doing, and wondered if they were both fools.

Shae raised a brow at her. "For how much longer do you think that will be the case?" she asked idly. "Cersei Lannister is a force all of her own, and there is no one keeping her from King's Landing now that Lord Tywin is dead, except maybe that old thorny woman."

Sansa flushed. "Lady Olenna Tyrell is a force of will with of her own, I think," she offered shyly, but Shae just shrugged.

"But she is not infallible," Shae said, in a quiet, ominous voice that had Sansa glancing at her in concern, because it sounded as if Shae knew something that she did not, with those words.

Sansa felt a slight headache coming on. "I don't know what to do," she admitted. "I...I couldn't tell him that there is nothing at the Rock." She licked her lips. "That it's useless. I couldn't do that to him, knowing that he was going to spend the rest of his days until his trial knowing it."

Shae gave her a look. "It isn't useless just because the Lannisters are broke, Sansa," she said softly.

"It is to me," Sansa muttered in annoyance, reaching up and rubbing at her sore lips.

"It can still serve as a protection for you," Shae reasoned, and Sansa saw then that Shae had wanted Sansa to give up the Rock. Had wanted Tyrion to tell her to keep fighting for it. Because it belonged to him, at the moment, and Shae was going to lose him, Sansa supposed grimly.

"I know," Sansa said, even if she wasn't certain of that, any longer. "That's why I told Tyrion I'm going to try and keep it."

But she hadn't told him that the Rock was empty of gold. She wondered if his reaction would have been the same if she had, or if he would have told her not to bother.

But it didn't matter, because she hadn't.

Sansa bit back a sigh. "I need to go and find the Queen," she informed Shae, standing to her feet and then grimacing as the whole world shifted before her eyes.

Shae pulled her back down. "Rest for a moment, you silly girl, before you go and see your queen," she told Sansa. "Just a moment."

This time, Sansa did sigh. "All right," she agreed, letting Shae pull her down onto the bed and lay a blanket over her. "But just a moment. I really do need to speak with her, if we're going to do this. She can..." she grimaced. "She can help."


	156. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: F/F/M, extremely dubious consent, panic attacks

The boy was very pretty.

Margaery had insisted on that, when she told Olyvar about the unique...predicament that a noble lady of her acquaintance had. He'd narrowed his eyes at her words, obviously trying to figure out which lady she spoke of, but because he'd been trained by Baelish, he didn't ask any questions.

Which relieved Margaery, because she knew how Loras seemed to like Olyvar, now, even if he wasn't Renly and never could be.

There had been a moment, a moment of weakness, in which Margaery had considered simply asking Loras for help in this matter. He was far less likely to turn on her with the information, and he would do it, she knew. But she couldn't ask that of him. Not her brother, who had spent half a lifetime trying to convince himself that he could marry and lie with a woman if it was for his family, and the other half trying to make up for it with Renly.

She couldn't pull him back down to that, not when he was already so unstable.

One of her conditions to Olyvar, one of the reasons why she could not ask for him specifically, was that she wanted whoever this was to be as willing to lay with a woman as any hot blooded young man. Sansa wouldn't be able to go through with it, Margaery knew, if it were any other case.

Only one of them, of course.

Pretty, and near to their age, because Sansa had told Margaery about the experience on her wedding night with Lord Tyrion, an experience she attempted to justify a thousand times in the telling of it but which had left Margaery reflecting in horror on hands, roving their way down her form, sickened, ale breath and craggy skin, and she wasn't going to inflict that reminder on Sansa, however much the girl insisted that she was fine and that she and Lord Tyrion were friends now.

He was pretty, and prompt, showing up at the back entrance into the Keep on time, Alla reported, after she snuck him into Margaery's chambers through the entrance to Margaery's bath.

Margaery looked him over, bringing her finger to her lips in thought.

She was still a bit surprised that Sansa had agreed to this, if she was being honest. She had been so adamantly against it before this, so convinced that there was another way to save the Rock for herself and her husband, that Margaery wondered what had finally changed her mind, and so strongly.

Sansa hadn't said, when she came to Margaery's chambers the night before and forewent sex to inform Margaery that she thought Margaery had had a good idea, with what she had suggested earlier.

She had stumbled over the words, flushing her way through them and clearly incapable of articulating what she was actually agreeing to.

That had concerned Margaery, because she knew that Sansa, still very naive in some ways, viewed sex as something precious, something intimate in a way that nothing else could be between two people, and while that made Sansa's willingness to sleep with Margaery all the more appreciated, it also frustrated her.

Frustrated her every time Sansa gave her some wounded look, knowing that Margaery was leaving the room after fucking her senseless to go and be fucked by Joffrey. Frustrated her every time Sansa made some snide comment, and they were getting more frequent now, about Margaery being shared between the two of them. Frustrated her because she knew those comments belied a judgment that Sansa hadn't brought up in some time, but that was still there nonetheless.

It wasn't Margaery's fault that she hadn't been born in the frigid North, to a family so convinced that honor and morality were the only way to do things.

She sighed, brushing at her lips and trying to push those thoughts down. It also wasn't Sansa's that she was, and she knew that she was more frustrated with how strained things had seemed between them lately than that.

"You'll do," she told the boy, and then, grimacing, "What's your name?"

He did look young. Painfully so, and she felt a stab of guilt at the thought. Older than Sansa, perhaps, and certainly old enough for the task for which they needed him, but still too young for the line of work that he was in.

"Janek," the boy informed her, giving her a wide smile. "Are you the one I've been sent to see tonight, Your Grace?"

She slapped him. Alla jerked, where she stood behind Janek, but Janek didn't even flinch at the touch, merely let his head whip back with the sensation without losing his balance.

"We don't have names here," Margaery informed him softly. "You don't know who I am, and you don't know who the lady I will have you seeing to is, or I will let Olyvar know how badly he's disappointed me tonight."

The boy paled. "My apologies, Yo-my lady."

Margaery nodded. "Good." She bit her lip. "Alla, why don't you go find some of the other ladies."

Alla fled without another word. Margaery waited until she was gone, the door shut behind her, before speaking again.

"The lady that you will be seeing to is quite...hesitant. Shy." She raised a brow at him. "Olyvar assured me this wouldn't be a problem for you."

Janek nodded, eager to please now. "I've deflowered quite a few innocent maids, my lady," he told her. "All for good coin, of course."

Margaery's eyes flashed in amusement. "Of course. But my lady isn't an innocent maid; she's a wife in desperate need of a child."

"Yes, my lady," Janek nodded. "And I'll...I'll manage that, if I can. She won't feel a thing, either. I'm very gentle."

Margaery didn't doubt it, looking over him. "Good. She'll be a few moments, because I wanted to speak with you first, but when she comes in, I want you to give her some wine," she gestured over to the wine sitting on the table beside Margaery's bed. "Make her comfortable. She'll...feel better about this whole thing if she connects with you somewhat. And I won't be leaving, either. Is any of that going to be a problem?"

He stared at her, a little wide eyed, and then shook his head. "Of course not, my lady. But I shouldn't say her name, if I know it?"

Oh, he would know it, Margaery didn't doubt that.

"That would only scare her away," Margaery informed him. "No, don't say her name." She paused. "And we'll want to make this quick." She eyed the waistband of his thin, unsubtle trousers pointedly.

The young man looked down, and then seemed to understand her meaning, and as he reached for the drawstrings of his pants, Margaery walked over to the table by her bed and reached for some wine.

She had informed Joffrey that she was sick today, because if there was one thing guaranteed to keep her husband out of her chambers it was the knowledge that he might become ill from it, so she knew there wouldn't be any interruptions, once Sansa arrived.

Still, the wine burned pleasantly going down. She thought she finally understood why Sansa always felt so jealous, when Margaery had to run off to be with Joffrey.

She watched with a clinical sort of detachment as his trousers fell shamelessly around his ankles and Janek wrapped a hand around the base of his cock, palming it until it was half hard, quietly grunting as it began to leak.

She'd always wondered about this part. Wondered how men were so easily able to work themselves into a frenzy without some sort of stimulation, whether it was even pleasurable, at that point.

She'd never had the opportunity to ask Joffrey. He was always hard enough to fuck her when they started; turned on either by her touch or some new discovered violence.

She didn't ask Janek.

"That's enough," Margaery said, and Janek let out a frustrated groan, but obediently dropped his hand. "Why don't you go sit on the bed? When she walks in, she won't feel...intimidated, that way."

Janek raised a brow. "You paint her as quite the startled bird," he said, moving over to the bed and sitting down with a grimace, legs far apart.

Margaery nodded. "Well, in a way, I suppose she is," she said, just as a quiet knock came to the door.

They both startled, at the sound, and then Sansa's quiet voice murmured, "Margaery?"

Margaery set down her glass of wine, moved to the door. Sansa stood on the other side of it, flushed, hands clasped together and fidgeting, and her eyes widened at the sight of the mousy haired naked boy on the other side of Margaery's door.

Margaery dragged her inside, shutting the door behind her. It sounded ominous.

Sansa chewed on her lower lip, looking far more unsure than she had a moment ago.

"Darling," Margaery said, in lieu of using Sansa's name. "This is Janek."

The boy smiled at Sansa, a bright, brilliant smile, and Sansa's flush only grew as he stood to his feet, hardened cock bouncing up against his stomach.

Margaery wondered for the first time if Sansa had ever even seen one. She had to have; she had brothers, she thought desperately, wondering if she shouldn't have ordered Janek to get dressed again before she let Sansa inside.

"Can I get you some wine, my lady?" Janek asked Sansa, already reaching for the pitcher. His eyes flashed in recognition, but, as Margaery had ordered, he said nothing.

Sansa nodded mutely, glancing nervously at Margaery. Margaery gave her an encouraging little nod, and wondered if this wasn't a foolish plan, after all.

But Sansa had said she wanted to do this, and Margaery still thought it was the best plan they had, to keep the Rock in Sansa's hands. Maybe it would have been better if they had more time, if they weren't going to have to bluff their way through convincing Joffrey now and make sure the pregnancy took, whether tonight or soon, though Margaery hadn't actually mentioned that concern to Sansa, but it was better than giving up the Rock entirely.

Janek handed a glass of wine to Sansa, and as she took it, their fingers brushed. She flushed, and glanced up at him; Janek smiled at her, reassuring, a kind smile.

She wondered how much of this, of the putting on of personas, was pretend, for a whore. Wondered if it was anything like putting on a persona as a wife.

Sansa took a rather large sip, and Janek moved behind her; Margaery winced, watched as Sansa's shoulders stiffened, only for Janek to reach up and rub at her shoulders, the gentle touch of a lover.

And then his left arm moved downward, wrapped around her waist and began to pet at Sansa's stomach through her gown. Her eyes went wide, took on the look of a frightened doe Margaery remembered watching Joffrey shoot. This wasn't going to work.

Margaery moved forward, even in the knowledge that this was sealing Janek's fate in this situation where she might have managed to spare him before, pulled Sansa into her arms and placed an open mouthed kiss to her lips.

She felt Janek stiffen behind her, but he didn't pull away or otherwise acknowledge it, just kept rubbing at Sansa's shoulders as Margaery kissed her again, as she worked Sansa's lips open with her own and delicately flicked at Sansa's mouth with her tongue.

She let her fingers fall down Sansa's cheek, let them brush at her breasts through Sansa's gown, until they hardened beneath her ministrations, as Janek kept rubbing at Sansa's shoulders until they fell from around her neck, began to loosen.

Margaery walked backwards, pulling Sansa and Janek with her, until she felt the bed hit the back of her knees, felt Sansa disconnect a little, and kissed her again.

Thought of the time when Joffrey had called Sansa to his chambers in the dead of night, and managed not to feel a shred of guilt for what she was now doing.

She waited until Sansa was moaning against her mouth before pulling her down onto the bed, glancing back at Janek as she pulled her lips from Sansa's and got to work on her breasts, pulling them free from the confines of her gown.

Janek looked rather harder, now. She spared a brief thought to the worry that he wouldn't be able to wait until Sansa was ready, before Sansa distracted her as she had intended to distract Sansa, latching onto Margaery's neck and sucking greedily.

Margaery blinked the fog from her mind, gestured with a hand for Janek to get on the bed with them.

Sansa pulled back the moment she felt the added weight on the bed.

"Sansa," Margaery pulled her attention back. "Eyes on me."

"But-"

"Sansa," Margaery repeated, and Sansa's eyes skirted back to her own. "Whenever you’re ready," she told Sansa. "We can take as long or as short of time as we need to. This is all whatever you want, you understand?"

Sansa bit her lip, the sound of her ragged breaths momentarily breaking off, before she nodded. "Yes," she whispered. "But I need-"

She looked down at Margaery's lips again, cutting herself off, and, with only a brief hesitation, Margaery gently pushed Sansa aside, brushed her lips against Janek's.

Janek startled for only a moment, but she supposed that the excitement of interlocking tongues with a queen was rather hard an opportunity to pass up, and a moment later, he was kissing her just as passionately as Sansa had been.

Margaery moaned, louder than she really felt like doing, because this was for Sansa's benefit, not her own. And then she reached out, wrapped a hand around Sansa's breast, rubbed at it gently.

When she and Janek detached, Sansa bit her lip, swallowed thickly, and kissed Janek as well. He moved a little closer, reaching out to gently support her back as he did so, kissing her no longer with the passion he had been kissing Margaery but again with that gentle touch.

Margaery watched, and found the whole thing a bit more...exciting than she probably should have.

It was some minutes before Sansa finally pronounced herself ready, looking a little wild as she did so but also breathing as harshly as she had been when Margaery fucked her mouth with her tongue, and Margaery wasn't touching her at all, now.

Her dress lay around her knees, and she wasn't blushing anymore. She looked beautiful, almost as beautiful as Margaery could usually make her look on her own.

And then Janek palmed his cock and reached between Sansa's legs, and Margaery didn't know if it was the sudden reminder that Janek had one that was the problem, because he'd been touching her there before, or something else, but that was the end of the line.

Because Sansa scrambled back from him, pulling her knees up to her chest as she flattened against the headboard, eyes wide in that same doe-like way, and her breathing came out in startled, too fast inhales.

Margaery swore under her breath, ignoring Janek's own startled expression to move over to where Sansa sat. She pulled Sansa into her arms, frustrated when Sansa flailed against her before falling into her, and stroked at her hair, pulling her face away from Janek until it was buried in Margaery's chest, blocking out the rest of the world.

"Breathe, Sansa," she told the girl. "Come on, breathe. Deep breaths. In, out. In, out."

"I can't," Sansa gasped out, pulling away, sniffling. "I can't. I can't-"

"All right," Margaery reached out, wrapping her hands around Sansa's cheeks and pulling her close, ignoring the boy altogether. "It's all right, Sansa. Just breathe with me. In. Out. In."

Sansa stared at her blankly for several long moments, before sucking in a breath of air in time with Margaery's. Margaery gave her a smile. "That's it. You're doing so well, darling. Keep going."

"I can't, I can't do it," Sansa whispered again, and tears were gathering in her eyes.

Margaery cooed, pulled Sansa into her arms. "Then you don't have to, darling. You don't have to." She leaned forward, kissing Sansa's wet eyelids, her nose. "It's all right. You're fine. It's all over, now. It's all over."

Sansa sucked in a massive breath, then another.

"Good," Margaery praised. "Come on, you're-"

And then she sicked up onto Margaery's golden blankets. Margaery thought she saw Janek grimace, but she didn't care, only pulled Sansa's hair back just in time and wiped at her mouth with the already ruined blankets, thought that at least now she would have evidence that she had been ill, with Joffrey.

"Come, dear," Margaery said, helping Sansa off the bed and to her feet, "Why don't we get you cleaned up."

Sansa carefully didn't meet either of their eyes as Margaery led her into her bath room, as she started a bath for Sansa and tried not to think of the last time she had started a bath on her own, before getting Sansa situated.

"Are you all right, now?" she asked, because one of the things that had helped the most after...was a warm bath, the floating sensation it produced.

Sansa nodded tiredly, still not meeting Margaery's eyes, and Margaery moved forward, kissing her on the forehead. "I don't want you to worry about this, Sansa. It really will be all right."

Sansa swallowed thickly, nodded. "I..." she didn't seem capable of saying more, lips smacking shut a moment later.

"Now," Margaery said, still in that gentle, reasonable tone that belied her own concern, "I'm going to go take of our guest and see that one of my ladies takes care of the sheets, all right? I'll be just a call away if you need me."

Sansa nodded again, and she was flushing now, which at least meant she was back in the present.

Margaery left her with only the smallest feeling of guilt, stepping into the bedchamber once more, where Janek still stood naked in the middle of the room, and she sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose.

And then she moved to the outer door of her chambers, where only Loras stood guard, expression grim, and she wondered if he had heard everything.

"I think we're done here," she told him, and he nodded, stepping into the room as Janek hastily pulled his clothing back on.

Margaery passed him without remark, though he looked nervous now, as if he thought he had failed and her earlier threat was about to come to pass, or perhaps she was misreading him and he was only worried that he wouldn't be paid.

She reached for the small satchel of gold she had prepared to reassure him.

"I trust not a word of what happened here tonight will reach anyone else's ears," Margaery said warningly, as she placed a sackcloth bag which jingled into his hands.

The young man's eyes were wide, though he appeared otherwise calm as he shook his head, pulling out the coins and causing his eyes to grow even wider. "You made your position in this matter abundantly clear, Your-my lady," he said, staring down at the floor in lieu of Margaery. Then he paused. "And besides, the Lady's...dedication to her husband is admirable. I wish..." he shook his head.

Margaery hummed, looking away. "And yet, I know your employer can be...tricky, at the best of times," she pointed out. "And I have no doubt that he knows a whore was brought to the palace for a young woman residing there." She nodded to the payment. "That should be enough, no?"

He glanced down at the coins practically spilling out of his hands, before stuffing them back into the sackcloth bag she had provided. "More than the agreed upon rate, Your Grace. It is...most generous."

"Yes," Margaery agreed. "It is. I think it should be enough to buy you a safe passage to Pentos and to have some left over once you arrive there."

His eyes jerked up to meet her own for the first time. "Your Grace?" he asked, desperation leaking into his voice as Loras came around the corner, coming to a halt behind the young man with gloved hand on the hilt of his sword.

"Do you know what I did with the last man who might have been able to put me in an...uncomfortable situation, to say the least?" Margaery asked pleasantly, even as a pang of guilt hit her at the reminder of the poor maester, as Loras' free hand clamped down on the young man's shoulder.

He gulped, was silent for a moment that grew too long. "My employer will notice if I do not return."

Margaery quirked a brow. "Will he?"

The man swallowed, eyes downcast, now. He worked his jaw for a moment, and then, "As I said, Your Grace, you have been most generous, and when I was not even party to anything that merits such payment."

Margaery's narrowed eyes trailed down his form, and then she turned to her brother. "Loras, please make sure that - Janek, isn't it? - Janek finds himself on a ship traveling for Pentos today, and that it is not the sort of ship that will find itself dragged back to King's Landing for any reason."

Janek gulped even as Loras nodded solemnly, wrapping a hand around Janek's bicep. "Of course, sister."

"Chin up, Janek," Margaery said blithely as her brother led him away. The man glanced back at her. "At least you aren't being taken to a Cell for being with a married woman."

She hated that the callousness in her own tone did not drown out the guilt she felt as the young man was taken away by her brother.


	157. SANSA

Sansa lifted her head when Margaery re-entered the bath room, wearing a different gown and holding one out for Sansa. She blinked in surprise when she realized that it was one of Margaery's, rather than her own, but she supposed it would look suspicious if one of Margaery's ladies ran down to her chambers and asked Shae for another gown.

Margaery held the gown out wordlessly to Sansa, who stepped awkwardly out of the bath and into it without a word herself.

The silence hung in the air like a noose, just waiting to ensnare the both of them.

"Sansa..." Margaery began finally, and Sansa lifted her head, not wanting to see the pity in the other woman's eyes. Pity that Sansa couldn't even bring herself to do what Margaery did almost every night for the sake of a child who would keep her safe. Pity that she had turned into a child herself, at the thought of what Janek would have to do to give her one.

Sansa wasn't even certain what had caused her to panic. Janek had been gentle, and a softer lover than Margaery usually was, and there had been nothing cruel in his eyes when he leaned down to kiss her.

And, with Margaery noticing the panic at the beginning, the attack of nerves, and coming in to help, Sansa had almost managed to forget that this wasn't just something between the two of them, something sweet and intimate and theirs.

She'd gotten off on it, too, which was more than she'd been expecting when she'd rationalized this plan in her mind in the hours after she told Tyrion and Margaery that this was what she wanted. This was how she was going to keep the Rock.

And then she'd seen Janek's cock, a hair's breadth away from her cunny, and Sansa had frozen, suddenly remembering the night of her wretched wedding, when Tyrion had touched her breasts and prepared to take her before he saw the fear in her eyes.

Remembered the night when Margaery had been there, too, and Sansa had been terrified that Joffrey was going to rape her. Remembered that Margaery had tried to distract her with gentleness then, too, but if it wasn't for Ser Jaime bursting in to the rescue, she wouldn't have made it out of that situation entirely intact.

And the thought of Janek shoving his cock into her cunny was suddenly just as terrifying, and she had pulled away, because no child was worth that.

She looked up.

There wasn't pity in Margaery's eyes, only sadness, and somehow, that was worse.

"Is he gone?" Sansa rasped out, as she pulled the gown tight around her shoulders. It felt...nice, knowing that she was wearing one of Margaery's Tyrell gowns, inhaling the scent of her in it. Grounding.

She didn't belong to Janek.

Margaery nodded. "I sent him away," she said gently. Then, "Do you want to talk about what happened?"

Sansa shook her head. "Not particularly."

"Of course." Margaery took her arm, led her out of the bath room. "Do you want to sit down, have something to drink?"

Sansa bit her lip, then nodded. "I suppose so."

She sat on the very edge of Margaery's bed, feeling uncomfortable even doing that, as Margaery got her some wine and sat beside her.

"What will I do now?" Sansa asked into the silence, because it was growing oppressive again.

Margaery didn't meet her eyes. "I don't know," she admitted, words soft, like she was doing her best to avoid pushing Sansa into another panic attack. Sansa flushed at the thought.

"Well that doesn't help," Sansa said, snapping.

Margaery winced. "Sansa, Yours was a wonderful plan to keep Joffrey from taking the Rock from you _for the moment_. But it is just as temporary as Joffrey's temperament. If Tyrion does...die, then Joffrey will still take it away from you. And if you can't..."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "I don't think I should try again," she said softly, looking down at her hands where the clutched the wine glass, now.

"I don't, either," Margaery agreed. "Clearly, this isn't going to work."

Sansa nodded. "I don't know what I'll tell Shae. Or, gods, Tyrion. But I'm not like either of you, you and Shae. I can't just..." she bit her lip, looked away.

Margaery stiffened at her words, and then looked like she was forcing herself to soften.

When she didn't speak, Sansa found herself doing so, desperate to justify what had happened in this room just moments ago. Or was it hours? She didn't know. "The Rock isn't worth my life, Margaery," she said quietly. "It may offer an escape, if I become pregnant and can run away to that place, but that escape would last...nine months, at the most. Joffrey wouldn't let me be gone longer. And I can't...it's not worth my life, or anything else."

"Sansa," Margaery said gently, Sansa nodded, biting into her lip so hard she was almost sure it would bleed. Margaery bit her lip, looked like she was going to argue, and then nodded. "All right. I don't like that you've no other choices now...but I don't see that we have any other option of keeping the Rock, and I don't want you to feel forced into this situation, again. The Rock isn't worth your life, it's true. I just hoped that it could save it."

She was the picture of contriteness, and Sansa leaned into her a little.

Not that it helped. It didn't give her the child Sansa had been too much of a coward to commit to, after all, no matter how much she tried to convince herself the Rock wasn't worth it and she had been wronged in some way.

For a moment, Sansa tried to imagine what it would be like, to live that life. To carry a child for nine months in her womb with the knowledge that when it was born, it might just kill her even if she did survive childbirth. To know that the child in her womb was nothing more than a tool, for herself, for Joffrey.

And, in the unlikely event that the Lannisters allowed her to live once her child was born, or when she had tricked them into giving her Casterly Rock as Lann the Clever once tricked his way to owning it, and barred the doors after herself, after she had proven her loyalty to them by draining Casterly Rock of every resource that it had, until it was nothing more than a barren rock in which she huddled, raising a child in such a place.

She thought that, just perhaps, she might be happy. To have a child of her own, away from all of this horror, away from Joffrey and in the safety of an impenetrable rock. To raise him in a world where she was his world, and he was hers. She would have named him Robb, and lived for him until the end of the war to regain control of Westeros. Poverty stricken, terribly alone, and captives in a Rock that would never again open for them, but happy.

Sansa shook her head. It might have been horrible as well, she thought. She might have given birth to a terribly deformed dwarf who ripped his way out of her womb the same way that Tyrion Lannister ripped his way out of her mothers, and if she had survived that, he might have been just as much of a monster as Joffrey. And then the Lannisters would rip him from her arms and raise him up to be that monster anyway, while she was never allowed to see him and pollute him with the thoughts of her traitorous bloodline.

No, she thought, shuddering. It was just as well that she couldn't bear the touch of a man.

No barren rock was worth that, no matter what would please her husband. And Tyrion was unlikely to make it out of this situation anyway, no matter what scant amount of evidence they held against him.

She felt another sting of guilt at the thought, but she had tried, for him. That was all he could ask, surely.

"I think I should go back to my chambers, now," Sansa said quietly. "You may have an excuse for," she waved a hand around the bedchambers, realized abruptly that the blankets on the bed they were now sitting on were Tyrell green instead of Lannister gold, "but someone might come looking for me."

Margaery gave her another soft look. "Are you sure?"

Sansa jumped to her feet, suddenly very sure that she needed to get out of this room, and now. "Yes," she said, "I'll just go and rest for a while. And Margaery," she turned back at the door, already halfway out of it, "Thank you. For trying, at least."

Margaery hesitated, and then nodded.


	158. MARGAERY

Sansa had been...distant, since that night with Janek. Not that Margaery blamed her for it, of course. She knew that the situation had left its scar on Sansa, even if it had not left a child within her, and Margaery had been there that night, and was a reminder of it, so it was only natural that Sansa would need her space, would need the chance to think about what had happened.

Sansa was like that, sometimes, in a way that Margaery found both endearing and frustrating. She wasn't sure what she was finding it now, only that every time she thought of Sansa's panicked expression as she huddled on the edge of Margaery's bed, she couldn't stop her hands from tremoring.

Which was why it was rather surprising when Sansa showed up on the doorstep of Margaery's chambers not three nights later, looking hot and bothered and barely shutting the door behind her before rushing at Margaery.

Margaery let it happen, even in her bemusement, because she could taste the desperation on Sansa's lips even as she tasted the desire there.

She only wished the desire tasted quite as strong as Sansa pulled her towards the bed, divested Margaery of her clothes long before Margaery managed to be rid of Sansa's.

"Sansa," she gasped out. "What are you...what are you doing here?"

Sansa shook her head, kissed Margaery again. "Isn't it obvious?" she whispered hoarsely, and peppered Margaery's neck with kisses.

Margaery abruptly forgot what it was she was asking; let her neck fall back to expose more skin to Sansa's beautiful ministrations.

"Margaery," the other girl gasped out, as they fell onto the bed, laughing slightly when they almost fell off of it a moment later.

"Tell me what you want, Sansa," Margaery murmured, reaching for her, pretending that the desperation in Sansa's eyes matched her own.

"I want..." Sansa licked her lips, practically keening as she reached between Margaery's legs. "Please..."

Margaery moaned as she felt Sansa's fingers push inside of her, arched up her back at the sensation, as her cunny grew wet under Sansa's ministrations.

She reached for Sansa, drew her close enough to run her fingers over Sansa's form, to pull at the gown still covering her like a shroud.

Far too much clothing, in Margaery's humble opinion.

Sansa pulled back then, fingers drawing out of Margaery's cunt so abruptly that she gasped at the sudden loss, felt her body push forward in an attempt to follow Sansa's fingers.

"Sansa?"

Sansa shook her head, breathing heavy, unable to meet Margaery's eyes. "I..." her hand lifted delicately up to her throat, covered by the smooth linen of her gown.

Where the scar that Ellaria Sand had given her was. Gods, Margaery had almost forgotten about it. Forgotten why she was so angered by the Martells, forgotten why she had thrown them at the mercy of Joffrey, however unthinkingly.

"Sansa," she said, reaching up to brush at Sansa's scar where she was sure it sat beneath her high collar. "It doesn't matter." Sansa looked up, met her eyes. "It doesn't matter."

Sansa shook her head. "I don't..." and then she bit her lip, pulled her gown over her head and drew Margaery in for another hard, passionless and desperate kiss.

"Sansa..." Margaery tried, starting to pull away, but Sansa kissed her again, harder this time, fingers digging into Margaery's uncovered arms. Margaery melted into the sensation, leaning forward and wrapping her arms around Sansa's stomach, their breasts brushing together as Sansa arched and gasped on the bed beneath her.

Margaery thought about her earlier worries, that someone would hear or see what they were doing and Joffrey would see them both destroyed for it, and didn't care, in the moment, because she was fucking Sansa in her own bedchambers, and she was going to enjoy every damn minute of it.

She didn't remember much of the actual coupling, knew only that Sansa stared at her so intently through all of it, in a way that Margaery couldn't quite define, and that she wasn't certain she liked, but it took her through the euphoria of her orgasm and Sansa's slightly more delayed orgasm all the same.

When they both lay on the bed, panting, Sansa sat up a little and kissed Margaery on the lips, a gentle, teasing kiss, hand reaching down between Margaery's slightly parted legs again.

"Sansa," Margaery tried, starting to sit up, but Sansa pushed her back down again, smiling teasingly as her fingers gently kneaded at Margaery's cunt, pushing apart the folds of her womanhood in slow, knowing strokes as Margaery found herself rather more aroused than she'd been expecting to be, so soon after her orgasm.

Sansa bent down, taking Margaery's mouth with her own, fucking her tongue in and out of Margaery's mouth as her fingers gently slid further into Margaery, the touch soft and gentle in a way that Margaery had not come to expect from Joffrey.

She keened, pushed up a little into Sansa's hand, didn't like the sudden feeling overcoming her, and sat up in bed despite Sansa's other hand, pushing back into Sansa's mouth until the other girl gasped and their tongues collided, brushing around each other before entangling.

Margaery reached out a hand, brushed it down Sansa's back, down the individual nodes of her spine until she cupped at Sansa's arse, pulled at it a little, felt Sansa arch and groan against her touch.

Sansa's fingers still rubbed at her cunny, and Margaery swore into Sansa's mouth, kissed her harder, until she had Sansa backed up against the headboard and moaning against her, until Margaery forgot how to breathe because Sansa's middle finger brushed against that spot inside of her that Joffrey never found and which left her senseless.

She came again, moaning, felt Sansa gasp against her, and when she opened her eyes, Sansa was half-lying on the bed beside her, and Margaery contemplated how she was going to explain the need to change the sheets so quickly after the last time to poor Elinor.

Who no doubt already knew what they were doing in here, after all, and likely wouldn't care in the least.

She glanced up at Sansa, eyes a little misty, and wondered what they'd just done. Wondered what it meant.

Sansa looked a little green, she thought idly, watching Sansa's hand fall to her stomach as she once again refused to meet Margaery's eyes.

"I..." Sansa bit her lip. "I really should go," she said.

Margaery shook her head, reached out and placed a hand on Sansa's arm. "Stay," she murmured, and, after a moment's hesitation, Sansa laid her head down on Margaery's stomach willingly, closed her eyes.

Margaery lay back flat on the bed, ran her fingers through Sansa's hair, and wondered what they had just done. Because it didn't feel like what they usually did in this bed, and that feeling was leaving sickening twists in Margaery's stomach.


	159. SANSA

"You're making the right decision, Lady Sansa," Lord Varys told her, as the quill in Sansa's fingers hesitated above the parchment, and she glanced up; saw the smallest smile that he sent her. Wondered what it meant.

No doubt Margaery would know, if she were here, but she wasn't. Wasn't, for which Sansa was terribly relieved, because she didn't think she could sit at this table in the Small Council chambers and sign away her husband's right to Casterly Rock and meet Margaery's gaze at the same time.

Which was why she had requested the chance to come before the Small Council early in the morning, before Margaery would have cause to be invited by Joffrey over their morning breakfast, as she knew was Joffrey's habit, and late enough in the morning that Joffrey would actually be awake and interested enough to accommodate Sansa.

She felt rather guilty about doing this, sneaking around behind Margaery's back to sign away the thing that they had both risked much attempting to get. But Margaery would try to talk her out of it, would try to convince her that there was another way to have what she wanted, and Sansa didn't want it enough for that.

She should have realized that before she put herself, Margaery, and that foolish prostitute at risk, however, and for that, Sansa felt rather guilty.

She wondered what had happened to the boy. She hadn't asked Margaery; she had been too disturbed by the whole event in the first day or so, and then she hadn't wanted to know. Hadn't wanted to know because she feared she already knew the answer, and she couldn't bear to think of Margaery in that way.

It would be too dangerous to leave the boy alive, after all, knowing what he did about them, about what they had all done together that night. He may not have impregnated Sansa, but they had done enough that Joffrey wouldn't care about that, if he ever found out.

She bit her lip, squeezing the quill a little more tightly in her hands.

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, you are saving House Lannister the great embarrassment that having Casterly Rock thrust upon your husband would bring us," he told her, not sounding particularly grateful. "Or upon a traitor's daughter. Now hurry up and sign it, lady aunt."

Sansa supposed that had more to do with the fact that her signing was a refusal of his "offer," than because he was unhappy that he had won against the Imp.

She felt a small splash of petty victory in the knowledge that he wasn't getting what he most wanted out of this, and that she was signing over a barren, empty rock to all of them, though she supposed they would take some comfort in the soldiers there, if nothing else.

Sansa swallowed, leaned down, and signed her name prettily where she was told to, hating the title that she signed beside it for the first and last time.

Sansa Lannister, Lady of Casterly Rock.

She missed the less whimsical sounding signature of her youth. The one that promised less but delivered more.

She was not going to be forced to carry around some stranger's child for signing away her husband's claim, and she was not going to be tied to a barren rock, but what had she gained from it, beyond the conscience she couldn't let go of?

She chewed on her lower lip, and thought of Janek, reaching for her, cock ready to fill her with a child she didn't want, ready to fill her when she didn't want him, polluting the bed that she and Margaery had laid claim to a hundred times.

Joffrey grinned, snatching the paper away from her the moment Sansa had finished, and handing it over to Mace Tyrell.

"Wonderful," he murmured, practically leering at Sansa, his earlier ire at her refusal to take his offer forgotten in his victory. "I suppose you ought to run along and tell your husband. I will even be a magnanimous king and give you leave to visit him. Of course, if the two of you plot any treasons together I'll stick you down there with him."

Sansa froze, wondered if he somehow knew about her visit to the Black Cells, somehow knew that Ser Jaime had smuggled her down there. And then her thoughts tumbled in a different direction, and her cheeks burned as she thought of her husband's reaction, after the hope she had seen in his eyes at the proposal she had given him in the Black Cells.

By the gods, he had been willing to let his wife be impregnated by another man if it meant keeping the Rock for the both of them, and now she would have to go back down there and tell him that it was already done, that she had taken his home away from him and given it to his hateful sister.

Sansa swallowed the bile at the back of her throat. She had tried, she reminded herself. The young man with whom she had tried had been beautiful, in a feminine sort of way, and gentle, and she still hadn't been able to be with him in the way that would give her a child. Still felt sick at the thought of it.

And it scared her that she didn't know if that sickness was because she was betraying her husband, however much leave he had given her, betraying Margaery, no matter that the other girl had been helping her do so, or because the thought of being with a man made her physically nauseous for other reasons altogether.

She stood to her feet, curtseyed before the Small Council and the King. "Thank you, Your Grace," she said, "that is most kind."

Joffrey signed a note that she presumed would allow her to visit her husband with his permission, and then handed it to her and waved a hand impatiently. "Yes, yes," he agreed, and with that, she was dismissed.

Sansa had never moved so quickly, relieved once she was out of the Small Council chambers but stopping outside of them, ignoring the Kingsguard standing outside as she pulled in one breath, then another.

The last thing she wanted to do now was go and face her husband, but Sansa supposed that Tyrion had the right to know, even if it was cruel to take even this away from him before he was killed for something she did not think he had done.

But if he found out from Joffrey at his trial, that would be far crueler.

She sighed, ignored the look Ser Boros sent her, and found her way down to the Black Cells, which seemed all the more ominous and terrifying without Ser Jaime walking along ahead of her, offering a brief respite from the dark walls with his white cloak.

She was almost amazed that she managed to walk down them on her own, was almost amazed when she didn't turn around and run back to her chambers. Tyrion's chambers. She sighed.

She hugged herself, and wondered if she shouldn't have asked someone to come with her, a guard of some sort, wondered if anyone would have bothered. Wondered if Tyrion had told Ser Jaime that Sansa had a plan for keeping the Rock, and now she was going to disappoint them both.

When she reached the bottom of the stairs, Sansa remembered the leering guards. It was not that she had forgotten them, with their staring eyes and smirking lips, but rather that her concerns about how her husband was going to react had pushed them from her mind, if only for a little while.

They stepped forward as she came down, and Sansa froze, resisted the urge to back up a step. "My lady," one of them said, and it was a wonder that they recognized her now, in her normal gowns, when they had not while she was dressed as a serving girl. "You cannot be down here."

She shivered, her gown not as protective against the elements down here as the multiple layers she had worn as a serving girl had been.

Sansa swallowed past the sudden dryness in her throat. "I have special permission from His Grace, the King," she informed them coldly, holding out the note Joffrey had given her. "You will allow me to see my husband."

The guard closest to her snatched the note out of her hands, held it up to the lantern near the chair he had been sitting in when she arrived and squinted at it.

"Hm, I suppose you do," he said. "You understand we have to search you, though." He smirked at his companion. "As his wife, we can't have you bringing in anything for the prisoner."

Sansa chewed on the inside of her cheek, could hardly protest that she knew they didn't need to search her, that they hadn't searched the serving girl and whore they had thought her the other day.

"We're not especially close," she informed them primly. "I only wish to see that he isn't dead." She almost managed not to flinch as she said the words.

The guards exchanged glances. "Still, my lady, we insist."

Sansa closed her eyes, held out her arms to signal that they should proceed, tried to bleed impatience as they stepped up to her so that they would not see her fear.

She endured the search with as much dignity as she could maintain, tried to remind herself that she was the Lady of Winterfell as she felt their grubby fingers brushing over her breasts through the thin cloth of her gown, that she was the aunt of the king, whatever that meant, as they took their sweet time ensuring that she wasn't carrying anything on her person.

She felt violated in a way she hadn't on the night Joffrey had called her to his chambers.

"Are you satisfied?" she demanded, when they finally stepped back.

"Not particularly," one of the guards muttered under his breath, still smirking, and led her down the hall to Tyrion's cell. She hugged herself again, wished she'd had the presence of mind to go and find Shae, but she didn't want Shae here as she explained to Tyrion that she had signed away his claim to the Rock, that it was over with, and there was nothing he could do about it.

That was almost more daunting than the knowledge that she was standing alone in a dark corridor with a man twice her size, and the only one who would hear her scream was a man imprisoned in a cell.

She stood outside it for a long moment as the guard fumbled with the keys, and then he unlocked the door, and Sansa took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and stepped inside.

Tyrion glanced up as the door slammed shut behind her. Sansa felt a brief moment of panic, without Ser Jaime standing on the other side of that door, that it wasn't going to open again.

He was sitting against the wall on the other side of the cell, looking rather forlorn in here alone, his only light coming from the small candle hanging from the ceiling as Tyrion sqiunted at one of the books Sansa had smuggled in for him.

"Sansa," he breathed, clearly surprised to see her. "How did you...?"

Sansa forced herself to smile in greeting, because that was what wives should do when they greeted their husbands, and she hadn't yet been able to bring herself to kiss him. "Joffrey decided to be kind, today."

Now Tyrion was squinting at her instead of the book, setting it aside in the straw and standing to his feet. "That isn't like him," he observed.

Sansa bit back a laugh and wiped at her mouth. "No, it isn't," she said, and then couldn't bring herself to finish that sentence except in her mind. Except when he knew he could afford to, because he'd already won.

"Sansa?" Tyrion stepped closer. "Are you all right?"

She hated the concern in his voice, abruptly. Hated that he had given her his permission to be with another man, to let another man impregnate her so that she could save his stupid home, the one that wouldn't be worth a fig to him when he was dead and wouldn't be worth anything to her.

And yet, he had the gall to look so concerned for her, now, because she wasn't smiling.

She felt a sting of guilt at the words. Here was her husband, about to die for a crime she didn't think he had committed because of their King's malice, and she was angry that he was showing concern for her, when she had come down here to be cruel to him.

"I had to...I had to sign away Casterly Rock," Sansa told him quietly, and Tyrion's eyes flitted away from her own, but not before she saw the hurt there. The hurt, the disappointment. "I didn't want to, I swear to you, but they didn't leave me with a choice."

Tyrion's voice was hoarse when he finally spoke, though grim. He did not look terribly surprised. She wondered if he'd thought her plan doomed to failure, wondered if he thought now that she had been caught, and forced to give up the Rock to keep her life.

She wished it were that simple. Wished that she had been forced to give it up, rather than going of her own free will before Joffrey decided to make things more difficult for her, decided to make her fight for something she didn't much want. Decided to punish her when she refused to give him the gold she had promised.

"Who will it go to?" Tyrion asked finally, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Sansa looked away this time. "Cersei," she whispered in a tiny voice.

Tyrion closed his eyes, nodded. He must have already known this, of course, because that was how the law of succession went, but it still felt like a betrayal, uttering that name when he seemed to blame Cersei for his situation.

"I..." he shuddered, opened his eyes. "I had hoped that Jaime would finally do what Father had wanted, and take up Lord of Casterly Rock," he said, and then laughed. "But I suppose it wasn't all just to spite father."

Sansa bit her lip. "I'm sorry."

He waved a hand. "You were prepared to do everything you could, Sansa," he told her gently. "It isn't your fault."

But it was, and she could never tell him that. She chewed on the inside of her cheek.

"Is there anything I can get you?" she asked. "Anything I can do for you?"

Tyrion shook his head, turned slightly away from her. "No, Sansa," he said, voice soft, but not from the gentleness she was used to from him, but rather from a bone deep tiredness that seemed to have overcome him. "No, there is nothing you can do for me."

Sansa chewed on her lower lip, tried to think of something else to say. "I..."

"Sansa," he turned back to her then, a wry smile playing at his lips. "I'm actually quite tired. I've been sitting here," he gestured back to the book, "reading for some time, and I hadn't realized how long until you came down here. It must be nearing sunset, isn't it?"

Sansa didn't have the heart to tell him that the sun had barely risen. "Yes, it is getting quite late. I...I'm sorry," she blurted, but her husband merely gave her a sad smile.

"I wish you good fortune, Sansa Stark," Tyrion said, as she knocked on the door of the cell to let the guards know to let her out, and Sansa froze at how much of a goodbye his words sounded like. "Survive."

Sansa looked back at him as the door opened. "Tyrion-"

The guard appeared then, waiting expectantly, and Tyrion hastily hid his book beneath some straw.

"I will pray to the Old Gods for you," she told him, dipping her head, ignoring the disgusted look on the guard's face.

"Hm, perhaps you should," Tyrion said, "I'd much prefer to walk with them than the Stranger."

She didn't know what that meant, but Sansa walked out the door of his cell all the same, and blinked back tears, unable to push down the feeling of failure overcoming her.


	160. SANSA

"You gave up Casterly Rock?" Margaery demanded, barging into Sansa's chambers sometime later that day.

Sansa sighed, closing the book of songs in her lap and glancing up. She supposed she should have been expecting this, but she was still surprised by how openly Margaery did it, followed by her ladies, who waited tittering out in the hall.

The song book hadn't alleviated her guilt, nor had it reassured her that there was still good in the world, as it had done when she was a child and her worst complaint was that Robb had yanked her braids out. She thought perhaps one of Margaery's ladies might like it, if she gave it to them to read. Perhaps to Alla, who had been kind enough to share her chambers with Sansa and Margaery.

"Yes," Sansa said calmly, as Margaery loomed like a goddess in the room, Sansa's door slamming shut behind her. "Our plan didn't work, and I didn't think we were going to come up with another one, certainly not in time to keep Joffrey from taking it from me. And this way, I avoided his anger."

Which Margaery ought to understand, when she did everything to avoid his anger. When his anger was something that could rip apart the realm.

"So you just gave it up?" Margaery demanded. The anger in her voice drained away to something else, something far too like the concern for her that Tyrion had showed while he rotted away in his cell. "Sansa, if you had come to me first, I could have tried to come up with some other way to help you. There were other things we could have done, I'm sure of it."

"Your last plan was forcing me to sleep with a man," Sansa interrupted her, voice colder than even she had been expecting. "I didn't want to hear what the less appealing option would be."

Margaery jerked back as if Sansa had slapped her, face going white at what Sansa suddenly realized had been an accusation. No, that was a lie. She had known the moment she spoke the words that there was no returning from them, and yet she had said them anyway, and a part of her, the part of her that had been thrown into a panic that night, felt a sharp spark of glee at the shock in Margaery's features, before it faded into guilt.

Silence hung in the room for some moments, and Sansa opened her mouth to apologize when Margaery spoke again, taking an actual step backward as she did so.

"I didn't force you to do anything," she gritted out, crossing her arms across her chest. Sansa noticed with bemusement that her hands were shaking just before they disappeared. "I was trying to help you. If I had known how much of an aversion you had to being with him, I wouldn't have let you go as far as you did. You must know that."

"Wouldn't have let me?" Sansa echoed back incredulously. "You were practically breathing down my neck for weeks, demanding that I do this if I wanted to keep my bloody station in King's Landing, when I didn't care about my station at all, and that night..."

She shook her head, thought about the way Margaery had kissed her when she had seen that Sansa wasn't ready, was about to back out of the room and run away.

Margaery shook her head. "Because I knew that you didn't want Joffrey fucking you like a two bit whore the moment Tyrion was dead," she said, and Sansa flinched violently, "and this was the only solution I could see. I'm sorry if my help wasn't wanted, but you should have told me."

Sansa raised a brow. "I did," she said. "The very first time you suggested it, but you wouldn't hear it."

"I don't mean then," Margaery said impatiently, "though yes, I should have listened when you said 'no,' then. I meant when you yourself suggested it, long after I had given up attempting to convince you."

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek, suddenly didn't want to keep having this conversation.

"And I had to make that choice," Sansa snapped at her. "Not you, not Tyrion, me. I had to make it alone, and I didn't know what else to do, not with Joffrey standing there, waiting to fuck me the moment he had the chance."

Margaery flinched, deflating. "Sansa..."

"And I had to make the same sort of choice when I signed away Tyrion's right to the Rock," Sansa said, "because I didn't have another choice, and I didn't know what to do, and that seemed like my only option, just as sleeping with that boy had earlier."

"Why did you have to give up the Rock?" Margaery demanded, took a step forward, and then hesitated. "Please, Sansa, if you would just tell me, maybe I could understand."

And she almost did. Almost opened her mouth and told Margaery that the Rock was useless because there was no gold there, and it wouldn't protect her against Joffrey if he thought she was hiding that gold.

She licked her lips, looked Margaery in the eyes, and almost spoke those words, but something stopped her. Something that flashed in Margaery's eyes besides the concern, or perhaps because of it, and she realized that she was a stupid girl and of course Margaery was going to use whatever information Sansa gave her, both to protect Sansa and to further her family's means.

If the Tyrells knew that the Lannisters were broke, they would be able to have their way with the court, would be able to withhold money in order to gain favors and know that the Crown could do nothing about it.

It would offer them everything House Tyrell wanted at the moment, and yet, Sansa couldn't bring herself to say the words.

She wondered if there really was something wrong with her, trying to help her captors in this way, but Sansa thought of little Tommen, locked away in his chambers without a maid to look in on him, and wondered what sort of life he would live forever indebted to a family that didn't care about him any more than his own did.

Yes, it would help her, to tell Margaery the truth, and would perhaps even offer her more protection against Joffrey, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to tell Margaery. Because she would forever wonder, after telling Margaery, after watching the Tyrells take control of the realm, whether Margaery had used that information for Sansa's benefit or her own. Because Tommen was good and innocent, even if he was a Lannister. Because Tyrion was going to die with the knowledge that he had lost the Rock, and he had told her since the beginning not to trust the Tyrells anymore than she did the Lannisters.

Sansa licked her lips, and felt her stomach clench. This was Margaery, after all. Margaery, to whom she told everything, and who would be a far kinder captor than the Lannisters.

But it had been a Tyrell ship that had dragged Sansa and the Martells back to King's Landing.

"It made me sick," she heard herself saying, as if from a long ways off, "knowing that I would own the ancestral home of the family that has slaughtered mine. And I couldn't...I thought that was enough to make me go mad, and I couldn't hold onto a place like that, knowing Lannisters had walked its halls for decades. Margaery, I couldn't..."

And then Margaery was walking the short distance between them, pulling Sansa into her arms and stroking at her hair. "I'm sorry, Sansa," she murmured, "I didn't think about that at all, and I should have."

"It's all right," Sansa heard herself saying, because she could hardly hold that grudge now, when she was holding so many and after all, Margaery had only meant to help, "it's all right. You were just doing what you thought was best."

"Sansa," Margaery whispered, pressing their foreheads together. "It wasn't just that. I care about you. And I'm sorry you felt like I forced you into that situation."

Sansa closed her eyes, guilt washing over her, shook her head. "You didn't force me into that situation," she admitted. "I know that. You offered, and it was a good idea. I just..." she bit her lip. "We can't all just..."

Pressed against her, Sansa could feel the way Margaery stiffened at the implication in her words, before she pulled back, straightening her dress in what Sansa realized was a nervous gesture.

"I understand," Margaery said, "but next time, please, be sure. Be sure of what you're planning so that I never have to see that fear in your eyes again. Yes?"

Sansa licked her lips. "Yes," she whispered, "yes, of course."


	161. SANSA

Sansa remembered the first time she and Margaery had had sex, how wonderful and exciting it had been, how she had writhed under Margaery's touch, so innocent and blushing all the while, but enjoying every second of it.

For a few moments, that first time, she had wondered if she had died and the gods had afford her some kindness in the afterlife for all that she had suffered, regardless of the fact that it was at the hands of another woman, and the gods would frown upon that, surely.

Today was not like that experience at all, and Sansa didn't know whether to feel guilt or resentment because of it. Didn't know if it was because they were making love in Alla's room, rather than Margaery's, as they had been doing for some time now, though Margaery seemed rather less worried about being caught than she had been, or if it was because of Sansa's own thoughts, the ones she had been trying to keep buried since returning from Dorne.

Well, the sea surrounding Dorne, as, after all, she had never actually stepped foot onto the land there, had never figured out if it was as wonderful as Ellaria and Oberyn kept assuring her it would be.

And she never would, because she would always be stuck here in King's Landing, a prisoner living a half life and pretending it was more than it was in order to stay sane.

She didn't know if Margaery had noticed her reticence, since she had returned on that Tyrell ship from an almost freedom, thought she had done a decent job of hiding her feelings about what they were doing now, but surely, she must have some suspicions.

Sansa was nowhere near the actress that Margaery was, after all. And Margaery had spent months in a marriage with a man who believed she was deeply in love with him, so surely, she must suspect something. Surely.

She lay back on the bed, closed her eyes and moaned as Margaery's mouth wrapped around the lips of her womanhood, and wondered why months ago the touch had seemed so much...more than it did now.

She had thought, when she first returned from Dorne and couldn't bear to hold a long, heartfelt conversation with Margaery in the knowledge that there was something like anger inside of her that might bubble up then, that this was the answer. That they could just make love, and not deal with all of the rest of the...craziness that came with their relationship lately. That, if they just made love, eventually things would go back to normal, and she wouldn't feel quite so...lost. Adrift.

As if she were still on that ship, waiting in the harbor of Sunspear to get off of it as the waves crashed against it, but knowing that she never would. Knowing that she would forever be stuck in a half life, with half pleasures keeping her afloat.

But this, making love with the woman she had thought she would have to give up in order to go to Dorne, wasn't working like she had thought it would, and every time they made love, Sansa found herself walking away from it feeling more belligerent, not less, and unable to explain why, if Margaery would ever ask.

And Margaery didn't ask, which just had Sansa wondering more whether she knew more than she was letting on. But Sansa didn't dare ask, either.

She licked her lips and moaned again, as Margaery's tongue flicked inside of her, and wondered if this was what Margaery felt like, making love with Joffrey.

She instantly chastised herself for the thought. Thinking of Margaery and Joffrey, together, wasn't going to help with this...situation, whatever it ended up actually being. It was only making things worse, and she knew it even as she couldn't stop thinking about it.

She needed to figure this out, because she did truly miss what they had had before, and she hated that every time they made love now, she thought of the sandy, warm open beaches of Dorne, and the Tyrell ship that had dragged her back to King's Lading.

Margaery pulled back abruptly, sitting up on Alla's bed and regarding Sansa with open concern. "Am I boring you?" she asked, tone only half teasing, and Sansa forced herself to look up and meet Margaery's eyes.

"Of course not," she began, and then Margaery placed a finger to her lips.

"Sansa," she said gently, bending down to kiss those lips a moment later, "it's all right. There are some days when a woman simply can't...enjoy the experience as much as she does on others. Are we close to your moon's blood?"

She asked the question so openly, clearly expecting an answer and not seeing the intrusiveness of the question, a question that Sansa's mother had never had the chance to ask her and never would have, if she had, that Sansa felt a spark of resentment rush through her.

"I think I might be," Sansa lied, for she'd had her moon's blood recently, while Margaery had still been paranoid that Joffrey was going to figure out what they were doing and had backed off for a while, but the lie tasted fresh on her lips.

Margaery nodded, believed her, sitting back on her haunches. "I understand," she said, wiping the hair that had fallen from its elaborate bun out of her eyes. "You don't mind if I finish though, do you?"

Sansa thought of what they might do if she did mind, shuddered at the thought that they would sit there and talk, and everything would come tumbling out when they had both worked so hard at keeping it in lately, and forced herself to smile. "Not at all," she said, and watched as Margaery spread her legs, lifted her hands to cunny without a second's hesitation.

Sansa watched as Margaery writhed and moaned under her own ministrations, and thought of the time she had touched herself with the thought of Margaery on her mind. Thought, for the first time since she had returned from Dorne, that perhaps Margaery didn't need her as much as Sansa needed Margaery for sex.

No, that was a lie, and she ought to be truthful in the safety of her own mind, where she had only the white noise to accompany her. She had been thinking that since her return from Dorne, and perhaps before.

Thinking about Margaery, and the dozens of ladies who followed her around when Sansa could not, when Sansa had to hide her feelings in one of their bedroom's, knowing that at least one of them was recently in a sexual relationship with Margaery as well, something that Margaery had thought of as nothing when sometimes Sansa felt that all they shared was their lovemaking.

She watched as Margaery's back arched, and thought of the boy Margaery had been able to procure so easily, wondered how Margaery had known he was to be trusted and what had happened to him after their little scheme had failed.

Whether he was still alive.

She opened her mouth to ask that, but Margaery's face was twisted in orgasm and she looked so pleased, in that moment, so aroused as her fingers pushed in and out of her own cunny, that Sansa didn't dare break the spell.

She felt like an outsider, looking in, watching something that didn't belong to her, and Sansa felt tears clogging her throat when Margaery finally came.


	162. SANSA

"Lady Sansa," Margaery called, and Sansa blinked, tried to think of the last time Margaery had referred to her as "Lady Sansa," and then caught sight of the half a dozen ladies standing around Margaery as she stood in the middle of her outer chambers.

Sansa glanced wistfully at the bed.

"Your Grace," Sansa said, dipping into a curtsey. She noticed with a start that not all of the young women in Margaery's chambers were her handmaidens, but rather some of the ladies of the court who stuck around either with their husbands or to find some.

"We're going down into the city to help with an orphanage I have grown quite fond of, during my time here," Margaery told Sansa, pulling on a pair of white kid gloves as she did so. Her other ladies were wearing shawls, and Sansa felt terribly underdressed. "With everything that has been going on lately, I haven't had the chance to visit them recently, and these other ladies would like to find ways to contribute to the growing issues within the city."

Sansa blinked at her, tongue feeling rather wooden, suddenly. "Are you sure that's wise?" she asked. "With all of the unrest there now?"

The other ladies stopped and turned as one to stare at her, and Sansa remembered suddenly that she was speaking to the wife of the king as a captive of the king's, not to Margaery as Sansa. She licked her lips.

"I'm sorry," she said, "I am sure we will be protected by the Kingsguard."

Margaery nodded. "And by some of the green cloaks who accompanied me to King's Landing," she told Sansa, but her eyes were soft, now. "We don't anticipate there being a problem, when we are here to help. In fact," and now she was looking at all of her ladies, "I think it is better that we do this in times of unrest than simply in times of peace. We must be brave, for we have encountered a great loss in the death of our Hand, of course,” Margaery told them primly, “But as long as we show the smallfolk that there is nothing to be afraid of, they need not fear."

Sansa flinched, and thought of how frightened Margaery had been simply to have sex with her recently. This whole situation, as she protested that she had not brought a gown suitable for walking in and Margaery said that surely it would be fine, felt terribly surreal.

Like she was someone else, someone who had not had Margaery's cunny in her mouth, and she didn't quite remember how she used to handle it.

"It's settled then," Margaery said decisively, and like that, Sansa found herself swept out the doors of the Keep, surrounded on all sides by armed guards as the swarming smallfolk rioted just beyond the steps, kept back by gold cloaks.

Sansa shivered, pulled at the collar of her gown, and wondered what Margaery thought she was accomplishing, doing this.

They walked through the crowd, servants carrying the items that Margaery insisted on bringing for the children, though Sansa had not seen inside the boxes, and the smallfolk parting before them at the sight of the guards and their queen, making their way into the lower town until they apparently found the orphanage that Margaery was looking for, buried between several other stone buildings but looking slightly less dilapidated.

Margaery strode forward purposely, picking up the hem of her gown as she walked and managing a smile while the ladies behind her grimaced and held their cloaks up to their noses, careful not to get them dirty as they walked through the mud entrance to the orphanage.

Sansa stepped nimbly behind them, rather aware that this was one of her only good dresses while the other ladies had more than enough to spare, and found herself walking behind young Alla, who wouldn't meet her gaze and surely must know what she and Margaery did all the time in Alla's chambers, young as she was.

The septas who ran the orphanage surely must have heard that Margaery was coming, for they were there to meet her with dozens of children crowding around them, wearing their rags proudly as they stood to meet the Queen of Westeros.

They thanked Her Grace for coming, and then the children were crowding around Margaery and the boxes, and Margaery moved forward to pull several of the items out of the boxes, clothes that weren't rags and certainly didn't belong to smallfolk, food, sweets, which the children found most exciting, several books.

Sansa raised an eyebrow at the books, but didn't say anything as Margaery handed one of them to one of the septas.

And then Margaery stepped back, apparently content to watch as the children perused the gifts, and Sansa found herself drifting over to Margaery as many of the ladies of the court stared down in bemusement at the children.

Sansa found herself feeling much the same way, but it was annoyance that won out, when she stood next to Margaery and began to speak.

"It must look very good of you, as the Queen, to spend your time helping orphans," Sansa muttered, and what was wrong with her.

Margaery sent her a look that was almost hurt. "I enjoy helping the smallfolk here in any way that I can," she told Sansa, and Sansa wondered when the mask of the Queen had been pushed up around her, wondered if that was only for the benefit of those watching them. "And, it is good to remember that there are those suffering more than us, so that we may help them in turn."

Sansa shot her a look. "They might not be suffering more than us for much longer," she muttered, taking in the sight of an emaciated child and unable to think of anyone but Rickon, killed by Theon. "Not if Joffrey has his way."

Whether that meant killing them all with some stupid new law, or killing Sansa and Margaery, because of his stupidest new law.

Margaery gave her another warning look, but didn't have the chance to respond before a little boy came running forward, cradling in his hands a toy soldier that he waved before her.

"Queen Margy, Queen Margy," he called, and Margaery grinned, bending down to meet him.

"Why, hello again," she said, reaching out and ruffling at his hair. Sansa took in the sight of the green cloak the soldier wore and struggled to bite back a snort. "I hope your soldier has been protecting you since I gave him to you."

The little boy nodded eagerly. "All the other kids want one," he told her proudly, "but no one's going to fight me for him."

Margaery's smile was a bit a sad, then. "That's good to hear," she told him. "I know it can hardly make up for the losses you have suffered," she said, "but I want you to know that you have a friend in the Queen, and that if you ever do find yourself in a fight, you can always come to the palace, through the kitchen entrance, and ask for me."

The boy stared at her, wide eyed, and Sansa found herself wondering what right Margaery had to make a promise such as that, when no doubt the guards at the palace would never let the boy inside, would never let a street urchin near the Queen.

But the boy looked adoring as he walked away with that promise, and Sansa only felt her annoyance increase.

And then Margaery turned to her, eyed her.

"I have been thinking," Margaery said through a smile as she straightened, not meeting Sansa's eyes.

"Oh?" Sansa muttered, but didn't think Margaery heard her over the din, much to her relief.

"We must find another way to protect you," Margaery continued, "now that we do not have the Rock to do so. Ser Jaime is back in King's Landing, but I do not anticipate that we can count on him where we did before, not when he will be despondent over the death of his brother and you will no longer have a husband to keep you from Joffrey's interest."

Sansa froze. "Margaery," she said, hating the desperation that leaked into her voice, "my husband is not yet dead."

Margaery smiled and waved at a little child staring up at them. "Yes, but it isn't wise to wait until after he is so to formulate a plan," she warned Sansa, and Sansa bit the inside of her cheek.

"Do you have one?"

"I am going to push for Joffrey to find you another husband," Margaery said, and Sansa choked on the next gulp of air she was taking in.

"Wh-what?" she demanded.

"It would have to be someone with enough good standing and noble blood to make you an offer worthy of your station, but also someone whom Joffrey wouldn't feel terribly threatened by losing you to."

There were so many things wrong with that sentence that Sansa didn't even know where to begin. She found herself gasping out, "Of what station? That of a traitor's daughter and prisoner?"

Margaery shot her a look, this one more concerned than hurt. "Of course not. That of the Lady of Winterfell. There are few who could actually make that offer, but now that Tywin is dead and Cersei is in Highgarden, I think I can manipulate Joffrey into marrying someone who would not be horrible."

Sansa stared at her. "I thought we were here to show how Lord Tywin's death has affected us all," she said sarcastically.

Margaery glanced at her as she bent down and spoke brief words to another child before standing again. "With Willas wed, I cannot marry you to any of my brothers, but Ser Dickon Tarly is a lord within the Reach who stands to inherit a considerable amount, and-"

"Is this a punishment?" Sansa burst out.

Margaery blinked at her. "What? Sansa, of course not. I'm trying to keep you safe-"

"Because I didn't try to keep the Rock harder," Sansa snapped. "So you're going to punish me by marrying me off and trying to send me away?"

Margaery's mouth parted, but only slightly before she managed to get herself under control. "Sansa..."

"Your Grace," one of the septas who ran the orphanage stepped forward, giving Margaery a wide, wrinkled smile. She gave Margaery a sloppy curtsey. "Your contributions to the orphanage have been appreciated so much by the children, Your Grace. The children are better fed than some of the children who live in happy homes."

Margaery's smile fell. "Well, I hope that doesn't make them at risk of jealousy," she said, looking suddenly very contemplative.

"Oh, of course not, Your Grace, we are very grateful for everything you have done for us lately," the septa assured her. "Only, there are other orphanages within the city that do not have the resources you have so kindly provided us with, and we fear that if we begin to share, we will not have enough for the children here-"

"Then of course, you ought to send them along to the Keep's kitchens," Margaery said, "where I will gladly see to it that they are also helped with the children under their care."

She folded her hands sedately in front of her, and Sansa raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, thank you, Your Grace, we will let them know," the septa said, "only, we do not wish to take away from the resources you have so kindly provided to the children here..."

"My family has more than enough to spare, when those food and supplies come in each month from the Reach," Margaery assured her. "And we all ought to do our part."

"Yes," the septa said, "Yes, thank you, Your Grace. You are most kind. Now, if you could follow me, do you think you could answer for me the best use for...?"

And then she was leading Margaery away, and Sansa felt rather alone and bereft, standing in the middle of the orphanage, squinting at the filthy children as they put on new clothes and looked suddenly like noble children.

"They look so happy," a voice said from behind her, and Sansa startled, and then barely withheld a sigh.

The last person she wanted to talk to, at the moment, was Elinor Tyrell.

"Lady Elinor," she turned and greeted the other girl with a bland smile. "I suppose they do."

Elinor gave her a knowing look. "You aren't one to think much for charity, are you?" she asked.

Sansa shrugged. "I think it serves its purpose, but at the end of the day, we will return to the Keep and forget about them, and they will have ruined all of these fine clothes."

She was a bit surprised by the vehemence in her own voice, and, by the look on Elinor's face, so was she. Still, she didn't say anything, merely nodded and looked out at the children again.

"I suppose so. But Margaery thinks this might at least calm the smallfolk down," she said.

"I thought Margaery was attempting to bring up her reputation with the smallfolk," Sansa said bitterly, and tried not to think about why that thought made her so.

"Margaery was worried that, with the King's new law, there would be an uprising if the Crown did not attempt to show that it cares about the people," Elinor whispered to her, giving her an odd look even as she explained. "That's why we're here."

Sansa felt only a little foolish, then. So she had been half right. "Oh."

Elinor nodded. "Is everything...all right, Lady Sansa?" she licked her lips. "I know it's likely I am the last person you want to ask you this, but if you do need to talk, I...I understand."

Sansa gave her an annoyed look. "You're right, Lady Elinor," she said stiffly, "you are the last person I would want to talk to about this."

She walked away, to the other edge of the orphanage, but she could feel Elinor's eyes on her back, and what was worse, they didn't feel angry. Only pitying, and Sansa certainly didn't want her pity.


	163. SANSA

"Her Grace is inviting me to tea," Sansa said, setting down the missive a serving girl had just brought her. A serving girl. Not Margaery herself. She hadn't invited Sansa into her bed again since that day. That horrible day, when Sansa hadn't even been able to bring herself to come for the woman she was in bed with.

And she knew that it was most likely that Margaery was waiting, waiting for her supposed moon's blood to be over and for Sansa to approach Margaery herself, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to do it. Couldn't bring herself to continue with the lie.

"Her Grace," Shae repeated flatly, eying Sansa. She hadn't been happy since she realized that Sansa had given up the Rock. She claimed she understood, that she couldn't think of anything else Sansa could do in her situation, but she wasn't happy.

She didn't understand the freedom Sansa felt, ever since she had given it up. The freedom to stop pretending, to stop worrying so over everything. Because she loved Tyrion, she must have, and no doubt it would hurt very much to lose him.

And Sansa felt guilty about that, every time Shae eyed her when she thought Sansa wasn't looking, hurt and despairing and just a tad angry, but there was nothing she could do about it now.

"She hasn't been that in some time, my lady," Shae said carefully, while Sansa tried to think of the last time Shae had called her 'my lady.'

"No," Sansa agreed. "No, she hasn't. I..." she bit her lip, and remembered that Shae was most likely about to lose the man she loved forever. "I suppose I ought to go, then."

It was a strange conversation, and Sansa didn't overmuch feel like playing nice with Margaery and all of her ladies at the moment, but she thought it might be better than continuing a conversation in which she and Shae were both pretending to care about the topic.

Shae eyed her. "Are you still feeling ill?" she asked, reaching out and touching the back of her palm to Sansa's forehead.

Sansa forced herself not to flinch away. "No," she said placidly. "Could you grab the green gown that Margaery had made for me for that tourney?" she asked.

Shae blinked at her. "Isn't that rather fancy for tea?" she muttered, but got up and went to Sansa's wardrobe nonetheless, the one filled with only a few gowns at all, and most of them not made by Sansa's wish, but someone else's.

Cersei's, when she began to realize how embarrassing it was for the King's betrothed to own only a few, threadbare gowns, Margaery, when she was trying to be kind. The Martells, trying to display their ownership, or perhaps to let her know how very hot it was, in Dorne.

Never Sansa's commission.

Sansa shrugged. "I am having tea with the Queen," she reminded Shae, and hugged the threadbare nightgown she was wearing a little closer to her body.

She should have gotten up earlier, she knew, but today she was pretending to be ill, and Shae was pretending to take care of her, and she hadn't expected Margaery to invite her to tea anyway, as if she knew that Sansa was pretending.

She had only thrown up twice today. That wasn't even being ill, anymore. Not for her.

Shae reemerged from Sansa's wardrobe with the gown, and Sansa blinked at it, and thought it was very green, for so late in the summer.

She put it on anyway, Shae helping her into it without a word, not quite meeting Sansa's eyes as she did so, but Sansa saw the condemnation in them nonetheless.

Sansa was going to have tea with the Queen whom Shae knew she was fucking, while Tyrion rotted away in his cell, days or weeks away from a trial at Joffrey's leisure. Joffrey seemed in no desire to be quick about the trial, too caught up in trying to find more evidence, Margaery had told her, or fighting battles he didn't have the resources to win.

Tywin Lannister had never been a beloved man while he lived, and certainly wasn't one now that he was dead, it seemed.

Sansa didn't know whether she should feel petty happiness about that, or simply continue feeling dead inside, as she had since she had returned from Dorne.

Well, perhaps not quite dead inside, not as she had after realizing she had condemned her father to his death, but it was a close thing.

"You look beautiful," Shae offered, the words flat, and Sansa shrugged.

"I should go," she said. "Are you..." she bit her lip. "Are you coming with me?"

She didn't know why she felt so hesitant, asking. Shae was her servant, and would go where she went, because that was her duty. Still, she found herself asking, and once the words were out, she couldn't hold them back.

Shae raised a brow. "Of course," she said, and Sansa wondered if she was imagining it all, imagining the resentment Shae had felt toward her since she signed away the Rock. "Why wouldn't I?"

Sansa blinked at her, shrugged one shoulder inelegantly. "I...Never mind," she muttered, reaching up and brushing at her hair, still feeling that white noise pound away at the back of her mind.

She had slept most of the morning away, and still she felt tired. She wondered if she should go and see the maester, the one who had told her her scar would never properly heal.

Shae followed her down the halls of the Keep and out to the gardens that Margaery and her flowery ladies loved so well, and neither of them spoke during the walk. Sansa found the silence refreshing, but it didn't last long, all too soon taken up by the chirping of birds and the giggling of young girls as they found the table where Margaery had invited her for tea.

"Lady Sansa!" Margaery called, standing to her feet and walking over to take Sansa's hands into hers when they neared. She paused, hands still clasping Sansa's, and her expression became one of concern as she took in the look on Sansa's face. "I heard that you were ill this morning. Are you quite well?"

Sansa forced herself to smile, the way she used to for Cersei when the woman invited her to dine with her. "I'm feeling much better," she assured Margaery. "I was simply a bit under the weather, this morning."

Margaery didn't look convinced, but nodded and led her over to the table nonetheless. Sansa heard the faint trill of music playing in the background, and wondered if it was some Reach tune, for it didn't sound like the lonely dirge of the Rains of Castamere, today.

And then Margaery was moving to her seat, and Sansa froze, for a scant moment, before moving forward as well.

Sansa floundered when she realized that the seats directly beside Margaery's were taken, that Alla Tyrell and Megga Tyrell were sitting close enough to stifle their queen, and that the only seat still open was across from Margaery, just next to Elinor.

Sansa wondered if Margaery had planned that, for she almost looked startled, but, as always, she recovered quickly, and Sansa found herself sitting down beside Elinor, even when everything in her screamed that she didn't want to be anywhere near this girl and the reminder of what she and Margaery had once shared.

Elinor smiled at her, but it was a wan sort of smile, and Sansa wondered if she looked as ill as she had felt that morning, for everyone to be looking at her like that.

Margaery clapped her hands together as she took her seat, nodded to one of the servants as Shae stepped back near the ladies once more, eyed one of them with a glare hard enough to cut glass, and Sansa blinked, recognized Lady Rosamund, and wondered what so bothered Shae about her. She didn't think this was the first time Shae had looked at Lady Rosamund like that.

But then the servants were moving forward, pouring sweet wine for the ladies as they giggled and ate some cheese and gossiped about the best looking men currently at the court and in the Reach.

Sansa was not prepared for the topic of conversation to include Dickon Tarly, because the men of the Reach were just as fine, apparently, if not more so.

"I hear he's looking for a wife," one of the girls commented, blushing.

"I hear he's quite the looker," Megga confided in them, not blushing as she stuffed two pieces of pepper cheese into her mouth at once.

Alysanne snorted. "And you're going to catch him? Please, don't you have that child suitor vying for your hand? You must leave some for the rest of us."

This time, Megga did blush, which Sansa found a bit strange, but her mind was still wrapped around the conversation she and Margaery had had the other day, of Dickon Tarly and how he would make a respectable match for Sansa, would get her out of King's Landing just as the Tyrells had once promised Willas would.

She wondered how much of a step down a husband like Dickon Tarly would be, whether Margaery was deluding herself that Joffrey would ever agree to such a match for Sansa, once Tyrion was...

She glanced guiltily at Shae, but Shae was still glaring at Lady Rosamund.

And then she turned back, and felt Margaery's eyes on her. She lifted her own, met Margaery's for a few scant moments, saw the worry in them.

"Nothing would be worth putting up with his father, though," Lady Merry, as she always insisted on being called, muttered under her breath.

Margaery raised a brow. "Randyll Tarly has always been a great supporter of House Tyrell," she said, sounding bemused. "What could be so wrong about that?"

Sansa wondered, with a sudden suspicion, whether Margaery already knew what was so wrong about that, whether she was only voicing such concern so that Sansa wouldn't be worried about marrying the man Margaery wished to choose for her as she had attempted to choose the father of Sansa's child, because surely if the Queen knew nothing of a horrible man, then there wasn't much to worry over.

Meredyth Crane paled. "Ah, nothing, Your Grace," she said. "Only, I've just heard that he is a very strict man."

"Meredyth Crane," Margaery leaned forward, eying her lady speculatively, "Have you turned into a hunter of husbands as well on me? And here I thought Megga and Alysanne were bad enough."

Merry flushed. "We must all do our parts, in that respect," she said, and then smirked. "After all, our parents seem terrible at the job."

"Lady Merry!" Alysanne said, and started to laugh, and soon the other girls were giggling guiltily as well, but Sansa found herself still consumed by thoughts of Dickon Tarly and his apparently strict and very much alive father.

She glanced at Margaery.

The cakes came, then, brought in by a serving boy who Lady Megga very obviously flirted with, and left blushing fiercely.

The girls told the serving boy what they would like to have, out of the cakes; tea, lemon, or raspberry, and Sansa found herself eying the lemon cakes, and wondered if Margaery had chosen them solely for her benefit, wondered if she had known Sansa would come even that morning when these cakes had been made, and Sansa was still pretending to be ill.

"I'll have the tea," Elinor said quietly, and the serving boy turned to Sansa, holding out the dish.

"And you, my lady?" he asked.

Margaery laughed; it was a nice laugh, but it grated on Sansa's ears, nonetheless.

"Oh, she'll have lemon cakes, my dear. She always does."

And that was when the dam burst.

"Would you like to make that decision for me as well?" Sansa asked with fake cheer, and the other girls in the room fell silent as Margaery stared at her, mouth falling open.

And then Margaery pulled herself together, forced a smile. "Of course not. Lemon cakes or tea cakes, Lady Sansa?"

Sansa tried to pretend that the use of her title in Margaery's smooth mouth meant nothing to her, wasn't entirely certain she succeeded. "Tea cakes," she said, and Margaery shot her a knowing look as she placed them down in front of Sansa.

Sansa picked them up daintily, and tried to pretend that they tasted as well in her mouth as she assumed lemon cakes would have. Tried to pretend they didn't sit heavily in her stomach.

She didn't think she was fooling anyone, herself or Margaery.


	164. SANSA

Sansa wondered if this was simply a natural occurrence, between two people who had been together for some time. Whether her parents, who had at least cared about each other, had also grown bored with the thought of having even more sex. Whether it had ever been a chore for them.

Or whether that was simply Sansa's problem, in her own unique predicament. Whether every other coupling in the world never got dull, and the women in it never tired of their lovers and the things they could do to them.

Perhaps this was just because Margaery had just come from another boring meeting of the Small Council, where Sansa knew she would have been sitting just next to Joffrey, her husband, where he would have been more focused on his queen than on the matters of importance being relayed to him...

And she hated that she didn't know, that she didn't know if there was something wrong with her in particular or if this could be laughed away as normal.

Well, that was a lie. She did know, she just didn't want to acknowledge it.

Above her, Margaery licked her lips, clearly aroused by the sight of the naked woman beneath her, and Sansa writhed and tried to find some pleasure in the sight of Margaery's pert nipples, straining as they swung down against her chest.

She wondered if Margaery was already wet. Wondered how she could find these interactions both enticing and not arousing in the way that she ought to. Wished that everything was back to normal, or at least back to the normal that Margaery seemed to think they still shared.

She closed her eyes, felt Margaery lick a strip down her belly, heard the other girl moan.

"Marg, Margaery," Sansa gasped out, and Margaery lifted her head, squinted at Sansa.

"What is it?" she asked, looking slightly despondent, now. Maybe Sansa hadn't been doing as good of a job of pretending as she had thought.

"I want..." Sansa licked her lips, because she wasn't entirely sure how to articulate what she wanted, in the moment. Certainly not in a way that would entice Margaery.

Margaery bent down again and licked at the shell of her ear. Sansa shivered.

"What do you want, Sansa?" Margaery's voice was sultry and sweet at the same time. Her tongue was doing something to Sansa that she should have found wonderful, and she leaned into the feeling, because she knew that was what Margaery was expecting from her.

She found her voice, suddenly, because she didn't want to spend the rest of her life pretending that she was alive when she wasn't.

"I want you to pin me against the bed," Sansa said, and Margaery blinked at her, clearly surprised by the request, her eyes blown open rather wide.

"I, uh, thought I was," she said finally, after her brows furrowed in a confusion she quickly hid. Sansa didn't like that. Didn't like the feeling that Margaery was hiding things from her, was putting up walls, as Sansa was now doing.

"No," Sansa shook her head, "I want...more," she shook her head again, licked her lips, wasn't sure how to articulate what she wanted. She blushed a little as she said the words, not looking at Margaery. "I want you to hold me down."

Margaery stared at her, clearly trying to meet her gaze as she cocked her head down at Sansa. "All right," she said finally, licking her lips, and Sansa could tell that the idea didn't appeal to her at all. She felt a spike of guilt for that, but she needed to try this, anyway. Had to.

Her cunny was wet for the first time this evening, and the idea appealed far more than Sansa was affected by the trepidation on Margaery's beautiful features.

"Are you sure?" Margaery asked, after another significant pause.

Sansa nodded eagerly. She hadn't been more sure about something like this since she had gotten back from Dorne. "Yes," she breathed. "Margaery, please. I want to feel you on me. I want to know that you...that I'm yours."

She wondered if that was what she really wanted at all.

But she thought those words did the trick, for a moment later Margaery was moving on top of her, reaching out with a surprisingly strong grip to push Sansa's wrists down onto the bed, and Sansa moaned a little, arching up into the sensation, into the strength of them.

The friction as Margaery's hands held her down by her wrists was perhaps the most enticing sensation she'd felt in the bedroom, lately, and Sansa moaned as her wrists ground against Margaery's palms.

She closed her eyes as she felt Margaery straddle her thighs, wanted to feel the sensation of the body on top of hers even closer, smothering her...

"Sansa?" Margaery asked hesitantly, breaking the spell.

Sansa opened her eyes, the moment ruined, even as she tried to cling desperately to it.

"Is this all right?" Margaery asked, hitching her breath as she maneuvered her hips down against Sansa's, grinding them together in a way that wasn't quite as arousing as the feel of Sansa's bones grinding against Margaery's brittle hold.

Sansa reached out, wrapped her arms around Margaery's waist. "This is perfect," she whispered, hating how hoarse her voice was.

She could feel Margaery start to squirm, atop her. Start to pull away. She wondered if Margaery and Joffrey had ever done anything like this, and that was what was bothering her.

"Please, just like this."

Margaery hesitated for a moment longer, and then bent down, kissing Sansa gently on the lips. She opened her mouth, reveled in the taste of Margaery's tongue as it fell down against hers, tried to deepen the kiss.

"Yes," Sansa whispered into the kiss, reaching out and squeezing at Margaery, pulling her closer, enjoying the feel of Margaery's body, grinding against her own. Her hands weren't holding Sansa down anymore, but this was all right, too.

She felt almost alive for the first time since she had seen the Dornish shoreline.

"Sansa..."

And then Margaery was grinding against her, seeming to completely forget her earlier reservations, touching her, being everything, for a moment, that she had been before Sansa had ever gotten on that Dornish ship.

And then Sansa pulled them both back against the headboard of the bed, enjoyed the feel of the gold covered wood pressing into her spine, of Margaery pressing her into it until she felt her flesh twinge in pain at the sensation.

She reached a hand up, pulling Margaery's hand up with her, enjoyed the feel of Margaery's fingers wrapping around her wrist and holding it up against the headboard, closed her eyes once more and felt alive.

Because she could bind herself to a feeling like this. To a feeling that wasn't Margaery at all, but the bonds holding her down to King's Landing once more. And as long as she submitted to it, she wasn't still standing with one foot on a Dornish ship.

She twisted her wrist playfully underneath Margaery's palm, wanting to know what it felt like to know that she couldn't pull away, felt Margaery's fingernail scrape into her skin with a start.

"Fuck," Margaery whispered, pulling back, and the spell was once again broken as she pulled Sansa's wrist close and examined the damage, the little trickle of blood running down Sansa's arm. "Sansa, I'm sorry..."

"It's fine," Sansa whispered, reaching for her again, needing her again. It was a wonderful sensation. "It's fine, Margaery, come on..."

She tried to kiss the other girl again, desperate for it.

But Margaery didn't try to kiss her back. She turned her head, and Sansa found herself kissing Margaery's cheek as the other girl wiped at the spot of blood.

"It doesn't hurt," Sansa tried to assure her, tried to turn Margaery's head with the sheer force of her lips in order to kiss her again.

And that was when Margaery reacted, flinching back from her as if the touch of Sansa's lips against her own had burned her. Or perhaps the sight of blood in their bed. Sansa didn't know, and she wasn't entirely certain she cared.

She needed...

"Stop," Margaery pulled off of her abruptly, staring down at her with an expression closely akin to horror. Sansa didn't meet her eyes, but felt the weight of Margaery's stare on her for some time.

"Sansa, stop," Margaery repeated, because Sansa was still reaching for her, still wanted her through the haze of desperation overtaking her.

Sansa blinked up at her. "Margaery, I..." she could feel her face burning.

Margaery looked away, stared at the wall above Sansa's head. "What are you doing?"

Sansa felt her breath catch. "Margaery..."

She had asked Margaery to hold her down and fuck her, not make love to her. Margaery, not some oppressive symbol of King's Landing, and all at once she felt terribly ashamed for it, wondered what, by the gods, was wrong with her, that she had thought such a thing would be all right.

And yet, she wanted to do it again, and that scared her a bit more.

"What do you want, Sansa?" Margaery asked, reaching out and brushing her thumb along the trail of blood drying on Sansa's arm. Sansa lowered her eyes, watched as Margaery's fingers wiped at the drying blood, mesmerized for a moment, and terribly cognizant of the fact that she didn't want to answer Margaery's question, didn't have an answer for it at all.

"I..."

She didn't think Margaery would appreciate an answer in which Sansa asked Margaery to do the same thing to her again, because it made her feel alive, and she wanted to feel that again very much.

After all, she'd already told Margaery what she wanted, and Margaery didn't seem interested at all.

Silence reigned.

Margaery broke it, and when she did, it felt like the wall of glass holding in the white noise around Sansa's mind broke with it.

"I think you should go and get some rest, Sansa," Margaery said tiredly, wiping at the hair falling in front of her eyes. She wasn't meeting Sansa's eyes. "You're clearly not well."

Margaery's hand was shaking, as she tugged the strand of hair behind one ear. Sansa glanced down, noticed that the other hand was bunched into a fist against her thigh, saw the strain in her wrist as she held it there.

Thought about how, moments ago, it had been wrapped around Sansa's wrist, keeping her down...

Mortified, Sansa got to her feet, pulled her clothing a little more tightly around her as she reached for her shoes.

Perhaps Margaery was right. Perhaps this truly had been the foolish idea Margaery seemed to think of it as, and there was something not right with her after all.

_You're clearly not well._

How was it so clear to Margaery when Sansa hardly knew what she was thinking at the best of times?

"And Sansa," Margaery called to her as Sansa made her way to the door. Sansa bit back a groan, turned around to face her. "The next time you want to use sex to justify your feelings about something, I don't want any part of it."

Sansa gaped at her, sure that she was crimson, now. "I don't..."

Margaery held up a hand. "Just go," she murmured. "I wasn't lying about thinking you need to rest, Sansa. Mayhap when you do you'll feel better."

Right. Because Sansa had scared her, and clearly it meant that Sansa needed to go and lie down for a while, and then everything would be back to normal.

Sansa hesitated, and then moved forward to where Margaery still sat on the edge of the bed to kiss Margaery on the lips, because she thought that before she left she needed at least that small reassurance, but Margaery pulled away, giving her a strained smile.

Sansa's heart sunk into her gut, and she turned and walked out the door, made sure that it swung shut behind her.


	165. SANSA

Margaery reached for her breasts, but Sansa pulled back a little, unable to bring herself to meet Margaery's eyes as she reached up and clutched her gown tightly around her chin.

Margaery gave her a look of sympathy, and then splayed her hand out to massage Sansa's breast through the thick layer of her gown, glancing at Sansa for permission first. Sansa nodded, the feeling never quite as wonderful as the skin on skin contact, of course, but all that she thought either of them could bear, at the moment.

Sansa had thought, the first time she had done this, that Margaery would grow impatient with her, that the cloth forming such a barrier between them would be a turn off to the other woman, but, to her credit, Margaery Tyrell was a very...inventive woman.

And she didn't mind a bit that Sansa hated showing anyone the scar Ellaria had given her.

Still, a part of her found it infuriating, that Margaery could adapt so easily, could do anything Sansa wanted of her when everything in Sansa wanted her to fight back.

They weren't talking about what had happened the other day. Evidently, in Margaery's mind, Sansa had gotten her rest and there was nothing more to talk about.

So Sansa pretended that she felt the same way, and let Margaery caress her breasts, her cunny, let Margaery suck her cunny dry before she reciprocated, and wondered when she had begun to think of it as reciprocating, rather than the spontaneous act of making love to one another.

Sansa came first, and then again, after Margaery's first, watching the other girl's face twist in pleasure. She wondered if she would have been able to come from that sensation alone, watching a Dornish girl with Sansa's fingers inside of her.

"Do you remember when I said we ought to go to Highgarden?" Margaery asked her suddenly, gaze narrowing, and Sansa blinked at her.

"I...Yes." Sansa blinked in surprise at the topic of conversation as she was pulled from her post-coital haze, frankly relieved that she had been able to come at all. "Lord Tywin said we could not go, however, because you were not-"

"With child, yes, I remember," Margaery said, sounding rather frustrated, though Sansa could not well imagine why. She certainly would never wish to bring Joffrey's child into this world, were she married to the monster. "But Sansa, Lord Tywin is dead now."

Sansa sat up a little in her bed, remembering Margaery's not so subtle hints about her plans for Sansa the moment Tyrion was dead. "Margaery, what are you saying?" she asked warily.

Margaery bit her lip. "It is beautiful in Highgarden, this time of year. I think you would love it there. And it would give you a chance to meet Dickon Tarly."

Sansa sat upright, annoyance filling her. "Margaery..."

"I know you aren't fond of the idea," Margaery said carefully, "And I don't blame you, but Sansa, surely it is better to have a hand in your own fate rather than to let Joffrey choose it for you."

And considering that she would be handing her fate over to Margaery, rather than Joffrey, if Sansa agreed to this, Sansa couldn't help but find that argument rather ridiculous. She scoffed, and Margaery stared at her incredulously.

"Do you remember when I panicked that night, when we brought that boy in to-"

Margaery reached out, placed a finger to Sansa’s lips and glanced around with wide eyes, as if learning that Sansa had planned to impregnate herself with a whore from Littlefinger's brothels was somehow worse than someone seeing what they had just done.

"Sansa!"

"No one is going to hear us," Sansa muttered, frustration bleeding into her tone. "But Margaery, I think you need to hear this. Need to know why I couldn't be with him."

Margaery bit her lip. "I know why you couldn't be with him."

Annoyance flared up in Sansa's gut. "Oh you do, do you?"

Margaery gave her a look that she had never given Sansa before. "Some ladies simply can't pretend, with a man, Sansa. You aren't so special that you are the only one amongst those."

Sansa blinked, felt her eyes suddenly water, and tried to pull off the bed. Margaery reached for her arm.

"I'm sorry," she murmured, "that was cruel of me to say, and especially when I am trying to suggest that you do just that, if in another way."

"I suppose it wasn't wrong, though," Sansa said, not meeting Margaery's eyes.

Margaery hesitated. "Still."

Sansa released a deep sigh. "Margaery," she said carefully, and lifted her eyes to meet Margaery's, "Why do you want me to go to Highgarden so badly?"

Margaery shrugged. "I do not think it very safe in King's Landing, these days. The Martells might still have their designs upon you-"

"The Martells are under house arrest, and I went with them willingly," Sansa interrupted her, voice snippier than she had intended it to be when she revealed that, and Margaery fell silent, looked away. "I know that is not the tale you wish to hear, nor the tale I helped you spin to Joffrey, but it is the truth, Margaery. I went with them willingly."

Margaery reached for her, taking her by the shoulders and staring into her eyes. "Sansa, I care about you deeply, and I want you to be safe. You would be, in Highgarden. Please, listen to sense."

"Margaery, Cersei is in Highgarden," Sansa pointed out. "I would hardly be safer there."

"Safer, perhaps," Margaery said, and something in her dark eyes had Sansa narrowing her own.

"Margaery, what has brought this on? Do you...do you know something?"

"Sansa..." Margaery bit her lip again.

"You know something," Sansa accused softly. "It's Joffrey, isn't it? He's planning something."

Margaery's breasts swung as she sat abruptly upward. "Sansa, the last time Joffrey was given his free reign without Tywin about, he tried to rape you," she blurted, and Sansa flinched. "And now there is no one to stop him from doing so."

Sansa swallowed hard. "Tyrion-"

"Your husband is in the Black Cells," Margaery interrupted her scathingly, "For the murder of his father. Even if he does manage to escape them, there is nothing he will be able to do for you again."

Sansa worried her lower lip, for she knew that as well as Margaery, even if she could not bring herself to admit it.

Her husband was no longer the protection he had once been. Her husband could not protect her from the rest of King's Landing, could not protect her from Westeros' King.

"Margaery..."

Margaery laughed bitterly, moving across the bed to the small candle flickering on the bedside table, casting eerie shadows that made Sansa's situation seem all the more dire against the far wall.

"I cannot protect you, either," Margaery muttered, lowering her eyes. "And I cannot see that happen to you again. Sansa..."

Sansa swallowed. "And do you think his mother will be any different?" Margaery sucked in a breath, and Sansa forced herself to continue. "All those months, while I was here alone, forced to think that one day I would be married to that little beast, she was there, whispering away in my ear, taunting me even as she told me she was preparing me to become a better wife to Joffrey." She swallowed again, felt tears cinching in her throat. "I hate her. I hate her as much as Joffrey."

Margaery licked her lips. "I know," she said, quiet now. "But Sansa...I had to marry Joffrey." She turned worried eyes on the other girl. "Trust me when I tell that he is far worse a companion to have whispering in your ear."

Silence fell on the room then, and Sansa felt that Margaery had revealed something, in those words, which could not be taken back, even if she did not quite know the significance of it.

A part of her wanted to ask, to figure out what Margaery had meant by that, but she couldn't quite bring herself to do so. Couldn't bring herself to break the fragile image she had, of Margaery as the Queen of Westeros, with far more power over her life than Sansa had.

"I don't want to go away," Sansa said stubbornly. "Margaery, I..." she swallowed thickly. "I tried that, and now I...I can't. I'll be stuck here for the rest of my life because of that trip. Because it taught me not to hope."

“All right,” Margaery said quietly, interrupting her with a hand on Sansa's arm. “All right.”

They sat in silence for a long moment, and Sansa found herself wondering if Margaery understood, understood how difficult it was for her to come back to this after she had almost been free of all of it, or if Margaery's own standoffish behavior was for another reason entirely.

"But you should know, that I will not be responsible for whatever it is I must do to keep you safe from him," Margaery vowed, and Sansa swallowed hard.

"I know," she lied, leaning up to kiss the other girl. Sansa wondered if her own lips still tasted sweet, or if Margaery could taste the bitter twang of Sansa's bile upon them every time she kissed her, now.

Margaery's lips had ceased to taste like honeysuckle or whatever other sweet aromas they'd had, before, Sansa thought idly, getting lost in the kiss as she felt Margaery moan and clutch at her. They tasted like salt now, the kind that was spread over meat to keep it fresh for some time.

Necessary, preserved, old.

The thought made Sansa jerk, and she pulled away from Margaery, giving the other woman an apologetic smile that she didn't feel.

"I really should be going," she told her, thinking of the words as quickly as she could and hoping that Margaery didn't notice her own desperation to escape this situation, as she almost had to Dorne. "I...Shae has quite a few matters that come to my attention, these days. I may not have the Rock but I still have some importance as Tyrion's wife."

Margaery's face fell. "Of course," she agreed. "You should...you should certainly see to those."


	166. SANSA

Sansa didn't know why she kept coming back for sex. She knew that there was something wrong with the way she was rationalizing what lay between her and Margaery in the bedroom, knew that soon enough, it was going to boil over into something that she couldn't contain anymore, but she kept coming back.

She thought that perhaps it was because coming back for sex, slipping into Margaery's or Alla's or her own chambers in the dead of night or in late afternoon when no one was around was better than talking about their feelings, or about what lay between them now, after Dorne, and that there was something even more wrong with that knowledge, but it didn't stop her.

Didn't stop her, because she'd felt alive when Margaery held her down like that, and she wanted to figure out a way to feel that way again, if Margaery wasn't going to give her that feeling alone.

So she kept coming back.

She found Margaery sitting in her chambers, on the edge of her bed, wearing only a purple, sheer nightgown that looked very inviting, and Sansa snuck forward, wrapped her arms around Margaery from behind after making sure that the door to Margaery's bedchambers was shut and locked.

Margaery shrugged her off, turning around and petting at Sansa's hair in apology, and Sansa felt her heart sink down into her chest at the gesture, at what it represented. She thought she already knew what Margaery was going to say, when she opened her mouth to speak. She wondered if Margaery had lured her here on purpose, with no intent whatsoever to talk.

"Not tonight," Margaery told Sansa, rather tiredly, fingers still brushing through Sansa's hair. Sansa did her best not to pull away from the touch. "I...I just came from Joffrey's chambers. I know I told you tonight would be a good time to meet, but I don't think I can, honestly."

And Sansa felt a white hot feeling that surely wasn't jealousy bubble up inside of her. She didn't meet Margaery's eyes as she thought of how guilty she had felt, the other day, telling Margaery that she couldn't have sex with her because she was on her moon's blood, even if she wasn't, as she watched Margaery come alone.

But she didn't think Margaery was offering even that, would ever offer that, was offering to watch Sansa come, because she knew that Margaery, unlike Sansa, wouldn't be able to resist getting in on the action of such a thing if it was offered to her.

And Margaery really did look exhausted, Sansa would give her that, but still, that resentment bubbled up in her, and she couldn't let it go.

"I don't understand how you can willingly be with him," Sansa muttered, and Margaery recoiled at the words, or perhaps at their tone. "How you can just set aside everything he's done in the bedroom."

Margaery stared at her. And then she stood, walked around the bed and poured herself some of the wine waiting in a pitcher at the other edge of the room, back purposely turned to Sansa.

For a moment, she reminded Sansa very much of Cersei, standing there with her back to her problems and downing a clear glass of wine unblinkingly.

And she didn't keep her mouth shut, even when she knew that she ought to. "I would hate every second of it. I wouldn't be able to let him touch me. I couldn't even let that boy touch me."

Margaery spun around then, the glass slamming rather forcefully down on the small table. Sansa flinched. She looked like an angry goddess. "Honestly? You want to have this conversation now?"

Sansa crossed her arms over her chest and tried not to feel terribly vulnerable as Margaery leaned back onto that table. "Well, apparently we aren't doing anything else," she said, looking pointedly at the bed she was still sitting on, but which Margaery had abandoned.

And finally, finally, Margaery snapped. Sansa didn't realize how badly she had been looking forward to it until it happened, and when it did, she forgot how to breathe.

"I can't just 'set what he does aside,'" Margaery told her, pushing off the table once more. "I think about it every moment that he's touching me, think that anything I do could set him off, and it terrifies me. Sometimes I can barely remember to pretend that I'm enjoying the things he does to me."

Sansa flinched, still breathless. "And yet, you do it anyway," she whispered hoarsely, not meeting Margaery's eyes.

She swallowed thickly. She should have stopped this conversation two sentences ago, and yet, her runaway mouth wouldn't let her.

"Because he's my husband," Margaery snapped. "And I know you don't understand that, with the relationship that you have with your husband, but we can't all be married to the Tyrion Lannisters of the world."

Sansa bit her tongue, stung by the implied insult in Margaery's words. Because they'd been talking overmuch lately about how Tyrion Lannister was about to die, and Sansa wouldn't have that blanket of security in her marriage for much longer.

"Fine," she murmured. "You're right, and I can't understand. Forget I mentioned it."

Margaery stared at her for a long moment, expression searching. She took a step forward from the wine table, looked like she was about to reach out for Sansa, and Sansa wanted nothing more than to lean into the touch, and then Margaery faltered.

"No, we are going to talk about this," Margaery told her, and Sansa felt something in her stomach sink at the words, because Margaery still looked furious, when Sansa had thought she wasn't anymore. Her face was reddening, and her hands shook by her sides. "Because I'm tired of those judging looks you keep sending me, the little comments about my whorish ways. If you have a problem with me, just say it, instead of hinting like this."

"I've never called you a whore," Sansa whispered, stung by the accusation, hating that even her words weren't denying that she had at least thought it.

"Because you're playing the games of court with me," Margaery shot back, crossing her arms over her chest in a mirror of Sansa's own reflection.

"I don't see why it should bother you," Sansa muttered, her own anger back abruptly, once again keeping her from nodding her head and placidly backing down. "You're a master at the games of court."

"Which is why I don't want to play them with you," Margaery told her coldly. Then, crossing her arms over her chest, "Sansa, if you truly think so little of me, why do you keep coming back for more?"

Sansa gaped at her, the anger abruptly draining out of her at the words. "I don't think little of you at all," she whispered, and tried not to think about how much she thought of Margaery, tried not to find the words to tell the other woman how much she thought of her, how much she needed her, here. She colored as she thought of how she had asked Margaery to hold her down, that night when Margaery had sent her to bed like a spoiled child. "I just...I just don't understand, how you could be with Joffrey."

"Because he's my husband," Margaery said calmly, talking as if Sansa were a small child. "And because I know that if I do not play my part as his wife, it is more than likely he will either set me aside or take what he wants anyway, and at least this way, my way, is far more pleasant."

Sansa shivered. "I..."

"But that isn't what you want to know, is it?" Margaery asked, no longer meeting Sansa's eyes, no longer looking at her at all. "You want to know how I can be with Joffrey and you at the same time."

Sansa didn't deny it. She crossed her arms over her chest and looked down at her bare toes.

Margaery let out a long sigh. "I told you about Highgarden, and how things are different there from here, or from the North," she said. "And while I understand that are situation here is...tense, and very different from Highgarden, I need you to understand that we can't have things the way you want them if we're going to keep going. Gods, Sansa, I thought we already had this conversation."

Sansa bit her lip. She knew that. She remembered vividly the conversation they'd had about Elinor, the one in which Margaery explained herself and Sansa told herself that as long as Elinor and Margaery weren't sleeping together anymore, everything would be fine.

"I just...I don't know where you stand sometimes," she said finally. "And I..." she shook her head. "It's foolish, and I'll try to work through it."

Margaery moved closer, taking Sansa into her arms. "You've been trying since we started this," she said. "And I know that. But...Sansa, you're not the only one who doesn't know where they stand in a relationship. This has happened to me before, and, even now-"

But Sansa certainly didn't want to hear all about how Margaery had been through this before, with someone else, or about her insecurities about where she stood with Joffrey.

"I know," she blurted, interrupting the girl, ignoring the hurt look that Margaery quickly hid. "I know, and it's all right. I'll...it's foolish," she repeated, "and I'm sorry I keep bothering you about it."

"Are you sure?" Margaery asked. "Because I don't want this to keep coming between us, and if it's something you can't let go of, I think we should talk about it more."

She was suddenly the caring, adoring Margaery that Sansa remembered, rather than the angry woman of a moment ago, and Sansa almost mourned the loss, because she certainly didn't feel less angry, even as she made an attempt to hide it.

Sansa bit her lip. "I'm fine," she said. "I just don't like sharing you, but I understand that I have to. I guess...my head just hasn't caught up with that, yet, but I just need time for it to do so," And she reached up, pecked at Margaery's lips and pretended that everything was all right.

Margaery gave her a long, concerned look. "All right," she said finally. "It's all right, as long as we've settled things. Do you want to...play cyvasse instead, or something?"

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek. "Sure," she said, even though it sounded like the last thing she wanted to do, at the moment. But Margaery sounded so damn hopeful, even if she was careful to keep her face blank.


	167. SANSA

Sansa had come to see if Ser Jaime had any more messages for her, from Tyrion, because she hadn't attempted to speak with him since the day she snuck down into Tyrion's cell and told him that she was giving away the Rock.

She doubted Ser Jaime would have any such messages, or he would have tried to approach her, because he was chivalrous in his own way like that, and thought he knew how desperate she was to learn of his brother's condition. Thought that she was desperate as him.

But he hadn't, and she doubted Tyrion had anything to say to the girl who had promised him everything he couldn't have and then had taken it away, even if Tyrion hadn't explained the circumstances to Ser Jaime, which she doubted.

They shared a peculiar sort of closeness, though at least not the closeness that Ser Jaime and his sister the Queen Mother were rumored to share.

She blushed at the thought of it, wondered which was the more grave offense to the gods, what Cersei and Ser Jaime shared, or what she and Margaery did.

Ser Jaime's chambers were in the White Tower, where all of the Kingsguard slept, although Joffrey had offered him better quarters as the uncle of the King. Supposedly, he had refused, and Sansa wished she could be there to watch someone else refuse Joffrey what he wanted.

She felt awkward and a little foolish, making her way up to the White Tower and passing the barracks where the other Kingsguard slept. At least Ser Meryn was not there to make her life a living hell, as he often attempted to do, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to find much comfort in that.

Come to think of it, the White Tower was completely abandoned. There was not a Kingsguard in sight, and she felt a pit fall in her stomach, realizing it was likely that Ser Jaime was not here at all and even if he was, he was far more likely to reprimand her for coming up here than to help her.

She was not even entirely sure what she was doing here, engaging on a frivolous mission in which, if Ser Jaime didn't have any messages for her, he would lie about her husband's condition, surely.

But she didn't know what else to do, because every time she spoke with Margaery she felt like that unrecognizable tightness in her chest was growing larger, and Margaery had made it clear that she didn't just want to have sex, these days.

And Shae was barely speaking to her, spending more time around that Lady Rosamund than she was around Sansa. Sansa had the absurd thought that they were fucking, and tried not to laugh at the image.

She paused outside the door to Ser Jaime's private chambers, as the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, where the rest shared bunks, and lifted her hand to knock.

Sansa froze at the sound she heard coming from within the already slightly ajar door, remembered that Lady Brienne was being kept as a prisoner in the White Tower, had been kept there since she'd brought back the Lord Commander and Ser Loras had insisted on it.

Her face flushed hotly, and she took an awkward step back.

But, as Sansa peeked in the door, blushing and realizing that she was a very foolish girl who should be turning around and leaving before she was recognized, Sansa didn't see Brienne of Tarth inside the room with Ser Jaime.

She saw a flow of blonde hair, backing another blonde up against the far wall, a flash of red gown that Brienne of Tarth would never have worn.

"Took you long enough," she heard Ser Jaime say, his voice a low, primal growl that she had never wanted to hear from him, and she blushed just at the sound of it, glanced down at her feet as she thought about fleeing.

Surely, if she made a sound now, she would be heard, and Sansa didn’t care to speculate on what would happen to someone who saw this. She bit the inside of her cheek hard enough to draw blood.

"I came as soon as I could get away from those fucking Tyrells," Sansa could hear Cersei Lannister whispering in Jaime's ear as she clutched to him in a way that Sansa had never once thought of holding her brothers, while any of them had still lived.

Sansa couldn't believe she had not heard that Cersei had arrived in King's Landing, couldn't believe Joffrey hadn't made some grand affair out of it and forced Sansa to come to the throne room the moment Cersei arrived.

She flushed, wondered how, by the gods, she hadn't known. Wondered if she was truly that wrapped up within her own world, that she had not even noticed Cersei’s arrival in King’s Landing, because suddenly Margaery’s suggestion that Sansa go to Highgarden and meet Dickon Tarly made a lot more sense.

"And left a sick husband behind in the Reach, I hear," Jaime muttered, and Cersei raised a brow at him, giving him a look Sansa had never seen the Queen Mother give anyone before. She tried not to blush, actually did take a step back.

"I don't care about him," Cersei snapped, finally. "And if you loved me, you wouldn't either. You didn't when I married Robert, after all."

She really should leave, Sansa thought. The door was open, and either of them could see her at any moment, and Cersei Lannister was back in King's Landing. She should turn around and leave now, before they saw her and she couldn’t live to regret doing so.

Sansa had not been prepared for this at all.

Cersei bent forward to steal another kiss from him, and Jaime pulled away, shook his head. "Father is dead, Cersei, and...as you told me, we've been away from each other for a long time."

Cersei glared at him. "Do you think I care about that anymore?" she demanded finally, her breaths coming in hot hisses. And then she slapped him. "I don’t. I didn't even fuck that crippled husband of mine, because all I could think of was getting back to you."

Jaime swallowed. "The things I did to get back to you, to endure all that, only to find you-"

"I choose you," Cersei whispered, and Jaime froze, gazed at her with a furrowed brow.

"Those are words."

"Yes." She sounded terribly pleased.

"Just like the ones you told me when I endured all of that time as a prisoner, only to come back and find that this-" he held up his golden hand, and it glinted in the dim light of the room, "Stood between us."

She shook her head, moved closer and pressed their foreheads together. "I don't care about that anymore," she murmured. "I didn't then. I just...I was so alone without you, and then suddenly you were back, and-"

He kissed her. "I've wanted to do that since I got back," he murmured, sounding breathless when they pulled apart, and Sansa had the distinct impression that she should leave now, should go before she witnessed more of this.

This wasn't like what she and Margaery shared. She didn't need to watch it, out of some strange fascination in the shared wrongness of it.

"Gods, Cersei, I-"

And then his face hardened, and he pushed his twin away from him, annoyance creeping into his expression. "But it doesn't matter. We can't."

She pulled them together, kissed him again. "Why not?" she whispered, and Sansa had to strain to hear, even as she told herself she ought to go.

Jaime's expression hardened, and he rasped out, “Cersei, our father is dead. I have a duty to him, to-"

She shook her head. "I didn't love Tywin Lannister. He's dead now. He doesn't matter anymore."

Jaime made a strangled sound. "Cersei-"

Cersei pulled him close again. "I love my brother. I love my lover. People will whisper, they'll make their jokes. Let them. They're all so small, I can't even see them. I only see what matters.” She held his face in her palms, kissed him again.

Jaime groaned, low in his throat. "Someone will walk by."

She shook her head. "Let them. I don't care."

She kissed him again, long and low, the way Margaery kissed Sansa sometimes, when they had been apart for more than a few days.

Sansa flinched at the internal comparison.

And then she was watching them, the voyeur as Cersei pushed her brother up against the wall and kissed him again, reached out to pull his hand to her waist, to hold it there as she pressed up against him, pressed them closer to one another.

Reached down for the ties of her gown, hastily beginning to pull them open.

"Cersei..." Ser Jaime whispered, his tone broken. "Someone could..."

"I don't care. Let them," she rasped out, kissing him again. Then, "Father is dead, Jaime," she heard the other woman murmur against his skin. "He can't keep us apart again, and I will never allow anyone else to do so now."

The words were a vow, like the one Margaery had made when she had told Sansa she would do what she had to if it meant keeping Joffrey from harming them again.

Sansa took a step back, feeling bile rise in her throat as her stomach clenched and she remembered why her father had died.

Cersei Lannister had returned to King's Landing.


	168. MARGAERY

Margaery could remember quite clearly when she was a little girl, sitting by her brother's chair, and asking him why he couldn't run about with her, as Loras and Garlan could, why he must always sit in that chair and obsess so over his falcons.

And her brother had smiled gently and told her that it was because he hadn't minded his Ps and Qs as a child, and that she ought to, so she could run through the fields of Highgarden forever.

She had giggled and told him that one day she would find the elusive Golden Elixir she'd read about in her stories, and heal him.

And then he had read her a letter from Oberyn Martell, comparing the horses of the Reach to the horses of Dorne.

Her brother had never been bitter about his handicap, had never once cried over the loss of his working legs or his status as the crippled son of Highgarden, mocked by everyone about him.

He had always had a smile.

When Margaery had learned, at the tender age of thirteen, the truth of what had happened to him from a rather vengeful Loras, she had confronted Willas about it, demanded to know why he hadn't wreaked war upon Oberyn Martell and his family for destroying him so, why he wasn't angry about it.

If it was her, she wouldn't have let a single Martell be able to stand after what they had done, would have made sure they were punished in the long game that her grandmother was just beginning to teach her about.

Willas had told her that she was wrong; that he was angry about what had happened to him, that it was a slow consuming anger that would likely stay with him until the day he died. He hated not being able to walk on his own, hated that the best he could ever do was a cane, like a man three times his age, that he would never be able to cover as much land as his falcon.

But it wasn't Oberyn Martell's fault. Oberyn Martell could have just easily been jousting Loras, or Prince Rhaegar, or Robert Baratheon, or Renly Baratheon. He could have been anyone, and to blame him for something that anyone might have been done in a tourney was hardly fair.

And if Willas spent his time sitting around and wallowing about it, or worse, plotting revenge, he would never be able to enjoy the rest of his life, would never be able to prove that he was more than a weak, crippled man.

Margaery had fallen on his lap and sobbed that she was sorry upon hearing those words, sobbed while Willas petted her hair and told her that everything was all right, and then helped him to feed his falcon for the evening.

It was the first time she had ever suspected that her grandmother wasn't right in everything she did and said.

The subject of Oberyn Martell and the tourney that had crippled Willas was never brought up again.

And now Willas was ill, fallen asleep in his bed and never waking up from the coma like state he had fallen under, and the healers said that this was because he had weak lungs and a weak heart. From their disuse, they said, as if they knew Willas at all. They said further that there was no question of foul play despite the fact that Cersei Lannister had spent all of a few months in Highgarden, and suddenly her loathed husband was dying because of weak lungs that had never inhibited him in the years before his marriage.

It had been difficult not to let Sansa see the damage, especially when she was so perfect at that with everyone else, once Margaery read the letter.

She could tell that Sansa was getting worse, saw, every time they ate together, how she barely managed what could be called eating, how she stared at her food as though she was expecting it to leap off the plate and attack her. Saw how she was so steadily becoming little more than skin and bones. Saw the anger bubbling up in Sansa every time Margaery tried to talk to her about something other than sex.

And saw that there was not a damn thing she could do about it without making things worse between them.

Her brother was dying, and she had not told Sansa because she did not want the other girl to fear Cersei Lannister's return to King's Landing until she absolutely had to. She had tried to warn her, only for Sansa to brush off her words and cling to the sex she suddenly found herself so desperately in need of these days.

And Margaery had known, the moment her mother had written to her about Willas' mysterious illness, that Cersei would be returning to King's Landing now. Wild horses could not keep her away, if she poisoned every member of House Tyrell so that they could not keep her back.

And, too, she had not wanted to give voice to her very real concerns that it had been Cersei who had nearly taken her brother's life, only after knowing that she could get away with it.

Margaery didn't think she could bear voicing such a thought, and then doing nothing about it, letting that bitch come back and steal back her power and thwart her every move.

Was that wrong, to attempt to shield a woman that she...cared so deeply about, in such a way?

Margaery had never been one for fully understanding the fine line between right and wrong, but she would apologize to Sansa of course, for concealing the truth from her, would explain why she had done so and hope that Sansa would understand, now that Cersei was in fact back.

Because Sansa wouldn't believe for a moment that Margaery hadn't known, wouldn't believe for a moment that Sansa herself shouldn't have known.

And, too, there was guilt of another kind, halting her warnings to Sansa. She had wanted Cersei away from her, after what had happened with Ser Osmund, frightened of what else she would accomplish and frightened that she would tear Joffrey away, but more than that, because she had wanted to see Cersei forced into something she didn't want, wanted to see her degraded and humiliated and shipped away, knowing that it was because of Margaery and that she could do nothing about it.

And she'd gotten what she wanted. At the cost of her brother.

But of course, Sansa wasn't going to be shielded from the truth forever.

Which was why she was hardly surprised that evening, when Sansa walked into her chambers as if she had any right to be there when Margaery's ladies and serving girls were about, and asked if she might speak with Margaery alone.

Elinor sent Margaery an alarmed look, and Margaery merely nodded tiredly, pretended that she hadn't spent the afternoon in the arms of her ladies, worried about her brother.

"Of course," Margaery said. "You may all leave, and Elinor..." she paused, waited until she had Elinor's attention, rather than looking at Sansa's smoldering eyes. "You may shut the door behind you."

Elinor hesitated, and then nodded, herding the other girls out with a few whispers and swats of her hands, and then they were alone.

For the first time in a while, though a part of Margaery suspected that was not the case with Sansa, Margaery dreaded that they were alone.

"You knew," Sansa whispered hoarsely, and Margaery swallowed, wished suddenly for some wine. "You knew that Cersei was coming back to King's Landing. That is why you wanted me to go to Highgarden."

Margaery glanced at the far wall in lieu of the other girl. She had certainly figured that out fast, and here Margaery had thought Sansa had forgotten that particular conversation.

"I suspected," she murmured, and Sansa sucked in a low breath. "Lord Tywin was her father, after all. My family wasn't going to be able to keep her away forever, though I suspected my grandmother was trying."

Sansa stared at her. "Then why didn't you just tell me, instead of cloaking it behind words of travelling?"

Margaery sighed. "Sansa..."

"You go on and on lately about the importance of not keeping secrets from each other, and here you are, keeping secrets from me. Yet again, as if nothing has changed, when you demonize me for the same," Sansa blurted out, and looked gloriously angry as she said those words.

"I know," Margaery said, not meeting her eyes.

Sansa stared at her incredulously. "Then why?"

"I didn't tell you because I'm worried about you, all right?" Margaery erupted, and Sansa fell silent at the words, watched Margaery's chest rise and fall a little too rapidly. "You haven't been the same since the Martells took you, and I didn't want you to have to think of it before you had to. I'm sorry. I know it was wrong, but I'm worried about you," she repeated.

Sansa opened her mouth to respond to that, shut it abruptly. "I don't want to talk about this," she murmured.

Margaery snorted, because she was getting rather tired of all the things that Sansa didn't want to talk about, lately. "You were the one who brought it up, not me," she pointed out, but Sansa merely shook her head stubbornly.

"Let's have sex," she suggested, reaching for Margaery, almost desperate, and Margaery gave her an uncertain look before reaching for the ties of her own gown behind her neck, slowly loosening them.

She wanted to watch the arousal bloom in Sansa's eyes as they slowly pulled off each other's clothes, as they used to do in the past before Sansa started making that action less than entertaining, had started ripping at Margaery's clothes to get at what was underneath as if the act of stripping was somehow beneath her.

Sansa's eyes didn't blossom with arousal until Margaery's gown had pooled around her waist, and then Sansa was pulling off her own clothes, backing Margaery up against the bed as she did so, and Margaery had a moment of panic in which her hands began to shake before she reminded herself that they both wanted this, they just didn't know how to express that because they were foolish girls.

She allowed Sansa to push her back onto the bed, didn't close her eyes because she wanted to watch Sansa's every reaction, and wanted to feel it as she did her own.

Sansa started with Margaery's neck, lavishing affection upon it in a way that Margaery had been forbidden to do with Sansa's since the other girl had returned from her escapade with that scar she found so horrid, and Margaery moaned a little, arching up into the feel of Sansa's lips against her neck, but refusing to close her eyes, looking for the reaction in Sansa's own.

Sansa didn't let her look for long, was soon making her way with her lips and her tongue down the length of Margaery's body, and Margaery pushed herself down a little further into the bed, tried not to squirm when Sansa's lips brushed against the lids of her cunny because she was still waiting to feel Sansa's nipples go pert beneath her ministrations.

It wasn't until Sansa's lips had locked around her cunny that she saw it, the spark, there and gone almost so quickly that she wouldn't have seen it at all if Margaery weren't so desperately searching for it.

She recognized the look in Sansa's eyes, the moment the spark had left them.

She felt it often enough entering her own, when she was letting Joffrey fuck her and pretending to get off on it. A sort of hardness that couldn't be faked, and couldn't have been explained away, if Joffrey ever opened his eyes and looked at it.

And then Margaery didn't want to search for anything at all, wanted to lose herself in the sensations, and did, as she came, as she switched them around on the bed so that Sansa was on her back and pinned down Sansa's hands with one of her own as Sansa had begged her to days before.

She thought she almost understood Sansa's desperation now, as she pushed two fingers and a tongue inside of Sansa's womanhood.

Something harder still that Margaery should have recognized weeks ago flashed in Sansa's eyes as she came, and Sansa didn't meet Margaery's eyes as she rolled onto her side, away from Margaery, and lay still, breathless and flushed, afterward.

At least she still looked alive, which was more than Margaery felt, as the moment of realization passed over her.

Sansa wasn't enjoying this...thing that they shared.

It explained why she only wanted to have sex with Margaery these days, rather than sharing in her company, explained why she had wanted Margaery to hold her down, had pleaded so desperately for it. Explained, she supposed, why every time they attempted to have a private conversation, it devolved into some argument.

Figuring out why should, logically, be Margaery's next step, but she found that she didn't want to. Feared that, if she did, it would mean the end of whatever it was they still had, and she was terrified to let go of that.


	169. SANSA

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is going to hurt, guys. Well, more. I'd also like to remind everybody that the 'eventual happy ending' tag is still going to happen, no matter what turn this story takes. That being said, it's going to be a long eventually.

"Sansa," Margaery said, reaching out and running a finger down Sansa's arm, "Do you still want me?"

They were lying in Margaery's bed, after yet another session of lovemaking away from the prying eyes of Margaery's guards and ladies, and Sansa was tired enough to blink wearily at Margaery's question in confusion, tired enough that the carefully blank expression on Margaery's face slipped into one of hurt before she had responded.

Sansa blinked at her. "What? Of course I do. What are you talking about?"

Margaery laughed bitterly, sliding away from her and wrapping the sheet around her chest, effectively shielding herself from the other woman. "You've been distant, if distant is the right word."

Sansa shook her head, not sure where this conversation was going even as it pulled hotly in her stomach as something like dread. "I...I've had a lot to think about, since I...since Dorne."

Margaery hummed, sitting up completely. "And I've tried to respect that," she told Sansa. "Because I care about you, and I know this has been hard for you."

Sansa felt her walls tighten, felt her body stiffen as she too sat up, moving to the other side of the bed almost without realizing she was doing so. "I know," she said. "Margaery, can we not talk about this right now?"

Everything in Sansa was screaming that they couldn't talk about this right now. Because Sansa still didn't know how she felt, after all of this time thinking, and she didn't dare to analyze it while she sat before Margaery.

But Margaery didn't heed her request this time, as she had all of the other times.

"I wasn't certain what was wrong, at first. I thought it was just that you were self-conscious, over what Ellaria did to you." Sansa reached up to brush at her neck instinctively at those words, flushing when Margaery gave her a knowing look. "But it's more than that, isn't it? I didn't start to put it together for certain until we visited those orphans, but I think I understand now."

"Understand?" Sansa burst out, despite all of her reservations, despite all of her promises to herself not to do that very thing. "How could you possibly understand? You, who sit in this Keep as its queen, who doesn't have to plot for her life at every turn, for her freedom?" Sansa shook her head. "What am I to you?" she demanded quietly. "Am I just a distraction from Joffrey, from your duties as queen?"

Margaery lifted a hand to cover her mouth. "Sansa, of course not."

"No," Sansa interrupted. "No, this isn't some obvious thing. Tell me what I am to you. I..." she bit her lip. "Some days, I feel like I know, and others, I think you are only manipulating me like you manipulate Joffrey, and I can't for the life of me figure out what it would grant you."

Margaery worried her lower lip. "I've always cared about you, Sansa," she said.

Sansa swallowed, lips suddenly very dry. "Then why didn't you come to me, after the plan for me to marry Willas Tyrell fell through? Why did you...why did you leave me so alone then, if you've held regard for me all of this time?"

"It was selfish of me," Margaery agreed. "I know that, and I knew it then. My family stopped interacting wit you because you were no longer useful to them."

Sansa bit back bitter tears, closing her eyes and turning slightly away from Margaery. She froze when she felt Margaery's hand on her arm, opened her eyes.

"I didn't want to see your disappointment," Margaery confessed, licking her lips. "I had promised you freedom from King's Landing, and I couldn't give it to you. And I know you were very alone then, and I'm sorry I couldn't face you, but after seeing how you reacted to not being allowed to go to Dorne, I'm glad I didn't, at the time. I couldn't have born it, I think."

Sansa gritted her teeth. "I was alone," she whispered.

Margaery's eyes widened, her jaw slackening a little at the look on Sansa's face. "I never meant for that," she said.

Sansa shook her head. "You did, or you would have done something about it."

Margaery shook her head. "I didn't think it was safe, now that the Lannisters were unto my family's plan to steal you away and I was to be Joffrey's wife" she said. "I still don't, I just don't know how to pull away from you now."

She said the words quietly, like she didn't quite mean for them to slip out and didn't know how to meet Sansa's eyes now that they had.

Sansa felt dead inside.

"Sansa..." Margaery hesitated, pursed her lips, like she was holding something back, and a wave of anger swept through Sansa at the sight, that she didn't say what they both wanted her to. Finally, Margaery seemed to settle on, "You're right. I can't understand your situation here. I know that. But I at least thought that what we had-" and gods, it stung to hear that, _had_ , and all that Margaery's tone implied about it, "was enough of a connection anyway."

Sansa's heart leapt into her throat. "I-"

"If you don't want me, if this isn't enough for you, just say so," Margaery interrupted her, voice cool. "I would prefer it, actually, to empty lovemaking and tired proclamations. I've had plenty of that in the past, given enough of that to Joffrey, not to crave it now. To watch you put it behind everything else that you don't want to talk about."

"What are you talking about?" Sansa demanded, shaking her head in bemusement. "I put you first in everything, even though I have to sit by and watch you put the fucking throne before me, put Joffrey before me!"

Margaery jerked back at her words, stared at her through slitted eyes. "I've never asked you to put me before anything," she said, voice dropping into a coolness that sent a shiver down Sansa's spine. The sheet dropped from her hands, pooling in her lap, but neither of them noticed. "Never. But neither will I be your consolation prize because you could not have Dorne."

Sansa's heart skipped a beat. "I..."

"I understand that you're angry that you didn't escape to Dorne," Margaery said. "And, for what it's worth, I'm sorry that you didn't escape this place, which has been so horrid to you for so long." She licked her lips. "But I can't change that. And I can't do this," she gestured between them, to the innocuous sheets on her bed, "the way you are going about it now. I can't...sleep with you knowing that you don't want me when we are out of this bed, that a part of you will always resent me for not being your freedom, for not being the one thing you wanted more than I; Dorne, and a life away from this place." Her voice dropped very low. "I won't be your chain. I won't sit here and worry over you every moment, knowing that every moment I do, you're wishing for some excuse to be away from me."

"You're not," Sansa whispered, tone broken. "Gods, I...I do want you, Margaery. I do."

She didn't know who she was trying to convince, with those words, but they fell far too flat to convince either one of them of anything.

"Sansa," Margaery interrupted, voice far too gentle for her words, "don't lie to me. Please. I've..." she bit her lip. "I've seen the way you look at me, sometimes. It isn't you. It's me. When we," she gestured between them again, suddenly shy, Sansa thought, annoyance flooding her before she paled. "You just go through the motions."

Sansa gave her a long, carefully blank look, annoyed with herself more than Margaery that the other girl had picked up on that. But a little annoyed with Margaery, as well, if she was being honest, for being so perceptive, when Sansa wanted to bury all of this under the rug and hope that it went away soon.

"I can't afford to have you look at me like that," Margaery whispered. "Not after everything we've been through together. I can't...I can't stand it, not with everything else going on, not with everyone around me besides you pretending. I don't want you to pretend, Sansa, but I don't want this coldness, either." She gestured to Sansa, lifted her eyes to meet the other woman's. "So tell me how we can fix this."

Sansa gulped. "I...I don't know how to put you before everything," she confessed finally, when the silence grew too long, when Margaery's face fell still further. "I...There are things I do want more than you, even if you don't want to hear it. Freedom from this horrid place. My family-"

"I don't want you to put me before everything," Margaery repeated, sounding as tired as Sansa seemed to constantly feel. "I just want you to know, for certain, if you want me, rather than looking at me like shit because you didn't get what you wanted with the Martells."

Sansa's mouth opened and closed with no sound coming out, and Margaery snorted, rubbed at her eyes.

"I don't know," Sansa said finally. "I...I want you," she repeated. "But..."

But it wasn't enough. Margaery wasn't enough.

It was true, what Margaery had accused her of. Every time they were together, Sansa found herself thinking about the warm sands of Dorne, about the spicy food and the beautiful women that Ellaria had told her about, about the Water Gardens she had heard so much about, about finally seeing the Tower that had been the source of so much misery in her life, however indirectly.

And the things she did with Margaery were pale in comparison. Tired. Were no longer the safe coven they had been before, when she was only a prisoner of the Lannisters and there was still some hope of escape.

Margaery's lovemaking, Margaery's presence, it didn't make up for everything she could have had, didn't make the prison walls around Sansa disappear, and she couldn't pretend anymore.

She didn't want that. She wanted to be with Margaery in the way she had been before, wanted to care about the things they did together as she had before. But, as Margaery had said, a part of her did resent the other woman. Resented that Margaery was the only thing in King's Landing keeping her sane, resented that she had Margaery when she could have had her own freedom, far away from this girl and this court and these Lannisters.

And every time they weren't fucking, Sansa could only look at how happy Margaery and her ladies seemed together, knowing they weren't prisoners, and resent them for that, knowing it was what she could have had, in Dorne.

And when Sansa had been forced to try and sleep with a man to have his child, she couldn't help but think about how Margaery had chosen that path out of sheer ambition, and Sansa only out of sheer desperation to stay alive and intact, and she resented Margaery some more, even if all of this was hardly Margaery's fault.

And Sansa didn't know how to separate the two in her mind, when she was fucking Margaery and thinking about the rocking, gentle ship taking her to Dorne, far away from this poisonous place.

"Do you think I am not affected by all of this, as well?" Margaery asked tiredly, and Sansa flinched. "That I didn't want you to escape, didn't hate myself for wanting it even as I hated myself for thinking of denying you it? I'm no monster, Sansa, just because I married one. I just want...we can deal with this together, I just need you to try."

"Margaery..." She thought of how close Margaery had been to her lately, both in physical proximity and her plotting. Of how she seemed saddened whenever they had to be separated, of how she clung to Sansa during their lovemaking. "It isn't the same," she said. "What we're going through. And I can't..." she squeezed her eyes shut, breathed in and out. "It won't be enough, whatever we do to try and fix it."

More silence still, and Sansa hated the silence as it grew, seemed safer than the words they would otherwise throw at each other.

And then Margaery swallowed. "Get out," she whispered, staring down at her knees in lieu of Sansa.

Sansa shuddered where she stood, forgot to breathe. "What? Margaery-"

"I said, 'Get out.' If you really don't want to fix this, then just leave, because I can't stand the idea of teetering back and forth like this, never knowing whether you want this or not," Margaery snapped at her, lifting her head, and Sansa saw the sadness in her eyes then, the open vulnerability that she hardly shared with the younger woman.

“I do,” Sansa whispered. “I just...”

She couldn’t think of how to continue that sentence. The world spun in front of her, and for a moment, she couldn’t think at all.

Margaery had told her to leave. Margaery had told her to leave.

Sansa stumbled toward the door, feeling tears stinging at her eyes as she walked away. She made it all of the way out into the corridor, the door to Margaery's chambers slamming shut behind her, before Sansa dropped to her knees outside of Margaery’s room, leaned her forehead against the door, and ignored Lancel Lannister where he stood watching her in bewilderment as she felt something for the first time since returning to King's Landing that wasn't just fear.


	170. MARGAERY

The Queen Mother's first order of business, after returning to King's Landing, was to demand that the Tower of the Hand be fumigated. Joffrey was eager enough to watch something burn that he agreed almost immediately, and before Margaery could quite pin down Cersei's reasoning for it, the entire Lannister family was watching the Tower go up in flames.

She had been expecting Cersei to go after Tyrion, to demand that his trial happen quickly, because she was a creature of habit and everyone knew how she hated her brother, so this was rather unexpected.

"I don't understand," Margaery said, forcing herself to give Cersei a prim smile as she did so, just to watch the woman grind her teeth as Joffrey squeezed at Margaery's hand. "Why should the Tower of the Hand be burned? Lord Tywin wasn't killed by some disease, surely you don't think?"

Cersei's teeth ground loudly enough for Joffrey to hear it, attention snapping from the men gathering up all of the flammable items in the Tower of the Hand alongside the sticks that they were bringing to the Tower.

"Tell me, Queen Margaery," Cersei said, "Have you been up to the Tower of the Hand, since Lord Tywin's death?"

Of course she hadn't. She was making a concentrated effort not to appear interested in the Tower at all.

"I cannot say that I have," Margaery said, leaving off with the Queen Mother's title just to watch the woman's jaw twitch in annoyance.

"We don't know what killed my father," Cersei said coolly, "which I lay at the feet of the maester examining him, not being as good as my own." Margaery refrained from mentioning that the man she heralded as so great a maester had had his chain taken from him, because she didn't need to antagonize Cersei further tonight, "And as such, I think it for the best that the Tower of the Hand be purged of any diseases before any new Hand is named."

Margaery tensed. Beside her, Joffrey's eyes flashed. "I haven't decided that I am going to be naming a new Hand of the King, Mother," he told Cersei in a tone that Margaery would have found warning.

Cersei didn't acknowledge it at all. "Nonsense, darling," she told Joffrey, smiling placidly. "No King has ever reigned well without a Hand to help him."

"Well, maybe I'll be the first," Joffrey snapped, grabbing up Margaery's hand in an ironclad grip and dragging her over to where Prince Tommen was already sitting down in the middle of the little courtyard to watch the Tower burn.

Margaery wondered if disease was the problem at all, if this was some eulogy of Cersei's to her father, some revenge for the fact that the Tyrells had kept her away after his immediate death and after the septons had begun to prepare his body for its burial.

She supposed she couldn't begrudge the woman for that, even if a part of her found all of this rather suspicious.

Still, Cersei had nothing to hide with Lord Tywin. With Margaery's brother, perhaps, but everyone knew that Cersei was above harming her own family. Well, with the exception of her youngest brother.

"Start burning it," Cersei ordered the servants, and one of them stepped forward, ignoring the almost panicked look on Ser Jaime's face as they set a torch to the logs at the base of the Tower. The look quickly faded, behind the mask every courtier learned to wear, even if Ser Jaime was not exactly a courtier, and Margaery forced herself not to think too hard on it.

She supposed it would be rather unsettling, watching fire overtake a building in King's Landing the same way it had once burned a Stark Lord and his son.

Margaery wondered who was a better king, the Mad King or her husband.

Her mood effectively sunken, Margaery looked around and realized that she was not the only one, and Margaery couldn't have that, because if her thoughts kept progressing toward the morbid, they would find a focus that she was very carefully not thinking about.

"Look, Prince Tommen," Margaery said, bending down to whisper to the little prince, where he sat on the ground beneath Margaery and Joffrey, who had taken a seat on a raised stone bench. She had to speak now, or her mind would travel with the flames and all she could think about anymore was- "The flames are dancing. Just as we did at my wedding to your brother the king."

Tommen looked, and then his eyes widened at the pretty sight. He looked almost delighted, clapping his hands together. "They are. Look, Mother, they're dancing."

Cersei hummed noncommittally. Beside Margaery, Joffrey shot his little brother a glare.

"They're just flames, Tommen," he snapped, and Margaery glanced up, the smile slipping from her face at the expression on her husband's face, and she moved, going to sit closer beside him and reaching out to take his hand in her own, placing it rather suggestively in her lap.

Her husband seemed appeased after a few moments of stroking at the front of her gown, and Margaery bit back a sigh of relief.

She hadn't realized how tense Joffrey had been growing, lately. Like a taut bowstring, ready to fire at any moment. And she had been a fool, letting him grow so tense, when it was her unspoken duty as his wife to keep that from happening.

Had been a fool, thinking lately that there was nothing she could do about it, that she was as helpless as everyone Joffrey's newest edicts and newest proclamations was hurting, when she was the fucking Queen of Westeros, and if anyone had power here, it was her.

She had forgotten that, somewhere along the line, but she wasn't going to let Joffrey forget it, now. Not when it threatened to take what power she had over her husband away from him.

Cersei's return to King's Landing was a good reminder. What...had happened with Sansa was a good reminder. Knowing that Willas lay in a coma, perhaps dying, was a good reminder of everything Margaery had been setting aside, in her obsession with making things go back to normal with her lover.

Because Margaery knew exactly what had caused her to forget her own power. Worrying over Sansa fucking Stark.

"It's beautiful," Margaery said, leaning forward and laying her head in her husband's lap, because she was tired of him stroking her thighs when he wasn't going to deliver in front of his mother, and his mother was looking at her like she was a two bit whore from a brothel.

Joffrey hesitated, and then laid a ring covered hand in her hair. The touch was almost gentle. "Is it?" he asked, and she wondered for the first time if her husband was able to find anything beautiful, with his peculiar strand of madness.

Margaery made a humming sound. "Perhaps your mother was right," she said idly, "and we should have done this earlier."

Joffrey scoffed. "My mother suggested this just after she suggested naming my uncle Jaime Hand of the King," he informed her, and Margaery raised a brow, because Joffrey wasn't looking at her, but staring into the flames.

"Did she?"

Joffrey grunted, glancing over at his mother, who was still watching them, but standing rather too close to her brother to overhear what they were saying. "She thinks she's being subtle," he muttered, and Margaery was surprised by the annoyance in her husband's voice.

"Your uncle Jaime would be a safe choice," she said carefully. "He is your uncle, and it would appease those who are...disturbed by Tyrion Lannister's imprisonment."

Joffrey tugged on her hair, a bit too hard, then. Margaery carefully didn't wince. "My uncle Tyrion killed my grandfather," he muttered, "whether he'll grow a pair of balls and admit it or not. There's no one who has any right to be disturbed by his imprisonment."

Margaery bit back a smile. "I only mean, from the hearsay of the court, that there are those worried about the future of House Lannister," she said, making sure to keep her tone placid. "Your mother is right to wish to protect her family."

She felt a nail dig into her skull, didn't react.

"I am the King, not my mother, and I will decide whether or not my uncle Jaime will be the new Hand of the King, or whether I will have one at all."

Margaery closed her eyes, bit on the inside of her cheek to prevent a smile. "Of course, my love."

She had missed this, and she didn't know when she had forgotten that. Perhaps when she had learned that Sansa was back from her failed escape to Dorne, and needed Margaery as she never had before. Perhaps when she had found herself sucked up into Sansa's issues, the ones she had been trying to keep from Margaery since she returned. Perhaps while she had been spending all of her time trying to get Sansa to talk instead of focusing on talking to her husband.

Focusing on her duty, as the Queen of Westeros and the daughter of House Tyrell.

She had been so caught up in what was going on with her private relationship with Sansa that she had lost sight of what was important, of keeping her family on top, had felt so helpless and vulnerable around her husband because she felt helpless and vulnerable whenever Sansa indicated she didn't need Margaery after all.

Sansa, who had walked out the door of her chambers after saying her peace about how little she cared about the very thing that had been consuming Margaery for so long, and who hadn't come back. Who hadn't bothered to approach her since then, and it had been two miserable days.

But it didn't matter, because whatever the case, Margaery wasn't going to forget her duty again, because this was what she was good at. This was what she understood, in a way she was beginning to believe she had never understood Sansa Stark.

"Of course, my love," Margaery repeated, and pretended she didn't see a flash of red hair behind her eyes. She opened them, and saw red and gold flames, instead.

Jaime Lannister was never going to become Hand of the King. That was Margaery's new project.

And it was a far easier thing to plot toward than letting her mind swim in circles over where she had fucked up with Sansa.


	171. SANSA

The water shivered down her throat, too cold as it made its way down, and Sansa struggled not to choke at the sensation. She didn't want Shae fussing over her anymore than she already was, after all.

The woman already clearly suspected something was wrong, was already sneering at the amount of food that Sansa was returning with every tray. The first two days after...what had happened with Margaery, Sansa had pretended to be sick, and it had given her a good enough reason not to eat as much as Shae usually pushed into her.

After that, she had told Shae she was on the mend, even if Shae didn't look over much like she believed her, and started stuffing the remains of the food she picked at into her chamber pot, since she could be reasonably sure Shae wasn't going to snoop in there.

She might have, a month ago, when Shae still considered Sansa more of an ally than she did now. Before Sansa had told her was going to keep the Rock, and then had given it up because she was too afraid to try. But now, there was an obvious distance between them, the same sort of distance she felt between herself and Margaery, every time they were unfortunate enough to run into each other in the halls of the Keep.

It didn't happen often. They were both going out of their way to stay away from one another, Sansa knew that. And when they were forced to stand in the same room together, it was generally because all of the courtiers had been called to the throne room, and Sansa had the great displeasure of watching Margaery practically sit on Joffrey's lap, and didn't need to meet her eyes, at all.

Still, it was good, drinking water, and lots of it. It made her feel full in a way that food had ceased to do long ago, and it helped to quench the sensation every time hunger did hit her, in terrible, dizzying waves that almost brought her to her knees in a way that they had never done before.

That was why pretending to be sick was so helpful a ploy, she supposed. Sick people didn't have much of an appetite, after all. But she couldn't pretend to be sick for long before someone, whether it was Shae or Joffrey, demanded that she see a maester, and that was when she had to start getting inventive.

She knew she wasn't accustomed enough to alcohol to start drinking it regularly without making herself sick or drunk, and so she stuck with water, and cranberry juice, and, as often as she could spare in the hot weather, tea. Biscuits when Shae was around, and meat once a day, to keep up her strength.

Without Margaery around to protect her, it was only a matter of time, Sansa knew, before she would need her strength.

Sansa set down the glass of water, thoughts of Margaery washing over her no matter how hard she attempted to stop them.

She kept thinking back to that moment, when Margaery had hugged her knees and told Sansa to get out, because Sansa's throat had clogged and she couldn't bring herself to say that there was even a part of her that still wanted Margaery. Because she was a fool, and didn't deserve what they had, anyway.

She had a feeling she had gone through every stage of grief, in the three days it had been since that night, and yet there was no sign that Sansa was coming out of them anytime soon. She felt as she had when her father had died, lost and adrift, which was ridiculous, because Margaery wasn't dead. She was just in the other room all of the time, but she might as well have been a thousand leagues away.

Sansa sighed, set down her glass of water, and climbed to her feet, glancing around for Shae. The other woman was making herself scarce lately, and though Sansa didn't know that she could prove it, she suspected that Shae had taken a page out of her book, and was visiting Tyrion in the Black Cells as often as she could.

If she was, Sansa was happy for her. Never mind that it meant that at least she had time to herself, which was certainly a relief.

Sansa couldn't remember the last time she had felt relieved to be alone. The only times she had felt relieved, before Dorne, was with Margaery. And now...

Sansa broke down and cried, head falling in her lap as the tears escaped.

She didn't think she had; since she'd gotten back from her failed escape to Dorne, save for when Margaery had thrown her out of her chambers. She hadn't cried for her throat, once beautiful and pale and now married with a vicious scar that would never fade, hadn't cried for the freedom from this wretched hell she'd almost had, and hadn't cried for the people she could have been with in Dorne, without Margaery.

Now, Sansa cried for all of it, head in her hands, falling back onto the bed that she had never shared with her husband, crying until the tears turned fat and hot and she almost couldn't breathe, body shaking.

When the tears stopped, she felt almost relieved. The feeling wouldn't last long, she knew, but it was enough for the moment.

It was enough, because she wasn't thinking about what a fool she had been, giving up the one good thing she still had in King's Landing. She wasn't thinking about Margaery's disappointed, wide eyed expression as Sansa actually listened to her and walked out of the room. She wasn't thinking about Margaery's cold voice when she told her to make a decision, here and now.

She wasn't thinking about any of it, just hearing the white noise of her mind after the tears ended and she couldn't think of anything at all.

She blinked, lashes sticky, when there was a knock on the door. She wasn't expecting visitors, after all.

Sansa choked back a laugh. Who would want to visit Sansa Lannister, anyway?

She sat up, wiped at her eyes, just as Shae was opening the door. Shae looked startled at the sight of her, sitting in a heap on the bed, and her eyes softened, but only slightly.

"I didn't think you would knock," Sansa said, hoping her voice sounded lighter to Shae's ears than it did to hers.

Shae frowned. "I thought..." she shook her head. "The Lannisters are inviting you to supper with them," she said, and Sansa sucked in a breath, more startled by that than she felt she should be.

"I...did you tell them I was ill?" she asked, desperate and scared all at once. Because Margaery would be at any meal with the Lannisters. She would be there, and she would be unavoidable, then.

Shae hesitated. "King Joffrey sent the invitation," she said finally, clasping her hands in front of her. "He would not take no for an answer."

Sansa sighed. "Of course not," she said, climbing off the bed. "Would you help me find something to wear?"

Shae eyed her, expression filled with suspicion, now. "I could tell them you are sick," she offered, tone grudging. A pause. "Queen Margaery will be there."

Sansa wilted. She hadn't told Shae, of course, but the other woman was no fool. "No," she said, and hated how sharply the word came out. "No, I'm well enough. You don't need to get in trouble with the King for me."

Still, Shae hesitated. "If you're sure..."

"Can you find me a gown that isn't too infested with moth balls?" Sansa interrupted her, and Shae shot her an exasperated look before moving toward her wardrobe.

Sansa wasn't sure how she made it through the next quarter of an hour, preparing for the dinner and not meeting Shae's eyes, but Shae didn't push, and she even managed to find a gown that-

"No," Sansa interrupted as Shae pulled out the green gown that Margaery'd had made for her during that tournament, what felt like a lifetime ago. "Not that one."

Shae shot her a concerned look, but nodded, turning around and putting the gown away, pulling out a pink one that reminded Sansa a bit more of Sansa Stark.

She was one of the last to enter the dining hall where Joffrey was having this ridiculous dinner, and she brushed her hair behind her cheeks self-consciously as half the members of House Lannister turned at her entrance.

There was only one gaze that she was concerned about, and Margaery wasn't even looking at her. She was sitting so close to Joffrey she was practically in his lap, and Sansa could hear her, mid-laughter, as she reacted to something Joffrey whispered to her.

Sansa flushed, couldn't help but wonder if whatever he had said was about her. She shook her head, forced herself to keep her head high.

If Margaery was fine, then she had to be fine, too. She couldn't let Margaery see how much-

"Sansa," Joffrey drawled, eyes skimming down her figure with a look that was almost bored. She almost forgot how to breathe. "A wonder you showed up at all."

Sansa flushed again, sunk into a seat beside Tommen, since her husband wasn't exactly present.

That was when she noticed Cersei, sitting on Joffrey's other side, sipping her wine and glancing at Margaery and Joffrey together with as much distaste as Sansa was trying to hide.

The woman's eyes slanted to her, and Sansa had a sudden flash of the memory of Cersei, pressed up against Cersei, of her panting and gasping as she told Jaime she wanted him, how she had seen that and thought of Margaery.

She swallowed hard, glanced down at the plate of food that one of the servants placed in front of her.

"I'm sorry, Your Grace," she said down into her food, because that was better than looking at Margaery. She hoped that the tear tracks on her face had faded by now. "I...I haven't been feeling well."

She did glance up then, because she couldn't look away, and saw the flash of concern on Margaery's face before it was buried deep. Sansa wondered if that was an act or not.

Joffrey waved a hand. "Well we weren't going to wait for you," he told her, and Sansa nodded, feeling sick as she looked down at the food. She realized, quite suddenly, that she couldn't eat this.

If she did, she was going to be sick in front of Joffrey, in front of Margaery, and she couldn't bear that thought.

Sansa swallowed hard, took a sip of the water one of the servants poured for her at her request.

The food hadn't gone anywhere since the last time she looked at it, and now Margaery was looking at her again.

Sansa swallowed, grabbed up her fork, had a sudden, vivid image of stabbing it into Margaery's smirking face. She gulped, stabbed a piece of her meat instead. It wasn't nearly as satisfying, and she nearly choked on it as she pushed it down.

The next piece, she knew she wouldn't be able to eat. She cut at it, cut it into small pieces as Joffrey complained to his mother about how hard it was to be a King, as Margaery laid her head on her husband's arm and smiled when he ran his fingers through her hair.

The piece of meat that she cut off, Sansa carefully moved into the sleeve of her gown, looked around. No one had noticed. Besides Margaery, no one here would notice, she thought. It was only a matter of making sure that she was subtle about it, that Margaery didn't notice.

She may appear completely distracted by Joffrey, but Sansa knew how shrewd she was. She couldn't know about this.

Sansa focused on where she was going to hide the next piece of meat, because that was an easier fear, an easier focus.

It was almost a relief, not to think about Margaery, even with the girl sitting not so far away from her. Not to let the white noise that had accompanied her on the Tyrell ship back from Dorne invade her thoughts.

Almost like a game, and for the first time, Sansa thought perhaps she understood why the other courtiers so immersed themselves in the games of politics. Because thinking about how she was going to get through the day only eating as much as she needed to was much easier than thinking about how she had walked out of Margaery's bedchambers when the other girl had told her to.

She picked up the second piece of dried meat on her plate, cut into it with her knife, picked it up with her hands and stuffed the half she'd cut off into the pocket of her gown. She'd be able to get away, she was certain, before anyone noticed.


	172. MARGAERY

Margaery knew that Joffrey was going to fuck her like a horse the moment they got back to their chambers.

She just hadn't been prepared for how...enthusiastic he was about it, and by the time he was finished, she was almost wet enough to convince herself that perhaps she wasn't as uninterested in men as she had always believed.

Then she remembered that she was fucking Joffrey, and the moment faded. Rather quickly.

His mother had invited herself to the day's Small Council meeting, apparently not content with managing things in the background, and the moment she brought up the position of the Hand of the King, Margaery found herself struggling not to roll her eyes hard enough for them to get stuck in the back of her head.

Joffrey was grinding his teeth so hard that she was surprised he actually bothered to answer his mother, and then it was only to tell her that he was the King, and he was still considering his options.

Cersei had started grinding her teeth then, and it looked particularly unattractive on her. Mace puffed up his chest and started muttering about the Crown's finances once more, about the war effort, like he already had the title.

Ser Jaime was noticeably absent from the proceedings, and Margaery wondered if Cersei had planned that, if she didn't want her brother present when she suggested him for the Hand. She wondered if Ser Jaime was even interested in the position. She knew that, when Ned Stark was named Hand of the King, for the short amount of time that lasted, Cersei had pushed for her brother then, too.

Margaery couldn't see him as one of the fat old men sitting at this table, but then again, according to her terribly well informed ladies, they were back to their old...sibling ways, and not even making much of an effort to hide it.

Joffrey did manage to get his way with Casterly Rock, however, because Sansa had signed it away and it belonged to Cersei now, as the next in line for it as the eldest daughter of her father's house, but Joffrey had his plans for it.

Cersei had looked almost as disgusted as Sansa, when Joffrey informed her that the soldiers at the Rock would be used to help quell uprisings here in King's Landing, as if she couldn't imagine how she had birthed such a foolish son.

But she did as she was told, even if she protested almost to the point where Joffrey might have commanded her as her king, and Joffrey pulled Margaery back to his chambers and fucked her under the giant stag he was so proud of ordering one of his Kingsguard to shoot, the week before.

Margaery hadn't been there, of course. She'd been too busy trying to find ways to reconnect with Sansa to worry overmuch about what her husband was doing.

And now she couldn't stop thinking about Sansa. About how Sansa had looked at supper the evening before, wan and pale and like she wasn't eating nearly enough. Ill, like Margaery had overheard she was. Margaery hadn't quite believed it until that moment.

But she didn't think the illness was a natural one. Sansa didn't meet her gaze once during the meal, was purposely not looking at her.

Margaery closed her eyes.

But he fucked her under it today, the stag, and Margaery didn't even have to pass the time looking into the holes where the eyes of the stag used to be. She was too busy getting her womanhood ground into by her husband.

"My mother has a suggestion for every question that enters my mind during the Small Council meetings," Joffrey said after he was able to breathe again, when he came inside of her moments later, languidly running his hand up and down Margaery's sleeve. "She has a suggestion for Hand of the King, she has a suggestion for how to deal with Stannis Baratheon, and she has a suggestion for how to deal with my fucking uncle Tyrion. She won't shut the fuck up with them, actually, but you haven't been whispering in my ear since she returned."

Margaery was almost surprised he had noticed that. She lifted her chin, tried to sound prim rather than nervous when she responded, "Because I didn't think you would appreciate being told everything you must do, my love. I am but your wife, after all, and I know that my place is not to tell you how to run the kingdom."

He gave her an appreciative look. "I am glad one woman in my family understands her place," he said, and Margaery had a rather inappropriate flashback to licking the cum from Sansa's cunny.

She flashed him a grin she didn't feel. "I live to please Your Grace," she said, letting her hand dip down between his legs.

He batted her hand aside, and Margaery blinked at him in confusion, uncertain why he wasn't advocating for sex, even so quickly after the last round.

"Your father," Joffrey said, "it would seem to my mother's eyes that he is practically..." his brows furrowed, "salivating for the position of Hand of the King."

Margaery chuckled, sitting up a little. "My father is ambitious to serve the Crown in whatever capacity you would give him, but he would make a terrible Hand of the King, Your Grace," she told him honestly, flopping down onto her back beside him, "precisely because he is too malleable a man, and too loyal a soldier, not to disagree with you."

Joffrey raised a brow. "And you think the Hand of the King ought to disagree with me?" He didn't sound angry at the suggestion, only...confused.

If he's smart, Margaery thought, with no small degree of malice. "I wouldn't know, Your Grace," she told him, "but I think that Ser Jaime would, if he felt it was the right thing to do. My father would be too busy not wishing to upset you, even if he knew it was wrong to do so."

Her husband's eyes gleamed. "You have...certain opinions about your father," he pointed out.

Margaery nodded. "If my honesty makes you uncomfortable, my love, then..."

"No, no," he lifted a hand. "It is refreshing to get the truth from someone, and especially from my wife."

Margaery grinned at him. "I am so relieved to hear you say that, my love," she told him, leaning close to whisper it against his naked skin. "Would you like to hear what else I think of the people around us?"

Joffrey gave her a considering look. "What do you think of my mother?" he asked her, and the teasing atmosphere vanished from the room as if it had never been.

Margaery froze. "Your mother, Your Grace?"

Joffrey shook his head. "She spent an awful long time making her way here from Highgarden," he said, and sounded mulish about it. "One would think she would have hurried back here to help bury her father. Ser Jaime was back before she was, and he was all of the way from the Iron Islands."

"I..." she thought about the discreet letters her grandmother had sent her, about Willas being sick and about Cersei being far too excited about it, far too doting to her husband, just after learning that her father had died. She had told Olenna that it gave her something to do, but Olenna hated the sight of Cersei around her grandson.

Hated it almost enough to send her back to King's Landing, but she'd resisted Cersei's demands to be allowed to return with her servants and her guards, because, as Olenna claimed, it simply wasn't safe for the mother of the King, if the Hand of the King could be so easily killed.

Oh, Margaery knew well why Cersei had not arrived earlier, and a part of her feared and wondered how much Cersei knew.

"I think that Her Grace was likely overcome with grief, upon learning of the death of her father," she said carefully. "It was a great loss."

Joffrey gave her an unimpressed look, and Margaery wondered how self aware he was of his mother. "She's plotting something," he said.

Well, it didn't take a genius to figure that out, though no one would ever argue that Joffrey was that. Cersei was always plotting something. Margaery simply had to figure out what it was she was plotting.

But it worried Margaery, that she couldn't figure it out what it was. Couldn't figure out why Cersei had wanted the Tower of the Hand fumigated, couldn't figure out if Willas' current state was because of Cersei.

Couldn't figure out why Sansa was so glad to be rid of her company.

Margaery shook her head. "She's trying to protect you, my love," she said, because even if she didn't know what Cersei wanted, it was a good guess, with that woman. "After what your uncle did, I doubt she believes anyone can be trusted."

Joffrey gave her another searching look. "I don't like that she's just returned and thinks she can go back to running everything, like she's still the Queen Regent," he told Margaery.

Margaery gave her husband a sympathetic look. "Then perhaps you should tell her that, Your Grace," she said, not even trying to contemplate how badly that would go over with Cersei. "She is so used to being a mother to you, to protecting you, that perhaps she does not even realize that she is overstepping."

Joffrey nodded emphatically. "Yes," he said. "Perhaps you're right. But she ought to realize that I'm not a baby anymore. Not like Tommen."

Margaery nodded, tutting, reaching out and petting her husband's hair. "That she should, Your Grace," she assured him. "You are more than a man grown now, after all," she said, and reached between his legs.


	173. SANSA

Sansa barely left her room in the following days. It wasn't as if Margaery were sending for her, not to liaison in their chambers, not to eat or sew with her and her ladies. And it wasn't as if there was anyone else in King's Landing who was willing to damage their reputation enough to spend time with Sansa Stark.

She swallowed hard as Shae entered her chambers to change her bedding. Sansa was hard at work pretending to read a book about marital law, but they both knew her heart wasn't in it. She hadn't turned a page in the past hour.

Shae moved around Sansa's chair, to the bed, and began stripping it. Sansa was abruptly reminded of the morning after she and Tyrion's wedding, when Shae had checked the bedding and realized that they hadn't consummated their marriage.

It was on the tip of Sansa's tongue to ask whether Shae had seen Tyrion recently, whether he was all right.

She didn't know what was holding her back.

"Why don't we go down to the harbor?" Shae asked, hands full with Sansa's sheets.

Sansa glanced up listlessly from her book. "What?" she asked. She didn't think she had gone to the harbor since that day when Margaery had kept her from trying to escape.

Well, there was the time she had escaped with the Martells, but that hadn't been Sansa Lannister, that had been Sansa Stark.

She swallowed. "I'm not feeling well enough," she told Shae, painfully aware of how much of a lie the words sounded.

Shae harrumphed. "Perhaps some fresh air might help," she suggested, in a tone that seemed to believe Sansa wasn't going to change her mind, anyway.

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek. "Maybe tomorrow," she said.

Shae hesitated, and set the bundle of sheets back down on the bed. Sansa felt her heart leap up to her throat as the woman sat down on the bed across from her, stared at her.

Sansa fidgeted under the scrutiny, setting down the book she wasn't really reading, anyway.

"Sansa..." Shae chewed on her lower lip. It was something Margaery did every time she hesitated over something, and Sansa hated that this was her first thought, seeing it.

She felt her stomach twist as the silence drew on.

"If you want to talk, about anything," Shae started, but Sansa cut her off, suddenly frightened even if she didn't know why.

"I'm fine," she stammered out. "I just...I just want to be left alone."

Shae shook her head, some of her dark hair spilling in front of her face. "I know it can feel like that, but I worry about you. We don't even need to talk about..."

No, she knew why she was worried. If Shae was able to figure out what was wrong so easily, who else would be able to take one look at Sansa's face and figure that out, as well?

Sansa swallowed. "I said I didn't want to talk about it, Shae," she snapped, and instantly felt guilty as Shae's face closed off, the way Margaery's had before she demanded Sansa get out of her chambers.

Shae nodded, stood to her feet. She picked up the bundle of sheets. "Well, if you ever change your mind..."

Sansa felt another hot spike of guilt. Shae was struggling as much as she; she knew that, what with Tyrion locked away. Like Sansa, he had been one of her only protections here in King's Landing.

"Shae," she started, and when Shae looked back at her hopefully, she could only manage to get out, "thank you."

Shae hesitated again, and then reached out and clasped Sansa's hand in her own. "It's going to be all right, Sansa," she said softly. "You'll see."

Sansa felt wetness accumulating behind her eyes. "How can you say that?" she asked, before she could stop herself.

Shae's gaze softened. "I'd better take these," she said. "What with Tyrion..." she swallowed. "The servants are not quite as understanding," she said, and Sansa swallowed, miserable, then nodded.

"Of course," she said, and watched Shae go.

She barely made it to the chamber pot in time when the door closed after Shae.

She sat over it, dry heaving and shivering, for a long time, hot black spots appearing in her vision. She rubbed at her barren stomach as it cramped painfully.

It seemed she was destined to destroy every good relationship in her life, she thought miserably.

And that thought had her getting up to her feet, reaching for her ratty shawl and pulling it around her shoulders. Shae was right. She couldn't keep sitting in this room, this room that she used to share with her husband, near this bed she used to share with Margaery.

She walked out of the room, ignoring the looks of the servants she passed in the hall, ignoring the careful way that the lords and ladies she passed didn't look at her.

She didn't know where she was going; only that she couldn't bear the thought of the harbor, and she couldn't bear the thought of remaining in that room. That was all that mattered.

And that was how she found herself standing outside her old chambers, the ones she used to have before she was married to Tyrion.

Sansa stared at the old door that didn't look like it had been opened since the servants had moved her things out of it, took a deep breath.

She wasn't even sure how she had ventured this far, to the other end of the Keep, without passing Margaery or one of her ladies-

No, she couldn't think of that.

Sansa tried the door, was surprised to see that it was unlatched. It pushed inward, and, after a brief hesitation, Sansa stepped inside, pulling her shawl a little more tightly around her shoulders.

The room was just as she had left it, covered in a layer of dust now, but the same. She wondered at that, wondered if the Lannisters simply hadn't had any other guests that they felt the need to give these chambers.

She swallowed, thought of how she had sat here with her septa, complaining about how boyish and childish Arya was, complaining about the fact that her father wanted to leave King's Landing without letting her marry Joffrey.

She swallowed thickly, and thought she would give anything to return to those days. Anything.

Sansa swallowed, walking over to the banister looking over King's Landing and looked out it, clutching the railing in an iron grip. She closed her eyes as she could practically hear her father speaking over her shoulder, asking her if Joffrey made her happy, to be a bit kinder to her sister.

She missed being Sansa Stark so much, missed being the naive little girl who thought all princes were kind and good, and that all queens were gentle and compassionate. She missed being the little girl who had a mother and a father, and who thought these chambers were beautiful and so far above her own, in Winterfell.

Sansa closed her eyes, breathed in the room, and imagined for a moment she was breathing in something of the Sansa Stark of old. The girl who wouldn't have cared to go to Dorne at all because of the warnings her septa had always given her about it, who would have been happy to be only Margaery's friend and who would never have lost her in such a way.

She felt a tear slip down her cheek, and brushed at it furiously.

When she opened her eyes, she was met by a mop of blonde hair, and Sansa jerked, momentarily not recognizing Tommen, and seeing someone else. She wondered for a moment what in the seven hells he was doing here, why no one could just leave her in peace.

When she blinked again, he was still standing in front of her.

"Hello, Tommen," Sansa said, forcing herself to smile at him. "I wasn't expecting to see you here."

She hadn't been expecting to see anyone here, in Sansa Stark's old chambers. Had been counting on it, in fact. That was, she realized, why she had come here.

Tommen smiled, face wan. "I wanted to see the sunset," he said. "I can't see it very well, from my room."

Sansa squinted at him, and then turned to look out over the city again. He was right, she realized. This room had a spectacular view of the sunset.

She remembered standing on this very railing as Joffrey, making effort to be a charming prince, had given her a necklace and smiled at her as if he really loved her. She wanted to laugh at that naive girl, wanted to be her again.

"Oh," she said, for lack of a better word, and Tommen smiled.

"It's beautiful," he told her, and Sansa forced herself to nod, even if she thought it looked like blood.

Tommen was not put off by her strange behavior. "Mama used to say that it was golden because it belonged to the Lannisters," he said. "Golden like lions, because the coming day was ours."

Sansa almost smiled at that. "That's pretty," she said instead.

Tommen nodded, hugging himself a little. Sansa remembered that his mother had barely acknowledged him at that horrible supper Joffrey had forced her to attend, too busy glaring at Margaery and likely plotting her demise.

"Do you come here often?" she asked him.

Tommen flushed a little at being caught out. "Yes," he said.

Sansa smiled. "Can I join you, sometimes?"

Tommen swallowed, shrugged his small shoulders. "These are your rooms," he told her.

Sansa felt her lips pulling down, at those words. "They were," she corrected him. "Not anymore."

Tommen glanced up at her. "Won't they be again though, when Uncle Tyrion...?" he trailed off, lower lip wobbling.

Sansa looked away, unable to stomach the sight. "I don't know," she told him, and that much was true.

She looked out over the banister. "The sun's set now, anyway," she said. "Oughtn't you to be in bed?"

She wondered where his nannies were, that they hadn't noticed he was gone.

Tommen shrugged. "I suppose," he said.

Sansa reached out and put her hand on his shoulder, only realizing after that this was an imposition. He was a prince, after all, neglected or not.

"Come on," she said, letting go of him. "I'll walk you."


	174. SANSA

Playing with Tommen's kittens while he regaled her with all of their less than exciting adventures was something to do that didn't leave Sansa thinking of Margaery. She suspected that it was something she never would have done when she was Sansa Stark, something she would have found demeaning or childish.

But now she was Sansa Lannister, and playing with Tommen's kittens was a relief. It meant that she wasn't thinking about Margaery, who hadn't approached her since that horrible day. It meant she wasn't on pins and needles around Shae, angry that Tyrion was going to die and that Sansa had given up on him.

It meant that she wasn't thinking about her hungry stomach, about the way it was clawing at her insides in a desperate attempt to find sustenance.

It was something she had been doing the last few days, coming to Tommen's chambers after she walked him back that first night, because she suspected he was just as lonely as she and at least it was a distraction. And Tommen loved his kittens.

It was almost a relief, to see a Lannister care about something that wasn't pure evil.

"Ser Pounce doesn't like that ball, Aunt Sansa," Tommen reprimanded her, in a voice that made it clear this wasn't the first time he'd told her that information.

Sansa sighed and set the ball down as Ser Pounce hissed at it, and then her. "I'm sorry," she apologized, and then forced a smile for Tommen's sake. "Which one does he like?"

Tommen smiled. She felt a pang of guilt, that he should be so happy for her company. He held a blue ball out to her, and Sansa took it, their fingers brushing against one another.

Tommen didn't appear to notice the contact, only reached out and ran gentle fingers through Ser Pounce's fur.

Sansa found herself wondering yet again what it would have been like, if she had been betrothed to Tommen instead of Joffrey. She almost might have preferred it to marrying Tyrion, she thought, even if it would have meant having Cersei as a goodmother.

Suddenly, Ser Pounce jumped up, tumbling into Tommen's lap where the boy had barely been able to coax him close before. His body was humming, but not from happiness, and he was staring with wide green eyes at the door.

Sansa found herself following the cat's gaze, jumped a little, startled, when she saw the large creature peeking out from behind Tommen's open door.

It didn't look quite like a cat. It didn't even look natural, but loomed, the size of a dog and barely visible in the shadow of the darkened corridor, and something about it made Sansa shudder.

"That's Balerion," Tommen whispered, sounding somewhere between annoyed and frightened. "He hates Ser Pounce." A pause. "He hates everyone, actually. Won't even let me feed him milk from my fingers."

Sansa found herself glancing up at the creature, hidden in the shadow of the door, glaring out at them with bright yellow eyes. She could hardly make him out, but he looked like a specter, twice the size of Ser Pounce and hissing angrily in their direction.

"Another stray?" Sansa found herself asking, the words tumbling out of her mouth even when she knew that wasn't the case.

It hadn't been the first time a stray kitten had found its way into Tommen's quarters, though none had done so today. She wondered if they had somehow known this creature was nearby, and kept away on purpose.

She knew it was silly to be frightened of a cat, even a particularly large cat like Balerion, but something about him did frighten her. She thought he was almost large enough to push over Tommen, were he standing.

Tommen shivered, pulling Ser Pounce closer. The cat let out a little yelp, but didn't pull away.

"No," Tommen said. "He..." he bit his lip. "He's been here since I was born, probably longer. Joffrey says..." he fell silent.

Sansa glanced at him. She usually avoided bringing up the topic of his brother, because she could tell he wasn't comfortable with mentioning his brother when he didn't have to. "What does Joffrey say?"

Tommen licked his lips, glancing around as if he thought anyone would overhear them, and then leaning closer. Sansa found herself unconsciously leaning towards him.

"Joffrey says he belonged to the slaughtered princess, the one Ser Gregor chopped into pieces," Tommen told her in a quiet tone. "And now he skulks around the palace, waiting to avenge her by eating the children of her enemies."

Sansa swallowed. The overlarge cat turned around and walked back the way he had come, the door slamming behind him. Sansa and Tommen jumped at the same time.

"I'm sure he's just a stray," Sansa managed.

Tommen shrugged. "Ser Pounce doesn't like him," he told Sansa. "Balerion attacked him once, when I first got Ser Pounce, and almost killed him."

Sansa shivered, looking down at the little cat breathing heavily in Tommen's lap, staring with wide green eyes at the door. He seemed to judge it safe now, for he climbed out of Tommen's lap and went back to playing with his ball.

Sansa remembered to breathe. She couldn't help but think how similar to Joffrey and Tommen this Balerion and Ser Pounce were.

There came a knock at the door behind them, and Sansa jumped, flushing a little at how silly she was acting when instead of the great cat, Cersei found her way into Tommen's chambers.

Sansa was surprised. It was the first time since she had started playing with Tommen and his kittens that Cersei had ever walked in on them, and the woman's eyes narrowed as she took in the sight of Sansa in her son's chambers.

"Lady Sansa," she said, voice pinched as though she were eating a sour plum. "I didn't expect to see you here."

Sansa flushed, standing to her feet and forcing herself to curtsey. "Queen Mother," she greeted, not meeting the woman's eyes. "Tommen asked me to come and play with Ser Pounce," she said.

Cersei nodded. "I see." She eyed her young son, and then her eyes flittered back to Sansa. She seemed to be weighing something in her mind for a moment, and then she spoke.

"I hear that I have you to thank for the fact that Casterly Rock is now mine," Cersei said primly. Tommen stayed seated on the floor, pulling the ball out of Ser Pounce's reach again and again, and eying his mother and Sansa nervously, clearly aware of his mother's raised hackles but unsure of why they were there.

Sansa froze, grimacing at the reminder. "Yes," she agreed finally, and chanced a look in Cersei's direction, wondered if the other woman was pleased with her or annoyed.

Cersei smiled, moved forward, reached out and took Sansa's hands into her own. Sansa barely refrained from flinching. "I always knew that I could trust you, dear girl. You remind me so much of myself, at your age." She bent forward, kissing Sansa on the forehead. It felt like she was searing a mark into Sansa's skin. "And while you've been forced to be with that Imp because of my father, I haven't forgotten how I once cared for you like a daughter."

Sansa licked her lips. "I..."

She couldn't think of a single thing to say. She knew that, in this moment, Margaery would likely have thought of half a dozen responses to insinuate herself into Cersei's inner circle, to-

She couldn't think of Margaery, just now. Couldn't let Cersei see her quite that vulnerable.

"I heard that Joffrey sent you down to the Black Cells, to deliver the news to Tyrion yourself," Cersei told her. "That must have been quite harrowing, but I imagine his response was worth it."

Sansa shivered, crossing her arms over her chest. Cersei looked hungry for details. "He...wasn't happy," she allowed.

Cersei smirked. "No, I imagine he wasn't. Our father refused to name Tyrion as his heir while he lived, because he was still holding out for Jaime to come to his senses and claim the position," she told Sansa, and Sansa wondered if that was alcohol she smelled on the other woman's breath. "But that isn't Jaime's place, and now we're left with this conundrum of old inheritance law. Still, you did a good thing, my dear girl."

Sansa wondered when Cersei's praise had ceased to mean anything to her. "Thank you, Your Grace."

Cersei eyed her son again. "Were the two of you enjoying yourselves?"

"Yes, mama," Tommen answered for the both of them, and Sansa forced herself to smile.

"I see," Cersei repeated. Then she squinted at Sansa, who felt rather like she was being picked apart. Perhaps she had better not come back here, she thought, and then felt her heart sink at that thought, for this was her only reprieve lately, from her traitorous thoughts about Margaery.

"I suppose Maid Margaery has crowed about my absence since the moment I left," Cersei muttered disdainfully, and Sansa found herself shaking her head before she realized why it was foolish to attempt to defend the other girl.

She didn't think anyone had mentioned Margaery's name to her recently, and hearing it startled her, made her want to act in a way that she knew would probably get her killed.

Instead, she echoed, "Maid Margaery?"

Cersei smirked. "Our precious queen, I meant, of course," she said, and then just stared at Sansa, as if daring her to dispute that.

Sansa swallowed. "Of course. I think...she has been quite distracted," she said quietly. "And she doesn't...talk much with me, anymore."

It had been five days.

And Sansa knew that was her fault more than Margaery's, that Margaery had a perfectly valid reason not to pour out her heart for Sansa when Sansa couldn't do so in return, but the words still stung.

She had learned from Shae, of all people, that Willas Tyrell lay on the brink of death, that his illness was suspected to be the cause of poison. That Cersei had returned to King's Landing in spite of this, perhaps because of it, since Olenna Tyrell was openly treating her with suspicion, and Sansa had not yet found the time to even tell Margaery that she hoped her brother recovered.

She wasn't sure Margaery would hear her if she did.

Cersei eyed her, expression suddenly wary. "Yes," she said, "It is a cruel thing, to lose a family member. I hope that she never has to experience it, as I have."

Sansa blinked at her, wondered if she meant Tyrion, for she could hardly imagine Cersei mourning the loss of her brother, especially not before he was dead. And then she realized that Cersei was talking about her father.

"Of course," Sansa dipped her head, and hated the woman a little more, for she'd lost all of her family members at the hands of either Joffrey or Tywin Lannister.

Cersei reached out and clasped Sansa's hand. "Well, my dear," and she turned to Tommen to include him in this, "I shall leave you to your playing." She glanced down at the kittens, and Sansa realized suddenly how strange it was, that Cersei had barely acknowledged her son while fawning over Joffrey since she'd returned. "Mind, don't do it too long."

This last was directed at Sansa alone.

Sansa bit back a sigh. "Of course, Your Grace."

Cersei brightened at the epithet.


	175. MARGAERY

The gown ripped as it pulled over Margaery's delicate shoulder, too tight for her body.

"Where in the seven hells is my normal seamstress?" Margaery demanded, extricating herself from the gown without allowing her ladies to assist her. "This new one has had access to twenty of my gowns, and she can't make my measurements to save her life."

The ladies exchanged glances. "You sent her back to Highgarden, Your Grace," Elinor told her carefully. "For ruining the gown you wore at the last tourney."

Margaery ground her teeth. "I see," she murmured. "Well this new one is just as terrible. Are there no good seamstresses in King's Landing, or am I going to have to start making my own dresses, the Queen?"

Alla bit her wobbling lip. "I'll find another one, Your Grace," she whispered, and Margaery scoffed.

"Don't bother," she murmured, walking naked to her wardrobe and pulling out the hunting gown she wore when Joffrey wanted to take her on another adventure into the Kingswood. "I'm going for a ride."

Her ladies glanced at each other. "Your Grace-"

"You can either accompany me, or find me another seamstress worthy of making clothes for the Queen," Margaery told them, and her ladies scrambled to find appropriate clothes in their own chambers down the hall.

Margaery nearly sighed in relief the moment they were gone. But her anger hadn't abated, and not at the seamstress.

She could feel it, a tight ball in her chest, unnamed but never ceasing. She could feel it bubbling up into her throat every once in a while, and she hated it as much as she longed to feel something.

Gathering the ladies and her guards for a ride did not take long. Loras was amongst her guards, but so was Lancel Lannister, and she eyed him carefully as her horse was brought out to her and she climbed onto its back.

And then she was riding into the Kingswood, her hair flying free behind her, the wind ripping at her clothes, and for a moment, Margaery felt free.

She rode, thighs digging into her steed, loving the feeling of being on a horse again after so long, on a horse that wasn't going to have to watch Joffrey kill something.

She should ride more often, she thought idly, ignoring the ladies and soldiers riding around her, reminding her of the life she was riding away from.

She remembered something then, something she had not thought about in some time. Her brother Willas was the one so interested in horseflesh, but it was her grandmother who had gotten her interested in riding. Her grandmother who, after Margaery had gone through twelve summers, insisted that she ride every day for weeks at a time, sometimes even in the colder days when her mother tried to beg off for Margaery's sake.

"It will be useful some day, as a maiden," her grandmother had told a twelve year old Margaery, and Margaery, a child at the time, had not understood what she meant.

Now, she snorted, ignoring the worried look Megga sent her way. She'd always enjoyed riding, and had known that it was useful in that way, but she had only just remembered this conversation.

She wondered if her grandmother had taken one look at her and realized it was going to be impossible to keep her solely in her husband's bed. Wondered if it were that obvious, that she was going to spend the rest of her life jumping from affair to affair.

But...no. What she and Sansa had was not just some affair. It couldn't be. She'd never-

Margaery sped up her horse, ignoring the startled cries of her ladies as she pushed further into the woods, glad to get away from them all. Glad when the darkness of the forest enveloped her, and she was just a lone woman on a horse.

She knew she would catch hell from going away from her protectors and her ladies, but at the moment, Margaery didn't care, and she dug in her heels, speeding her horse on.

It moved, and she gasped at the air entering her lungs, loving how it sped toward her, allowing her to breathe again for the first time in so long.

And then she had another flash of Sansa's bright red hair in the bird fluttering past, and the moment died as quickly as it had come on. She wanted nothing more than to get away, to get off this horse, lest she see another flash of red.

She didn't think about what she was doing, Margaery just moved.

She jumped off the horse in mid motion, fell to the forest floor in a flurry of fabric and a whoosh of air, and hit the meadowed ground with a sharp gasp.

The feeling didn't hurt at all, and she hated that a little.

Her horse pulled to a halt a few paces in front of her, glancing back at its mistress with wide doe eyes, and Margaery ignored him, sitting up and rubbing at her arms.

She hated this. She was angry, and none of it would come out, and she hated it. Margaery pounded her fist against the ground, and winced.

"Margaery?" a quiet voice asked, and Margaery glanced up, surprised to see Alla standing in the clearing, one hand on the reins of her own horse.

Margaery closed her eyes. "Where are the others?" she asked.

"They went a different way looking for you," Alla said, and then smiled at her. "I'm better at tracking than they are, anyway."

Margaery smiled. The motion felt forced. "I know."

Alla hesitated again. "Is it...do you mind if I sit with you?"

Margaery shook her head, didn't look up as Alla tied her horse to a tree, then Margaery's, and took a seat beside her on the grass, pulling at it.

Alla was so young, Margaery thought. If only she were that young again, when nothing felt quite as harsh as it did now.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Alla asked into the silence, the only other sounds breaking the noise that of the birds chirping around them, one of the horses snorting.

Margaery shook her head. "Not really," she said."

Alla nodded. "All right."

The silence dragged on.

"Sansa," Margaery whispered, when the silence and birdsong became too oppressive, and then gasped the name out again, ignoring the way Alla was looking at her. "Sansa. Sansa. I haven't..." she shook her head. "I've been avoiding even saying her name since..."

Alla chewed on her lower lip, let go of her fistful of grass to turn to Margaery fully. "You really care about her, don't you?" she asked.

Margaery glanced sideways at her, feeling heat blooming on her cheeks. "Is it so obvious?"

Alla grinned, but it was more subdued than usual. "Only to me, and the other ladies. We're your friends, you know. We've known you a long time."

Margaery swallowed, feeling a flash of guilt. "I haven't been much of a friend to any of you for some time," she said. "I'm sorry about that. I should...I should make more of an effort."

Alla scoffed. Margaery glanced at her incredulously.

"We're not blind, Margaery," Alla said. "We know the stress you've been under. You're married to the King, after all."

Margaery bit her lip, not wanting to be reminded that she was married to Joffrey. Not wanting to think about how, while all of her ladies had been fairly understanding about turning a blind eye on her liaisons with Sansa, if any one of them had been different, not from the Reach, they might have gotten her killed by now for breaking her vows to her husband.

"I wasn't talking about that," she said softly.

Alla smiled. "I know. But I think you deserve to find some happiness, even if it isn't around us."

She didn't know what she was talking about, Margaery thought. She was just a child. She didn't realize the repercussions. She could have been killed for offering up her room for Margaery and Sansa to use, and Margaery should never have endangered her like that.

Margaery let out a noise between a scoff and a sigh. "Well, I won't be having it anymore," she said, voice hollow.

Alla nodded. "I'm sorry."

Margaery glanced at her. "I've been endangering all of you for so long now," she said, "I'm sorry about that."

"I don't understand it," Alla said carefully, after a long pause. "But I can see that it's hurting you, to have given it up. I don't...I don't begrudge you for it, and I don't think the others do, either."

Margaery swallowed hard. "Does...Do they all know?" she asked.

"That something happened between you and Lady Sansa?" Alla clarified. Margaery nodded. "Yes."

Margaery sucked in a breath. "I see."

"Margaery..." Alla hesitated. Margaery glanced at her again. "You don't have to be the picture of composure all of the time, you know. We can...we can know about this, and it won't break you to pieces."

Margaery didn't tell her that she was already breaking into pieces. One that belonged to Sansa, one to Joffrey, none to herself.

"You're a good friend, Alla," she said instead, and Alla smiled, the moment broken.

"Does this mean I won't need to find another seamstress?" Alla asked, and Margaery choked back a laugh.

"I'm sure the one we have is sufficient for the moment," she assured the younger girl, and nearly yelped when Alla pulled her into a hug.


	176. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is pretty short, so I may be persuaded to upload another one today if I have time. :)

"You're distracted," Joffrey said as they lay tangled in his bed after another round of rigorous sex, sounding terribly petulant about it.

Margaery bit back a sigh. Trust this to be the only time Joffrey was observant.

"It is only...I have been thinking about Lady Sansa," she told him, which wasn't exactly a lie. It seemed that the only thing she could think about lately was Sansa, unless she was actively distracting herself with her plots for her husband.

Joffrey raised a brow. "She's been sick often lately," he muttered, and sounded almost disappointed. Margaery wondered if he was thinking about fucking her again.

Margaery laughed and hated how easy it was to do so. "She isn't sick, Your Grace, she's...mourning."

Joffrey blinked at that, as if he couldn't think of a single reason Sansa would have to mourn anyone. "She's still on about her mother and traitor brother?" he asked.

Margaery bit back a chuckle, because, grim as the subject matter was, her husband really could be clueless sometimes. If he were a less dangerous man, it would almost be amusing. "I think she's rather more concerned about the fate of her husband, Your Grace," she pointed out.

Joffrey's lips twisted. "She should be," he muttered.

Margaery cocked her head. "Lord Tyrion offered a certain amount of protection to her, protection she will not have when she is soon without a husband," she pointed out.

Joffrey cocked his head. "A husband," he repeated, and Margaery thought he was warming to the subject.

"When Lord Tyrion faces his trial for his terrible deed," she continued, reaching out and brushing at Joffrey's shoulder, "Sansa is going to be a widow very quickly afterwards. She will need a new husband, of course."

"Why?" Joffrey pulled away from her then, his tone almost...possessive. Margaery didn't like the sound of that at all.

Margaery shrugged, leaned forward. "Because that is what every woman needs, Your Grace, especially if she is young and fertile, and hasn't had children yet."

Joffrey thought that over. "She seems to think she's barren."

"I disagree," Margaery pointed out, thinking of all the times she'd made Sansa come. "She's very young, Your Grace, and perhaps Lord Tyrion simply isn't used to that...type...of lover."

Joffrey was definitely warming to the subject, now. "Yes, she will need someone to keep her sated and fill her with child, won't she?"

Now the trick was simply to transfer Joffrey's wish to be that someone onto Dickon Tarly. Margaery planned to take her time, but not too long. Not if there was a safer option she could present Sansa with, first.

"One would imagine that this is something Sansa has given much thought to, knowing that her husband's fate will soon be upon him," she pointed out, running her index finger inside the sleeve of Joffrey's cuff.

Joffrey snorted. "I don't know how soon that will be," he said, sounding terribly belligerent about it, and Margaery blinked in surprise.

She knew that there wasn't much evidence linking Tyrion to the murder, beyond that the knife that had been used was his, and that everyone knew how he had hated his father. Knew that was why Joffrey was so hesitant about pushing forward the trial, was leaving his uncle in the Black Cells for so long. No doubt he hoped his stubborn uncle would be broken enough not to fight the charges, when he was finally let out.

But Tyrion Lannister was a terribly stubborn man, and Margaery was counting on him not being broken enough to simply sit back and let his nephew condemn him to death. Not if it meant giving Sansa a husband she wouldn't further hate Margaery for.

"Well, don't you think he did it?" Margaery asked, smirking.

Joffrey blinked at her. "Of course he did it. The little imp has hated my grandfather his entire life, and, after all, he killed his own mother coming out of the womb."

That certainly sounded like Cersei's opinion, forming on Joffrey's lips. She would have to do something about that, as well.

"Well," Margaery moved close, let her breath ghost against her husband's cheek. "You are the King, are you not?"

Joffrey blinked at her again, looking bemused now. "Of course I..." what she was suggesting seemed to hit him, then.

"And the word of the King is a very powerful thing," she told him, bending forward to kiss her husband's lips. "If Your Grace believes your uncle Tyrion to be guilty, who are we mere mortals to dare object?"

Joffrey gave her another long look, and then he was kissing her back, and Margaery smirked into his lips.

Tyrion would get his hastily thrown together trial soon enough, if she had anything to do with it. And she did, and she rather enjoyed that feeling, after all.

It almost made up for the gaping hole in her chest, just under her heart.


	177. SANSA

"Maid Margaery," Margaery mimicked Cersei's high tones, with a laugh in her voice that had Sansa giggling from under the sheets. "Does this mean we might call her Shrew Cersei?"

Sansa guffawed, momentarily forgetting the awkward hesitation she'd felt as she lingered outside Margaery's chambers a few moments before, trying to decide whether or not she thought Margaery would like to be bothered by her. "Margaery!"

She realized a moment too late that they weren't on such affectionate terms anymore, that she ought to be calling Margaery "Your Grace," or nothing at all.

But the name had already slipped out, and there was no holding it back now.

Margaery's head jerked up sharply, her eyes meeting Sansa's. It took Sansa a moment to recognize Margaery in those eyes; in how wild and tired they seemed at the same time. She couldn't remember Margaery ever looking like that before.

The thought made her shiver.

The awkwardness seeped in once their laughter had died, the awkwardness that had been there since Sansa's return to King's Landing from that failed escape, and yet that she hated so much.

It was heavier now, with the knowledge that Sansa should not have tried to seek Margaery out after leaving her in the first place, and certainly not to tell her something as menial as the knowledge she already knew, that Cersei hated her gooddaughter and was out to get her.

Still, she'd come, wishing that Margaery could make sense of her feelings more than she could, because Margaery had done that the first time around.

She stood, brushing down her skirt awkwardly when she realized that she had gone without a second thought to sit on the edge of Margaery's bed, as she always used to do when they went to Margaery's chambers to talk alone.

The touch of Margaery's bed sheets against her calves hadn't burned until now.

"I..." she licked her lips, glancing at Margaery in desperation.

She wished that Margaery's chambers looked different, in the interim since Sansa had last been in them. Wished that the furniture was not all as perfectly arranged as it had been that day, that the sheets on Margaery's bed were not the same forest green.

Wished that something looked out of place, so that the memories of everything they had done here could not sear themselves in her mind every time she glanced at anything but Margaery's no longer smiling face.

But everything looked the same, as if Margaery had not at all been affected by the change in their situation. As if she had simply moved forward without thinking overmuch about it.

She tried to be fair to the other girl. Sansa's own chambers were no different, save for that now the chamber pot was closer to her bed than the small room off of it, and Shae had pulled some of her clothes out of the wardrobe to strewn them across the bed. Apparently, they needed to be taken in.

Sansa tried not to think about the guilt she'd felt with the way Shae had looked at her when she said those words.

She realized that she was still standing in the middle of Margaery's chambers, incapable of going away, incapable of staying.

"Well," Margaery said finally, after clearing her throat and looking away, releasing Sansa from her spell, "Thank you for telling me, Sansa. I suppose I shall have to keep an eye out for her."

Sansa bit her lip. As if she were not already doing that, not already aware that she had everything to lose from letting her guard down around Cersei.

It had been foolish to come here.

Sansa started to move toward the door, realized after a few moments that her legs were not actually moving. That she had been staring at Margaery's lips long enough for the other girl to notice, cocking her head.

Seconds passed. Sansa closed her eyes, shook her head, and hated how transparent she must seem to the other girl.

"I heard about your brother," Sansa blurted, opening her eyes. Hearing about Willas' illness had made her feel even more guilty about the fact that she had walked out of Margaery's chambers that day, Margaery, who must have known at the time.

Margaery's head jerked back up. She licked her lips, but didn't speak.

"I...I'm sorry," Sansa continued, a little nonplussed by Margaery's silence. "I mean, I shall pray for him to get better."

Margaery sent her a sad smile, and when she spoke, she sounded genuine. "Thank you. It's been...difficult, knowing that he is ill but being unable to go to him, because of the upcoming trial."

Sansa nodded, licking her lips and not meeting Margaery's eyes, now. "I...when Robb...I wished that I could go to him," she confessed. "In the end, but they wouldn't let me bury his body. Not that...not that your brother will..." she looked away, flushing.

Margaery lifted her chin. She didn't look grateful, now. "You didn't have to come and tell me this, Sansa," she said quietly, and that awkwardness seeped in again.

"I know," Sansa said, lowering her head and rubbing at the back of her neck.

Margaery took a step forward. "So why are you here?"

Sansa licked her lips. "I..."

The truth was, she didn't know. It had been a reflex action, to come here, and Sansa had not reconsidered until she was already standing outside the door, and Elinor had found her out there.

Elinor let her in before Sansa could explain that this was a mistake, that she hadn't meant to come here at all, with a knowing, sad smile.

A part of Sansa was convinced that it was so that she could beg Margaery to take her back, to see that she hadn't been thinking clearly but she was better now, she was.

Another part of her recoiled at the thought of touching Margaery again, after all of the cruel words they had said to each other. After realizing that all of those cruel words were still true.

"I just...thought you should know about Cersei," Sansa said. "She's...dangerous not to keep an eye on."

Margaery gave her a miserable look, voice coming out a tad testily. "Oh, believe me," she muttered, "I haven't let my eyes off her since she returned. Well," she clapped her hands together, "Thank you, Lady Sana. I...appreciate the warning."

Sansa felt her throat clog. Lady Sansa. The curtain had fallen again.

"Of course, Your Grace," she all but whispered, and turned and fled from the room.


	178. MARGAERY

"What is this I hear about you wishing to allow Oberyn Martell out of his house arrest, Mother?" Joffrey asked, sounding dangerously bored. Margaery had learned that it was often when he was boredom when he was at his worst.

She tensed, a little hurt that her teasing as they sat in the middle of the Small Council meeting had done nothing to assuage his boredom in the last few minutes.

Cersei calmly looked up from where she was engaged in some conversation about Casterly Rock with the Grandmaester. Evidently, he wanted more maesters to come to King's Landing, if House Lannister was not going to continue inhabiting the Rock for the foreseeable future.

Kevan Lannister was being asked to come to King's Landing. Margaery could only think of one reason why Cersei would extend that invitation. Perhaps she had been too heavy handed, in attempting to convince Joffrey not to name his uncle Jaime Hand of the King.

Cersei didn't appear to notice the danger in Joffrey's boredom when she spoke.

"Dorne is an impregnable stronghold, my son, but it is not completely impervious, and cannot keep up a fight indefinitely," Cersei reminded him. "Giving someone who has the authority to treat on behalf of Dorne the ability to do so can only help us in this three way fight we find ourselves in the middle of."

Except that Joffrey hadn't expressed any interest in stopping that three way fight. But Margaery found, to her annoyance, that she agreed with Cersei. If she was going to be Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, she would prefer that the Seven Kingdoms were not made of rubble, nor that her family's army was destroyed because of Joffrey's ambitions.

Never mind that her father would likely never forgive her for that.

Joffrey waved a hand, and his mother's eyes flashed in annoyance. "And you think I should trust that snake?"

"Prince Oberyn, while possessing many flaws, is still the second born son of House Martell," Cersei reminded her son, remarkably patient for a Lannister, Margaery thought. "It might be in our best interests to allow him out of house arrest, to treat on behalf of Dorne for peace with the Crown."

Joffrey scoffed. "He kidnapped my aunt Sansa," he reminded Cersei. "And the moment he is healed of his injuries, he will stand trial for it."

Except that Margaery was fairly certain that Oberyn Martell was capable of standing on his own now, and no mention of a dated trial had been made since Tyrion's arrest for Tywin's murder.

"As Tyrion has been allowed to stand trial?" Cersei asked, snappishly, evidently at the end of her small amount of patience.

Joffrey glared at her. "I haven't finished building my case against him, Mother," he told her, tone warning. "And Prince Oberyn's crimes hardly preclude murder of the Hand of the King."

Cersei's expression flattened. "Of course they don't. Which is why I do not believe that Prince Oberyn's crimes are as severe as you believe them to be."

She glanced around, and then lowered her voice, as if she thought for a moment that anyone in the room was not going to be able to hear her, when she sat across from her son at the table, and everyone in the room was hanging on their words.

Save for perhaps the Kingsguard. Jaime looked almost bored, where he stood at the other end of the room.

"He is, after all, a hot blooded man, and we all know of Lady Sansa's...apparent unhappiness here," Cersei continued carefully.

Joffrey lifted his chin. "Sansa expressed no unhappiness to be here when she testified that Prince Oberyn kidnapped her to the Crown," he reminded his mother coldly.

Cersei gave him a patronizing smile. "Because Sansa still is very young."

Because she'd known that it was the only way to protect herself, Margaery remembered, annoyed as well as Joffrey, now.

Cersei was pushing rather hard for Oberyn to be let out of his house arrest, and that boded rather ill. Whatever she was planning, Margaery knew she needed to be able to anticipate it, to be one step ahead of it.

"You think she went willingly?" Joffrey demanded, scowling.

Margaery rolled her eyes when she was sure no one was looking in her direction.

Cersei smiled tightly. "Merely allow Prince Oberyn to treat on behalf of his kingdom. He is in...Less open rebellion than Dorne is at the moment, after all, and we are getting nowhere with this blockade."

Margaery ground her teeth, glancing at her husband, a sudden inkling of understanding flooding her thoughts, and she hated the theory she was developing at the moment.

"Fine," Joffrey muttered, much to Margaery's annoyance. Not because he had agreed, but because it appeared that Cersei still had some hold over her son. "Allow the Prince of Dorne to come out of his chambers for one hour a day to treat with the Small Council on behalf of Dorne."

Cersei beamed. "Thank you, my son," she told him, and annoyance flashed in Joffrey's eyes.

But he didn't say anything, just turned back to Margaery, who struggled to hide her own annoyance.


	179. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is that a series tag now? Why yes, yes it is.

Sansa wasn't sure if Cersei had lobbied for her to speak with Ellaria because of her newfound attempts to be kind to Sansa, or for the sake of some plot she had going about the Martells, but Sansa couldn't help but be reminded of how Margaery had promised to speak with Joffrey on her behalf, and now here she was, allowed to speak with Ellaria Sand because of Cersei's efforts.

She tried not to examine that thought too closely. She didn't want to think of Cersei in any terms but ill ones.

But she was here now, standing outside the door to the chambers where Ellaria and her ladies were being kept in isolation, as isolated as Tyrion, in the Black Cells, and she ought to go in.

She had wanted this, after all. To see Ellaria. To let her know that Sansa was still alive, that she understood why Ellaria had...done what she did to Sansa. To figure out why Ellaria and Oberyn had taken her to Dorne in the first place, because she wasn't naive enough anymore to think that it had only been out of the goodness of their hearts.

Now that she had the chance, she oughtn’t to look too closely at it. The guards were going to be present, to ensure that Ellaria didn't try to attack her again, and Sansa had no doubt they would report everything back to Cersei that was said.

She bit her lip, and then knocked.

One of the soldiers moved past her, forcing the door open, and Sansa blinked in surprise, reminded herself that Ellaria and her ladies were prisoners, and were subject to the whims of their captors. Of course the guards would not see a reason to wait for them to knock on the door.

She felt a fluttering of nerves in her stomach, and then the door pushed open all of the way, and Sansa got her first good look at Ellaria since the day Ellaria Sand had tried to cut her throat open.

The woman was sitting on a divan in the middle of the sparsely furnished room, her ladies crowded around her, all of them somber and with dark circles under their eyes. They glanced up as one when Sansa entered the room.

"Sansa," Ellaria breathed, seeming to take no notice of the guards as they filtered in around her. She looked almost...glad to see Sansa, which merely sent another spike of guilt through her.

Sansa licked her lips. "Ellaria," she said, nodding to the other woman.

Then Ellaria seemed to take in the presence of the guards. "I'm surprised King Joffrey allowed you to come and visit us," she said, gesturing to her surroundings. "We've been allowed no visitors save for these callous guards since we were brought back here."

'Brought back here,' Sansa thought, and tried not to think of how they had been brought back. How she had nearly bled out on a Tyrell ship, how Ellaria and Oberyn had been wounded and brought back in chains.

She had narrowly escaped being imprisoned with them, Sansa realized abruptly. She swallowed hard.

Ellaria stood, approached her. Sansa flinched back at the same time that the guards' hands all went to the pommels of their swords.

Ellaria paused, cleared her throat. Her ladies exchanged glances, and Ellaria cocked her head. "You look very thin, my dear," she said softly. "Are you well?"

Sansa swallowed, thought of the piece of bread and bit of cheese she'd had today thus far. "I'm fine," she murmured, harsher than she'd meant to. Silence fell.

Ellaria cleared her throat into the silence that followed, her ladies shifting on the divan behind her.

"Have you seen my Oberyn?" Ellaria asked quietly.

Sansa bit her lip, shook her head. "I...they're not keeping him in the Black Cells, though," Sansa assured her. "He is under house arrest in a room not far from here, recovering from his injuries."

Ellaria nearly sagged in relief. Sansa flushed, realizing that this was likely the first time she'd heard anything about her lover since they'd returned. She might not even have known that he was alive.

Ellaria confirmed her suspicions a moment later. "Are you...do they say he will recover?" she asked. "They tell me nothing, in here."

Sansa was ashamed that she had not made an effort to find out. "I could try to find out," she whispered, and Ellaria paused, gave her a searching look.

"Sansa..." she started, and her voice was gentle, in a way that Sansa did not especially like. It reminded her far too much of Margaery's. "My daughters...the guards tell me only that the Crown has declared war on Dorne."

Sansa bit her lip, thought about Margaery, how petty she'd been lately, focusing only on her own misery when people were dying in a war of Joffrey's starting. "The Queen Mother means to end the fighting," she said, "she's going to let Prince Oberyn out to negotiate on his brother's behalf, because the Lannisters haven't managed to get passed their blockade of Sunspear."

Ellaria sagged in relief. "So all is not lost."

Sansa shifted from one foot to another, tried not to think about how it had been her false testimony which had allowed Joffrey to declare war so easily. "I hope not," she whispered, forgetting about the guards for a single moment.

Ellaria shot her an alarmed look, perhaps sensing that she had gone too far, there. "Oberyn will do his best to bring an end to the war effort," she said. "King's Landing has been racked by many tragedies lately, and he didn't not mean to take you in the middle of another one. Had he known what was going to happen, he wouldn't have tested Joffrey's grief."

Sansa bit her lip to keep from snorting at the thought that Joffrey might be feeling grief about Tywin's death.

And then another thought hit her, a suspicion she hadn't quite managed to voice before now, but that Ellaria's words contradicted.

"You...but...I thought..." she flushed, eyed the guards again.

"You thought we did it?" Ellaria asked sympathetically, no judgment in her tone, but a hint of fearing lingering there, all the same.

The guards shifted uncomfortably.

Ellaria ignored them. "Sansa, as much as my Oberyn would be more than glad to kill Lord Tywin, and as easily prone as he is to anger, and believe me, I know of his anger, he is not foolish enough to do so on the same evening that he sent his paramour and Sansa Stark back to Dorne."

Sansa swallowed. That was hardly a glowing rebuttal, she couldn't help but think. And she was terribly cognizant of the guards watching them, listening to their conversation. Of how careful Ellaria needed to be with her words.

"I knew that my lover wanted war," Ellaria said quietly, meeting Sansa's eyes, and, for the first time in some time, Sansa found herself able to believe everything the woman said.

She wondered if in fact Ellaria was trying to curb her speech at all.

"And I was willing to support him in that, even if it was not what I wanted for Dorne. But he would never have killed Lord Tywin, and he would not have kidnapped you if he thought that the Lannisters would so quickly catch up to us. He would not have risked a little girl's life."

Sansa licked her lips, tried to think of what it was she wanted to say.

The words came out anyway, lingering loudly in the room when they did so.

"You cut my throat," Sansa blurted out, the real reason she was here. "I nearly died."

"You were supposed to," Ellaria said, gave Sansa a pitying look. One of the Lannister guards stepped forward, reached out for Sansa.

Remarkably, it did not make her feel safer.

"Sansa, I asked you if you wanted to be turned over to the Tyrell soldiers, and you told me that you did not. I was attempting to keep you away from them for good, in the only way that I knew how. I was-" Ellaria looked away. "Attempting to keep my promise to you."

Sansa chewed on the inside of her cheek, felt her stomach clench, for a moment, though she was going to faint then and there, and the world swayed dangerously.

"You thought that was keeping your promise?" she asked incredulously. "Killing me?"

Ellaria gave her a long, tired look. And in that look, Sansa read everything she couldn't say in front of the guards.

She supposed it did make sense, in a morbid sort of way. But Sansa had survived so much out of sheer cowardice, and she hadn't wanted to die then either, not really.

Even if she supposed she could interpret her words that day to mean that she had.

"I need to..." she felt bile rising up in her throat, and Sansa stumbled past the Lannister guards, toward the door. "I need to go," she said.

"Sansa!" Ellaria called after her, reached for her.

Lancel Lannister unsheathed his sword. Ellaria stopped.

Sansa glanced back in the doorway. "I'm sorry," she gasped out. "I'm sorry."

And then she turned and was gone.

She didn't know if she was apologizing for misleading Ellaria that day about how far she was willing to go, or if it was for testifying against them to Joffrey, or for some other ill she had not yet done against the Martells.

She didn't know, she knew only that she had been a breath away from death that day, and Ellaria had thought she wanted it.


	180. MARGAERY

"Grandmother," Margaery greeted, throwing herself into her grandmother's arms. "I wasn't expecting you to be here so soon."

She tried not to think about what that meant, with her brother lying abed in Highgarden, ill to the point of death.

She tried not to think also of how badly she had missed her grandmother, of how she hadn't even realized how much she missed her grandmother until this moment.

Olenna waved this away, reaching out and smoothing down Margaery's hair as they pulled back from each other. "I figured I had best put myself where I am most needed," she said dismissively, and Margaery remembered how she hated being around the sick, helpless, "and someone needs to keep both eyes on your goodsister."

Margaery made a face. "I've been trying, but between her and my beloved husband..." she glanced around to make sure no one overheard them. Everyone else around them was too busy unpacking Olenna's belongings to take notice of the grandmother and granddaughter's reunion.

Olenna snorted rather inelegantly. "I can see how they would make for rather trying work," she said, and Margaery could not tell if that was a criticism or understanding teasing, in her voice.

She decided not to think of it over hard for now.

"You look pale," Olenna said, considering Margaery. "I hope that woman hasn't been too trying, in the days that she's been here."

Margaery shrugged, because she knew it wasn't Cersei making her feel ill each morning, pale and tired and barely able to formulate the plots she knew she should have already figured out long ago. "I'm fine, Grandmother."

Olenna tilted up her chin, stared into her eyes for a long moment. Then she harrumphed. "Your father wants to be Hand of the King."

Margaery bit back a laugh. "I know."

"How are you doing with that?" Olenna asked, because it seemed she wasn't going to broach Margaery's haggard appearance again. Not now, at least.

Margaery shrugged. "I think I've managed to convince Joffrey that Father would make an easily manipulated, easily managed Hand," she told her grandmother.

Olenna looked at her for a moment, and then chortled. "I'm sure your father will be pleased to hear it," she said.

Margaery licked her lips. "How is Willas?" she asked hoarsely.

Her grandmother waved a hand. "I wouldn't be here if he were in too dire of danger, my dear," she said, reaching out and clasping Margaery's hand tightly in her own. Margaery found herself glad of the comforting grip. She closed her eyes, swallowed hard.

"I've been...so worried," she said.

Olenna nodded, let go of her. She had never been much of a tactile comforter, after all. "Well, you needn't worry too much over it. We wouldn't want you being distracted here, especially Willas, when he's on the mend."

Margaery narrowed her eyes, and then cleared her throat, nodding.

"Come, Grandmother," she said, forcing some levity into her voice, "The Lannisters are hosting a supper, since you've arrived."

Her grandmother cocked a brow. "I had no idea that Cersei would be so happy to see me," she said. "Should I be worried?"

Margaery tried not to think of the conversation she'd had with Sansa all too recently, about how she had compared Willas to her brother Robb, however blundering she had been about it. "Of course not," she said. "It's more about Prince Oberyn, anyway."

"They've let him out?" Olenna asked, tone laced with suspicion, now. "I thought they had him locked away somewhere."

Margaery rolled her eyes theatrically as a servant walked by with one of Olenna's chests full of close. Say what you liked about the Queen of Thorns, she did not travel light.

"Cersei convinced my husband to let him out, to negotiate on Dorne's behalf."

Olenna raised a pale, nearly absent brow. "I suppose the Lannisters' wars are not going so well as they wish, if that's the case," she said, and then turned away from Margaery without another word, barking at one of the servants to find her shawl because she was an old woman, and didn't have the time anymore to sit around waiting for it.

Margaery smiled wanly. Yes, she had missed her grandmother.

They made it down to the dining room where the Lannisters were having their feast just as it was beginning, Mace joining them along the way, and Olenna's eyes gleamed with a pleased sort of malice as she took in the sight of Cersei sitting between Joffrey and Jaime Lannister.

"Go, child," she told Margaery, giving her a little shove, "Your husband awaits you."

Margaery felt her face fall. "I could..."

"I won't be sitting that far away," Olenna told her, eying the newest person to walk into the dining hall, surrounded by two guards on each side, despite his harmless state. "Now, go."

Margaery eyed Prince Oberyn as he took his seat across from the King, hardly subtle as he greeted Cersei, and then sighed, walking over to kiss her husband on the cheek before taking her seat, as well.

She carefully didn't look around for where Sansa was sitting as she did so. But Margaery did barely withhold a sigh when her grandmother sat down directly beside Prince Oberyn, ignoring her son completely where he waved at her further down the table.

Cersei raised a brow, and reached for her wine glass. Margaery reached for Joffrey's hand. The two women made eye contact for a moment.

Joffrey started to eat, after making some statement he probably thought was clever about bringing Oberyn out to negotiate and end the war with Dorne, as if he had not just begun it.

"Prince Oberyn," Olenna said, turning up her nose at him as a heady silence fell over the table. "I heard they were letting you out to be civil with the rest of us. A wonder they think a Dornishman inciting a war was capable of it."

Oberyn looked far too amused, despite the scars on his face and the obvious pain he was in as he took his seat beside her. "Lady Olenna," he said, "your charming tongue is just as subtle as ever."

Olenna waved a hand. "I don't care for subtlety," she said, "It makes life far too boring. Speaking of which, if your absconding with the Lady Sansa was some subtle message against marriage, perhaps you'll let me in on the lesson."

Down the table from them, far enough away for it to be obvious that Oberyn was in better standing than her own husband but not so far away that she could not hear, Sansa flushed.

"My love," Margaery said loudly, "Could you pass me the pie?"

Joffrey handed it to her, nuzzled his nose against her cheek in a gesture that was almost affectionate as he did so. Olenna did not take her eyes off the two of them.

Oberyn smirked, not looking at Sansa at all. "I would have thought my views on marriage were made all too clear long before this, my lady."

Olenna raised a brow. "Keeping a whore is something every lordling in Westeros manages, married or not," she said, and Margaery bit hard into the side of her cheek. Everyone knew Olenna's thoughts on Ellaria Sand; her grandmother didn't need to harp on them to Oberyn's face.

"Grandmother," she started, but Oberyn interrupted before she could get further in her reprimand.

Oberyn sent Olenna a shark's smile. "My lady is far fiercer than any of those."

"And yet," Olenna said without missing a beat, "I notice she isn't present to eat with us."

Oberyn's face fell. "Indeed not," he said, no longer meeting Olenna's eyes. "I have been, ah, allowed out, as you say, to negotiate with the Lannisters; my lady holds no such importance to them."

Olenna didn't look sympathetic, at the words. "Yes, well, we all hold some level of unimportance to the Lannisters, I suppose. A wonder my poor Willas hasn't gotten worse, in his grief over Cersei's abandonment."

Oberyn gave her a look that was a cross between amused and worried. Margaery felt like she was watching a particularly thought out game of cyvasse, and wondered if she would ever rival her grandmother in talent for it.

Cersei's hand was clenched so tightly around her wine glass her knuckles were turning white.

Oberyn opened his mouth to speak, and then Joffrey, as he always did, ruined the moment.

"Tell us, Prince Oberyn, is the food in Dorne quite so fine as the food in King's Landing is during a siege?" he asked. "When Stannis and his wicked hordes were trying to take the capitol, we fought them back and still managed feasts."

"Feasts brought from Dorne and the Reach, Your Grace," Oberyn said, and Margaery rolled her eyes, wondered if he had forgotten, in the space of a breath, that he was nothing more than a glorified prisoner, out on the supposed mercy of the Queen Mother.

Joffrey had more power than his mother here, much as Cersei loved to forget it.

Margaery understood why she had wanted to bring Prince Oberyn out now, much as she hated it. Deflecting any anger toward Oberyn meant that Joffrey could focus the full force of his rage on his uncle Tyrion, and then Cersei would have what she had always wanted; revenge.

Margaery considered that for a moment, and then shook her head, incredulous. Of course not. A preposterous thought.

Joffrey was purple. Margaery leaned forward to bare a bit more of her cleavage with her next sip of wine. Her husband didn't even look at her.

"I'm sure the food is not so fine down in the Black Cells," Olenna said effortlessly, eyes on Cersei, now. "A wonder you weren't kept there, along with the Imp."

Oberyn cleared his throat. "The Lannisters have been most gracious," he said, through clenched teeth.

Margaery was clenching her hand into a fist under the table. She struggled not to look at Cersei's smug smile, now.

"To you, perhaps," Olenna said, and then turned to Cersei, ignoring Joffrey altogether. "When is Tyrion going to be tried?"

Cersei glanced at her son. "We haven't set a date, as yet," she said.

"Indeed," Olenna murmured. "I should hope this isn't a sign of favoritism," she said, and Margaery sighed. "The people need this trial."

"Indeed," Cersei echoed her.

"I suppose the Wall looks nice this time of year," Olenna said, snorting.

"That isn't his only route," Oberyn pointed out easily. "He could always ask for a trial by combat."

Joffrey, at the other end of the table, guffawed. "My uncle is a half man, if you remember, Prince Oberyn," he called down the table. "He'd be squashed instantly by the Mountain."

Oberyn's gaze darkened.

"Well, it won't be an easy fight for him, if he is foolish enough to choose that route," Olenna said, sending Oberyn an oblique look that Margaery was frustrated she could not interpret. "Not with so many Lannisters amongst the ranks, now."

Oberyn frowned, and for a moment, Margaery saw a flash of rage in his normally so careful features, before that too was buried deep.

She took another sip of her wine, and tried to interrupt what it meant.


	181. SANSA

"My loyal subjects have waited some time for me to bring justice to my grandfather's murder," Joffrey said smugly, leaning forward on the ugly throne. The crowd shifted, restless with excitement.

Sansa swallowed, thinking of her husband in the Black Cells, the man she had not visited in some time now. Not since she had told him that his sister was going to get the Rock, that there was nothing she could do about that.

She glanced at Margaery, where she sat next to her husband, resplendent in a fiery red gown with golden trimming, looking every bit the vengeful wife of an angry King.

Sansa swallowed again, refocused her attention on Joffrey, forcing herself not to look at Margaery again. Forcing herself not to think of what might have truly caused the anger in her cold features.

Joffrey smirked, and looked right at Sansa.

"They need wait no longer. After much gathering of evidence for and against him," he began, and Sansa's heart stopped, "the trial against my uncle Tyrion for the murder of Tywin Lannister shall begin tomorrow."

Sansa forgot how to breathe. She glanced at Margaery again, saw that Margaery's expression hadn't changed, that she must have known before Joffrey announced it that this was going to happen, that Sansa's husband was going to be...

The Lannisters would not give him a fair trial, she knew. Cersei would never let the brother she hated walk for what she believed he had done, even if Sansa was sure that he couldn't have done it.

Her husband was going to die. She wasn't sure what she felt about that, still didn't know how she felt about Tyrion Lannister, but she knew what that would mean for her. Margaery had been more than clear about that.

She felt a vein in her neck beginning to beat against her as she glanced up at Joffrey again, saw the gleam in his eye. She knew that, logically, he wasn't thinking about her, with that look. He was merely thinking bout bringing someone pain, because he enjoyed that so very much.

She swallowed hard, because she hadn't even been able to be with Janek, the very thought of it had sent her into a panic attack that Margaery had barely been able to bring her back from.

Joffrey had called her once before, and Sansa had thought she would die that night, with Margaery hitting her because Joffrey asked his wife to do so.

Joffrey wouldn't back off, when Tyrion was dead. He would no longer have a reason to do so.

The walls of the throne room were closing in around her, and she thought she was going to faint then and there, in front of so many people. But she couldn't. She couldn't let Joffrey see her like that, couldn't let Joffrey see her that terrified of what he might do to her once her husband was-

Sansa stumbled out of the throne room, leaning against a wall the moment the door slammed behind her for support as her world tunneled into something black and cold. er face heated, and she thought that this was so much worse than it had been before.

If Margaery, if she were forced to, if she had to, after what had just happened between her and Margaery-

She forced herself to breathe, and her stomach roiled.

She had been foolish to let her guard down for even an instant. She had not been thinking about this at all, though she should have been; she'd been preparing so long for eventualities, terrified at the knowledge of what Margaery had hinted might become of her the moment Tyrion was dead, and here she was, completely unprepared when Joffrey mentioned his trial.

She'd thought she'd be safe for a little while longer, at least. Had thought she would have a little more time to plot her own protection from a life as Joffrey's plaything.

The trial was going to be tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tyrion was going to die tomorrow, and if not then, then the day after, and Sansa was going to be Joffrey's toy, to do with as he would, because she was a woman now, and an unmarried one-

Sansa felt bile rise up in her throat, and she only barely made it back to her chambers. Her husband's chambers, the one who could be dead come tomorrow evening. She found her champor pot, hidden away in the room with her bath once more, and rushed toward it, closing her eyes as she dry heaved into it.

She couldn't remember eating anything today. She wondered if that was the real reason why she had thought she was going to faint, in the throne room, and she didn't really care about Tyrion at all.

That thought just spurred on another round of pain, and Sansa felt her head beginning to hurt and her teeth clenching so hard her jaw ached. She sat up, wrapping her arms around her stomach and breathing hard.

She couldn't do this. She couldn't...She shouldn't have been angry at Ellaria, for what the other woman had tried to do to her on that ship. She should have leaned in.

Sansa sighed, wiped at her mouth, and walked out of the room with her chamber pot.

And froze.

Sansa blinked at the sight of Margaery sitting on her bed oh so calmly, as if it wasn't at all strange that she should be there, a glass of wine in hand and a platter of food in her lap.

Sansa's stomach turned unpleasantly at the sight of it, and she wiped at her mouth.

"Wh...what are you doing here?" she asked by way of pleasantries, moving a little further into the room and glancing around for Shae, who was suspiciously absent.

Margaery hesitated, looking suddenly unsure. She took a sip of her wine to avoid speaking. She was always doing that, Sansa thought. Trying to appear the picture of composure even when she wasn't.

Sansa had just gotten used to the times when Margaery forgot to do that around her, but they weren't...they weren't, anymore, and she was going to have to get used to this once more.

She swallowed hard.

Margaery licked at her lips, and Sansa tried not to follow the motion. Wallowing for the last few days about Margaery was what had gotten her into this state in the first place.

"I wanted to make sure you were all right," she said, and Sansa resisted the urge to slap herself.

"Was...was my running out of the throne room so obvious?" she asked, taking a step toward the bath once more, desperate to put some space between the two of them, even if she didn't feel the need to be rid of whatever was left in her stomach, anymore.

Margaery's smile was gentle, annoyingly compassionate. "Not to anyone but me," she said. Then, "Have you eaten today?" she nodded toward the closed door between them and Sansa's chamber pot.

Sansa stiffened. "Why?" she asked. "It's nearly noon. I-"

"Sansa," Margaery interrupted, and Sansa fell silent, flushing when she realized that she hadn't even been able to keep that from Margaery, as she'd thought she'd been able to.

"I..." she chewed on her lower lip, stomach gnawing at its insides. She mostly hadn't been able to push anything out because there was nothing there but water, but Margaery didn't need to know that, surely.

"Sansa," Margaery said again, in that gentle tone, but she didn't get up from the bed. Instead, she gestured at the platter in her lap.

Sansa glanced down at it and went green. "I wouldn't be able to keep it down now, anyway," she confessed, and couldn't bring herself to meet Margaery's gaze.

But Margaery didn't reprimand her for it, didn't yell, and a moment later, Sansa found herself looking up again.

Margaery was watching her with an unreadable expression. Then, "Will you please come and sit with me?"

It was the 'please,' that did it, the knowledge that Margaery was just as uncomfortable as she, that had Sansa sitting down on the edge of the bed, as far as she could get from Margaery, and staring down at her hands in lieu of the other woman.

When she finally glanced up, Margaery was holding out a piece of bread. Sansa grimaced and shook her head at it.

"You need to eat something," Margaery told her. "I understand that you and Lord Tyrion are...friendly now, but your wasting away won't help him. Trust me."

Sansa chewed on her lower lip, stared at the food before accepting a piece of bread, bringing it to her mouth, and gagging on air. She set it back down.

Margaery bit back a sigh, and drank some more wine. Sansa barely noticed her picking up the piece of bread and chewing on the edge of it herself.

And then, she lurched forward, capturing Sansa’s lips in her own, and Sansa could taste wine on Margaery's lips this time instead of candied flowers, and she closed her eyes, leaned into the warmth as if it would kill her not to.

She almost pulled back, almost demanded to know what in the seven hells Margaery was doing, why she was kissing Sansa now after telling Sansa to leave in the first place.

She didn't.

And then she could taste moist bread, pushed against her lips, and Sansa opened her mouth unthinkingly, taking it in along with Margaery's plush lips, and she gagged a little on the texture, but Margaery didn't let her pull away. She wrapped her hand around the base of Sansa's neck and pulled her closer, kissed her harder, until Sansa was forced to swallow the bit of bread or choke.

She wanted to hate Margaery for this, but Sansa found herself unthinkingly leaning into the touch.

She closed her eyes, swallowed hard.

And then Margaery pulled away, smiling at her as if Sansa had just given her the sun.

Sansa blinked at her, opened her mouth to speak, and then Margaery was kissing her again, another piece of soggy bread in her mouth.

Sansa wanted to hate her for this, for the humiliation coursing through her, because she felt like a child, like the baby birds in Winterfell, fed from their mothers' regurgitated food, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to feel enough for that.

So she just swallowed the food Margaery gave her, and for the first time in a week, the food went down without a fight.

She took another bite off of Margaery's lower lip, closing her eyes as she did so, trying to convince herself that she was just kissing Margaery. That this was as romantic as all of the other times she had ever done this, kissed Margaery.

That this was real, what they had shared before.

And then Margaery was pulling away from her, and Sansa found herself leaning forward as Margaery pulled away.

But Margaery wasn't kissing her anymore, giving her food, whatever that had been. She was looking back down at the food on the platter in her lap, and Sansa found herself staring down at the food with her, eying it with distaste once more.

The spell was broken.

"Do you think you can stomach some fruit?" Margaery asked her, picking up a piece.

Sansa hesitated.

"Sansa..." Margaery bit her lip, and Sansa was transfixed by it.

"Sansa," Margaery said, slightly more amused this time.

Sansa glanced up.

"Do it for me," Margaery said softly. "Sansa, please."

Sansa stared down at the fruit and bread sitting on the platter between them, felt a bit queasy just looking at it.

But she forced herself to smile at Margaery, reached out and picked up a piece of fruit, and brought it to her mouth.

It was green, a supple pear no doubt brought in from Highgarden with Cersei, and Sansa felt a little green just looking at it.

Still, she forced herself to take a bite, glancing up at Margaery with a rueful smile when she had it in her mouth, hoping the other woman would be satisfied. Margaery merely stared at her expectantly.

Sansa bit back a sigh, swallowing down the piece of fruit she was holding in her mouth and eying Margaery with something more akin to annoyance, now.

But Margaery looked relieved, and Sansa took another bite, just to keep her happy, all the while feeling dirty inside, as if, by doing so, she was lying in some horrible way to the woman she cared about. As she had when she had lied to Margaery about the Martells, about the Prince of Dorne's offer.

Sansa took another bite, and the fruit tasted rotten in her mouth. She just needed to finish the platter, Sansa told herself. If she finished the platter, Margaery would be satisfied, and Sansa could go back to the chambers she no longer shared with Lord Tyrion and be rid of it easily enough.

She didn't understand why Margaery was doing this, after she had made quite clear to Sansa her resentment over how Sansa had been treating her since her return to King's Landing from the disastrous escape to Dorne.

But it felt nice, pressing her lips to Margaery's again, for any reason. And for a moment, she almost forgot why Margaery had done so in the first place.


	182. MARGAERY

The trial for Tywin Lannister's murder had brought dozens of nobles into the capitol who had not been there a week ago. And with them, the smallfolk, crowding around the Red Keep, waiting with baited breath to hear the decision.

Vultures, the lot of them, Margaery thought distastefully. So many vultures, here only in the hopes of watching a man die.

People died every day in Westeros. There was no need to travel ten leagues just to watch it be made a spectacle of.

The vultures made her antsy; she didn't like so many people coming into the Keep, crowding it, influencing Joffrey with their bloodlust. Joffrey had enough of that on his own.

She took her seat somberly in the chair beside her husband's throne, reaching out and squeezing his hand as she did so. He turned, grinned at her. His eyes were dancing with an excited fire that made her gut clench.

She supposed someone needed to pretend like this event was a somber one, Margaery thought, giving him only a half smile in return.

She had pushed this trial forward for a reason, Margaery reminded herself, and certainly not the same reason as Cersei had tried to, but for once, she was glad of the other woman's help in doing so. She didn't like what it meant, that there was someone else out there influencing Joffrey, but that was a problem for another day.

The first order of business was getting through this one.

Margaery scanned the crowd of so many interested faces, wondered if they were really here to see a man die or were just here to garner favor with Cersei. She strongly suspected the latter, if she was feeling charitable enough.

Then she caught sight of Sansa, already dressed in a drab black gown that covered her all the way up to her neck, and Margaery bit back a sigh. She was glad to see that Shae, at least, was standing beside the other girl. She was going to need comfort from someone, during the trial.

Margaery felt considerably less charitable toward the vultures once more. Even if she could get off the throne and go down to comfort Sansa, she didn't even know if the other girl would welcome it.

Yesterday had been...alarming. She had known that Sansa wasn’t eating, could see it in the way her dresses hung off her form, knew that whatever it was preventing her from doing so had gotten worse since they had parted ways.

But she hadn’t understood the true, alarming scope of it until yesterday, when she force fed food down Sansa’s throat with her own tongue, like a mother bird.

She felt like she didn't know a lot of things about Sansa Stark, lately. She'd thought she understood her, and now they could barely speak to one another, and Margaery still wasn't quite sure how that had happened.

And then she saw Oberyn Martell, standing in the crowd, surrounded by two guards, perhaps, but far freer than Tyrion was even as a captive, and Margaery lost all thought of Sansa, for the moment.

She leaned over to her husband to whisper in his ear, nodding in Prince Oberyn's direction. "What is he doing here?"

Joffrey followed her gaze. "Oh. Mother wanted to do him the courtesy of inviting him. The negotiations over the fight with Dorne are going well, and this is his reward for it, I suppose."

Margaery raised a brow.

Joffrey grinned, moving forward and capturing her lips in his. "And he gets to see what happens to those who dare to break our laws."

Margaery forced herself to smile. "Then perhaps he'll learn something of it."

Joffrey waved a dismissive hand. "I doubt it," he said. "He's always been a particularly thick man. Otherwise he wouldn't have thought he could get away with running off with my lady aunt."

Margaery tried not to roll her eyes. She didn't get the chance to respond, however, not with the doors at the end of the Great Hall opening, silence falling over the assembly as the accused was brought forward.

Tyrion Lannister did not look well.

It was her first thought, upon seeing him. Sansa had been right to worry over him as she had, while he languished away in the Black Cells.

Her grandmother often lamented that she had not been able to meet the "Tyrion before Blackwater," who apparently had a spine and a wit she would have enjoyed sparring with, but Margaery hardly recognized the man before her from what she had known of him.

His short back was slouched, his eyes hooded as he walked up to the accused's stand, ignoring the cat calls of his audience, ignoring everyone, Margaery thought. There was a substantial bruise on his left cheek, and his face was wan and pale, no doubt from the lack of sunlight.

He stumbled in the chains fettered around his ankles and wrists, dragging along behind him in the hands of his guards, but managed to right himself before he fell.

Margaery found herself looking for Sansa once more in the crowd, saw the horror on her face. Perhaps, when she had gone to visit him down in the Black Cells, she had not realized there how badly he looked.

Margaery had heard the tales about his miserable life. She'd heard how his sister and father had hated him since he was born, and knew that out of all the Lannisters, he got the same amount of respect as a pissant. She'd seen that well enough even in her time married to Joffrey, especially at their wedding.

But she had still found it in her heart to hate him.

She knew that he was protecting Sansa with their marriage, and knew that he was a reasonably good man who wasn't going to hurt Sansa. At least, not the way that Joffrey might hurt her, and that was what was important.

But she could still hate him for the fact that he owned Sansa, that she was dependent on him for her protection.

And, as hypocritical as it sounded, for the fact that he could have what Margaery could not. A lasting bond, one that actually meant something in the eyes of the law.

It was foolish, she knew. She was constantly telling Sansa that their relationship transcended what she and Joffrey shared, near the end there. She shouldn't be jealous of a man who had never even taken Sansa into bed with him when it was well within his rights to do so, whether Sansa wished it or not.

But she had been, and it had made her feel rather hard toward him before this.

She had never pitied him before.

And now, she found it difficult not to.

Margaery was uncomfortable with the juxtaposition, and she barely noticed as Tyrion was placed in the accused's stand, his hands shackled before him and his guards stepping back as if even being near him stung.

Joffrey sat up a little straighter in his chair, as his uncle looked up at him.

"I, Joffrey Baratheon, King of the Seven Kingdoms," Joffrey said, smirking now, "will determine today whether you are guilty or innocent of the charge of kinslaying. And if I find you guilty...may the gods punish you as you deserve."

The crowds took some silent cue at that, sitting. Margaery could no longer see Sansa's face.

Tyrion shifted restlessly.

"You stand accused by my Queen Mother of murdering her father and my grandfather," Joffrey drawled. "Did you do it?"

Tyrion lifted his chin. "No."

Joffrey snorted. "Then who do you think did?"

"As I am not as knowledgeable as the gods, Your Grace, I couldn't say," Tyrion said, and there were mutters that sounded amused in the crowd.

Joffrey reached for Margaery's hand and squeezed it. Hard.

"The Crown may call our first witness," Joffrey said, and it struck Margaery that it was unlikely any trial had ever gone quite like this.

Cersei sat a little straighter in her throne, face somber as she called forth her first witness, Ser Meryn, who was only all too happy to speak out against Tyrion, detailing all the times when he had slandered the King, and been dragged before his father to answer for it, and meriad other things.

"This proves nothing," Tyrion snapped.

Joffrey raised a hand. "Did I say you could speak?"

"This is my trial," Tyrion reminded him.

"And I didn't say you could speak," Joffrey said, grinning. He looked like a benevolent child. Margaery hated him.

Cersei sat on her throne like a queen, bringing forth her many witnesses, and Margaery watched in annoyance as the number of them grew. And grew.

Margaery could only take comfort in the fact that most of Cersei's witnesses didn't have a shred of evidence between them. Everyone knew that Tyrion had hated his father, and his father him. There was no need to harp on about it for so long.

The knife with the lion's head was the only substantial evidence anyone had against Tyrion, and of course this was mentioned in every witness's testimony as being always on Tyrion's belt, before this.

And it didn't help that Tyrion had misplaced it the day Sansa had disappeared with Oberyn to Dorne, as he himself admitted through clenched teeth when Joffrey delightedly asked him.

Margaery sighed.

And then the Grandmaester was rambling on about the knife, about how the direction of it had been shallow but deep enough to kill a man as old as Lord Tywin, "begging Your Grace's pardon."

"If I might ask a question of my accuser," Tyrion started, perking up a little for the first time.

"You won't speak unless I tell you to, Imp," Joffrey snapped at him, and Tyrion subsided, glaring.

Margaery almost reached for her husband, almost asked him what harm he thought it could bring.

She did not.

And then it was Cersei's turn to stand up and speak against her brother, and she did so with a peculiarly morbid sort of relish. Margaery wondered if she thought she really had loved her bastard of a father.

"I will hurt you for this," Cersei recited. "A day will come when you think you are safe and happy, and your joy will turn to ashes in your mouth, and you will know the debt is paid. He said it to me shortly before the Battle of Blackwater Bay, when I confronted him about his plans to put the King on the front lines. As it turned out when the time for the battle came, Joffrey insisted on remaining on the front lines. He believed his presence would inspire the troop-"

"Thank you, Mother," Joffrey interrupted, giving her a look. Margaery remembered that he'd fled that battle. "What debt?"

She blinked at her son. "I'm sorry?"

"What debt?" Joffrey repeated. "Did he promise to repay?"

Cersei swallowed. "It really isn't a topic appropriate for-"

"I am the King, and I will decide what is appropriate," Joffrey interrupted her. "Now what debt?"

"I discovered he'd been keeping whores in the Tower of the Hand," she said. "I asked him to confine his salacious acts to the brothel where such behavior belongs. He wasn't pleased."

In the crowd, someone who sounded distinctly like Prince Oberyn let out a sound that might have been laughter.

Joffrey looked amused, and couldn't resist the chance to comment on that. "I'm sure he wasn't," he said, glancing at Tyrion smugly. "We all know about his whoring, after all. It's a wonder he hasn't completely ruined my lady aunt yet."

Margaery lamented yet again that she could no longer see Sansa's face.

"Your Grace, this is a trial into my character," Tyrion piped up, "not Lady Sansa's."

Joffrey rolled his eyes, waved a hand for Cersei to get off the witness stand and to call her next witness.

Who happened to be Lord Varys. The man spun a convincing tale of the discord he had noticed between father and son since Tywin Lannister had returned to take up his position as Hand of the King. He mentioned conversations he had overheard during meetings of the Small Council, where Tyrion had outright contradicted his father on menial things and seemed furious every time Tywin contradicted him. Where Tywin had demanded that Tyrion treat Joffrey more kindly.

Tyrion rolled his eyes. Joffrey preened, and when he saw Tyrion, scowled.

And then Lord Varys moved to leave.

"Your Grace," Tyrion said then, voice subdued, "If I might ask a question of Lord Varys. One question."

Joffrey's jaw twitched, and he glanced at Lord Varys, who shrugged his shoulders.

"Fine," Joffrey gritted out. "But Lord Varys is under no obligation to answer."

"It is all right, Your Grace," Lord Varys said calmly. "I have nothing to hide."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. Her grandmother chortled again.

Tyrion ignored them all, turning to Lord Varys with an expression that was desperate, a desperation that Margaery didn't like at all.

"You once said to me that this city would fall to its knees were I not here," Tyrion said, eying the other man. "You said that the histories would forget me, but you would not. Have you forgotten, Lord Varys?"

Varys gave him a knowing look. "Sadly, my lord, I never forget a thing."

And then he was walking away, arms tucked into the sleeves of his tunic, and Tyrion stared after him with something like hope in his eyes.

Margaery narrowed hers. She had not forgotten that one, either, she vowed to herself.

"I do believe we have one more witness," Joffrey said abruptly, and Margaery turned to him in surprise. She'd thought they had run out of their list of witnesses, though she was convinced that Cersei would have brought out more in a heartbeat.

And then the little maester who was Cersei's creature, who had exchanged numerous letters with her while she was in Highgarden and who had lost his chain, stepped forward.

"Maester Quyburn," Joffrey said. "What do you have to say on the matter that the Grandmaester did not already mention?"

The Grandmaester coughed up a fuss, then. "Your Grace," he began, "this man is no more a maester or an expert on the body than any member of the common people, and-"

"My mother says that he has served her well in recent years, as well as my uncle Jaime in restoring to him what use of his arm it has left," Joffrey interrupted, "and that the loss of his chain was due to trumped up charges. I would hear what he has to say."

Margaery grimaced and pretended it was a smile.

Quyburn, far from looking pleased at Joffrey's words, instead looked nervous for the first time that Margaery could recall, though she would be the first to admit that she avoided making any sort of contact with him.

He dipped into a shallow bow as he took his place in the witness stand, not looking at Tyrion at all, but rather at the Queen Mother. Margaery followed his gaze. The Queen Mother had paled where she sat, no longer looking quite so smug.

"At the Queen Mother's bidding, I reexamined the body of the Lord Hand," Quyburn said, voice so soft Margaery almost had to lean forward to hear. "It had been some days since his death, of course, and the body had begun to putrefy in that time-"

"Your Grace," the Grandmaester was already puffing up again, no doubt about to expound on the foolish whims of a madman-

"But the traces of poison within Lord Tywin's system were still clear enough to detect, for the well seeing eye," Quyburn continued, and silence fell.

Tyrion blinked.

Olenna, where she sat in the crowd, close enough to get in on the action even as her son sat several rows back, coughed.

Joffrey raised a brow, leaning forward in his throne. "Poison?" he repeated. "Perhaps the Grandmaester is right, Mother. Your creature clearly doesn't know poison from a stab wound to the heart."

"The Grandmaester was correct that his lordship was stabbed in the heart," Quyburn said smoothly, not at all bothered by Joffrey's loss of faith. He sounded almost...disappointed, that Joffrey was not more so. Cersei was grinding her teeth, though, and Margaery took that as a victory. "But it was not what killed him. I am convinced that the wound was not deep enough to be fatal, and the poison coursing through his system would have killed him in any case."

"Which poison?" Cersei ground out, face cold and almost fearful, now.

"Not just which, Your Grace," Quyburn said.

Cersei blinked at him.

"There were two poisons that I detected in Lord Tywin's system, both of which had destroyed his innards to the point where the damage could have been done by nothing else. They had been wreaking havoc on his lordship's innards for some weeks before his death, Your Grace."

Margaery sucked in a breath of surprise.

Grandmaester Pycelle shouted up a ruckus at that, and Joffrey raised a hand. The old man reluctantly fell silent.

"Grandmaester," Joffrey said, turning cold eyes on the man, "You have been the Grandmaester of King's Landing for a very long time."

The Grandmaester swallowed audibly. "Yes, Your Grace, and I have always served the King, and House Lannister. I daresay you should not trust the words of a halfwit mad creature who does not even possess a chain."

"And in that time, you've gotten very old," Joffrey continued, as if the man had not spoken. "As, I'm sure, have your eyes."

"Joffrey," Cersei sounded desperate now, more desperate than Margaery had ever heard her. "The Grandmaester-"

"If other maesters were to reexamine the body to determine the validity of this halfwit's claims, I do believe that would satisfy the gods," Joffrey said, and Margaery could almost picture him gleefully rubbing his hands together.

She could almost understand why. Whether the knife had been Tyrion's or not, he was going to fall for it, but this poison, added to the mix, meant that he was not the only one Joffrey would have the pleasure of being able to kill.

"This is ridiculous," Cersei spouted, clearly abandoning her creature. "Joffrey, Tyrion hated our father. He was willing to murder him, he just needed the opportunity, and he was around long enough to poison him, as well. Why should this change anything?"

But Joffrey, fool though he might have been at the best of times, seemed to understand what his mother did not. That the crowd was already shifting restlessly, that now that this news was out, there was no way to contain it.

"We will convene the court until the maesters can continue examining the body," Joffrey said, and then shot a look at Quyburn. "Assuming that the body is still in a fit enough condition."

It had been some time, Margaery thought, regardless of the fact that the body had been interred in the catacombs.

Quyburn dipped his head. "I found it so, Your Grace," he reported, though he still wasn't meeting Cersei's eyes.

Tyrion's lips pulled into small, shocked grin.

And that was about all Cersei Lannister could handle, Margaery thought, as the other woman climbed out of her chair and advanced toward her brother.

Jaime Lannister, where he stood near Tyrion's stand, reached out for her, but she pushed his arms back and he didn't try to stop her as she advanced on their younger brother.

"You fiend!" she shrieked, and the slap she delivered to his face was enough to send Tyrion's cheek slamming to the side from the impact, the loud cracking echoing throughout the throne room.

Tyrion's head rocked back with the slap, and he grimaced as the movement pulled on his chains.

"You killed our father," she said. "I don't know...I don't know what sort of mockery of his name you think you can achieve with this...this bastardization of justice, but you killed him."


	183. CERSEI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this chapter seems a little all over the place, it's because Cersei's mind is a bag of cats. Guh. Well, at least this was a short introduction into future Cersei POVs.

"You have always been loyal to me," Cersei told Quyburn, letting the disappointment and anger she felt show. For a moment, Quyburn seemed more unsettled than she had ever seen him, but the moment passed quickly.

He wore a mask at all times, she thought, like she did. Or, he simply had no real emotions. She hadn't decided which yet, but until today, she had been leaning towards the latter.

"I have, Your Grace," he told her, voice as soft as always. It grated, now. "You have been a kinder mistress than ever I might have expected, and have only ever let me continue my experiments without once attempting to stop me."

Jaime snorted, turning away and running a hand over his mouth, most likely in disgust over the thought of Quyburn's experiments. He didn't like the little man, no matter that he had been responsible for saving Jaime's arm, once. Cersei had never understood the displeasure, had thought perhaps it had something to do with the golden hand that he hated so. But now, she understood that hatred rather well.

Cersei eyed her brother as he paced up and down the hall of her chambers, tapping his fingers against his mouth. The golden hand fluttered uselessly at his side, and she knew that, for all that it was mostly for decoration, he went out of his way not to use it.

He looked exhausted. Cersei wondered if he had gotten a lick of sleep last night, the night before the trial. She hoped he hadn't.

Cersei considered her little former maester. She had never considered him a threat before. He was always happy to carry out her wishes, in return for her lack of questions into his experiments, in return for her resources.

He gave her his undivided loyalty, and she gave him unlimited access to anything he needed in King's Landing.

And now he had betrayed her, in front of hundreds of people and her smug shit of a little brother. And because of that betrayal, the little monster might go free after the wrong he had committed.

She shivered, wrapped her blood red gown a little tighter around her shoulders. He had killed both her mother and her father, she knew it. Not because he had any real motivation, either time, but because he was a horrid little beast who never appreciated the ones who had made him, who had deigned to allow him to live amongst them as if he were worthy of the Lannister name.

She wasn't going to allow him to go free. If it meant killing him herself, she would see the deed done.

She turned her attention back to Quyburn, who still stood silently before her, waiting for her verdict. He didn't seem nervous, or afraid. Just as still as a statue. Perhaps he wasn't human at all, but one of those creatures like Stannis Baratheon's daughter, turning slowly to stone and losing all emotions as they did so.

She was going to flay him alive when she did kill him, Cersei decided. And she would. She had known that even before this new betrayal. The man was a fascinating little creature, barely human, and he had proven himself useful to her, both in saving her brother's arm and in the other experiments she asked him to undergo. But he knew too much, and now, with this betrayal, she could no longer completely trust him.

He was smart, she thought. Perhaps he knew what she planned, and this was his contingency. Betraying her, like the little rat that he was.

She ground her teeth in fury at the thought. He wasn't going to live long enough to carry out that betrayal.

"Tell it to me again," Cersei said coldly, taking a sip of her wine and glaring over the top of her glass' rim.

Jaime, where he paced beside her, stopped moving and rolled his eyes. She ignored him, focused only on the creature she had thought would win this trial for her favor.

She had not expected him to betray her like this, the bastard. If he didn't come up with a pleasing answer in the next few moments, she was going to feed him to the dogs she often through his projects to, when he was finished with them.

Silence met her answer. Unlike his usual uncaring self, Quyburn seemed to realize the shit he had thrown himself into, not consulting her before the trial about his findings.

And why, by the name of the Stranger, had he not done so? He knew how badly she had wanted Tyrion's head on a spike by the end of the day. He knew that was why she had asked him to examine the body, and for no other reason save that one. Telling the truth was hardly the important information she had been looking for if it pointed away from her wretch of a brother.

She would have his head for this, after she took down that bloated, fat old Grandmaester for forcing her to use another to examine her father's corpse in the first place. If the old bastard couldn't understand the difference between death by poison and death by knifing, he didn't deserve to keep the title in any case.

"Cersei..." Jaime tried, but she shot him a quelling look, and he fell silent.

They were in her private chambers now, the ones she had returned to now that she had escaped the fucking Flowers' home and their fucking cripple of a son they thought to insult her with a marriage to. The rooms were hardly as comforting as they used to be, before she had been forced, once again against her will, to become a wife.

At least Willas was not Robert Baratheon, but it hardly excused the trying months she had spent in Highgarden, forced to smile and scrape for that fucking old bitch, Olenna.

She'd called Jaime here after Tyrion was escorted back to the Black Cells as his trial ended for the day, ordered Quyburn here in the same breath.

To his credit, Quyburn appeared to be expecting her summons. He came through the door like he expected her fury, and his death.

She couldn't kill him yet, though. Annoyingly.

Her hand clenched around her wine glass. She was free of Willas Tyrell now, or in any case, she would be very soon. And her father was dead now, anyway. Mace Tyrell might kick up a fuss because his old bitch of a mother demanded it, but no one would force her back to Highgarden now.

Jaime tapped at his golden hand with the other one, the one that remained. Cersei struggled not to stare, not to miss the Jaime he had been before he lost his hand and his pride, as a captive of those fucking Starks.

Her brother of old would never have looked afraid of her, when she let her anger loose on those rightly deserving of it. He had understood as well as her the need to protect themselves, their children, their family, even if he was in some ways very much a child despite his age.

She tried not to think of the way he had refused to fuck her this morning, of how he had known she wished to fuck him as a victory, before the trial. She was angry with him for that, she reminded herself.

Tyrion deserved to die for killing their father, and there was no doubt in her mind that he had done so. She knew that Jaime was still foolishly skeptical about the accusation against Tyrion, but he should have come around by now.

After all, no one else here would have had the guile to kill Tywin Lannister in a building full of Lannisters.

Or, she should be angry with her twin. Right now, she was far too furious with Quyburn to be angry with her twin brother. That would come later, when they were alone and she could forget about the trial for a few moments.

"The poison in Lord Tywin's system," Maester Quyburn said in his usual quiet tone, "I discovered it examining his heart and the knife wound there. It is lethal and slow and very, very painful. It would also attest to the smell emanating from the body, as many maesters and the silent sisters attested. It is also a known favorite of Prince Oberyn."

Cersei ground her teeth, took another, longer sip of her wine, and interrupted the little traitor.

"Then Tyrion got it from Prince Oberyn, as we suspected," she said dismissively. "In any case, there is still a knife with a lion's head buried in his gut, and that little fiend has no explanation for is disappearance."

"A knife that perfectly implicates him when he wouldn't be stupid enough to leave behind evidence like that," Jaime snapped suddenly, spinning back to her.

She hated the worry in his eyes, worry for their brother, that fetid, wicked creature who had now killed both their mother and their father. Tyrion didn't deserve compassion from any of them, much less from Jaime, who had spent his whole life trying to give their brother kindness, only for him to turn around and kill their father.

Jaime was such a fool sometimes.

She snorted at his words, and his eyes darkened. She wished he would use that passion for something besides defending the imp.

"Cersei, see reason!"

She whirled on him, standing now. He took a step back.

"You know how that little beast hated our father," she snapped at him, and was relieved when her brother flinched at her vitriol.

He opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off, more than annoyed by his attempts to defend the little shit.

Tyrion had never needed defense. Not when he was a little monster instead of a child, and not now.

"How much he loathed the man who allowed his continued existence in this world instead of ridding us of him as he ought to have. No." She turned back to Quyburn, but didn't take her eyes off Jaime. "Most likely, he plotted with the Tyrells to see this happen. No doubt they made many flowery promises, with Maid Margaery such a...close friend to Lady Sansa."

She noticed the look that flashed in Jaime's eyes as she mentioned Sansa, wondered what it meant, but buried her wonder deep.

She'd had a lot of time to think during her time in Highgarden, and she thought Queen Margaery was rather close to a stupid girl condemned to be hated by every other lady in Highgarden.

And yet, she was nothing but nice to Sansa, which meant she and her fucking family wanted something from her. Or, much more likely, her husband.

And it had taken Cersei this long to figure out what. Of course the Tyrells would profit from her father's death, and of course they would know as well as she how much Tyrion had hated her father.

Jaime snorted. "And now you're jumping at shadows," he sniped at her. "You really think the Queen of Thorns would kill off the one man keeping your beast of a child under control right in front of us?"

Cersei slapped him. She wanted to snap at him that Joffrey was his son, too, that he ought not to say such things about their child.

She was acutely aware of Quyburn standing before them still, so she settled simply for a fierce glare. She thought Jaime understood the sentiment, however, for he backed down.

"Ah," Maester Quyburn spoke then, "I do not believe that the Tyrells worked in tandem with Lord Tyrion to poison your lord father, Your Grace."

Cersei whirled on her pet. "Don't you?" she hissed. "Is everyone against me now?"

Anger flooded her veins, and she lamented the day she had ever taken Quyburn under her patronage. Clearly, the man was undeserving and ungrateful for all of her struggles in attempting to make him at least respectable in King's Landing.

Even if he had been helpful recently, before the trial.

Maester Quyburn swallowed. "There is something you ought to see, Your Grace," he said quietly, his voice sounding rather fascinated. And then he pulled out his knife, and cut once more into their father's body. "I think you will find it most...fascinating."


	184. MARGAERY

"Two poisons, and a knife," Lady Olenna snorted, "He wasn't immortal; they only needed one of the three for fuck's sake. The Old Lion ought to have employed a royal food taster and better guards. Always thought he was the brightest man in the room, and he died taking a shit. Well, that’s men for you. Their egos could never conceive of such a thing. Bad for us, too; now there's no one but the Imp to keep Cersei on her leash where she belongs, and he's about to get fucked, too."

"Grandmother," Margaery admonished gently. She glanced over her shoulder. They were sitting in Margaery’s chambers in the Maidenvault, so she was reasonably sure that no one would overhear them who was not loyal to them, but she couldn’t stop the nerves that had been coming up since Cersei’s return.

Too many people underestimated the woman to their peril. Margaery was not going to be one of those.

Her grandmother rolled her eyes at Margaery’s admonishment, and Margaery felt the need to explain herself. She took another sip of tea, lowered her eyes as her grandmother began to cough into her sleeve.

"Cersei has her ears everywhere, now that she has returned to King's Landing,” Margaery said, setting her tea cup down on the low table between them.

Olenna had returned to King's Landing alongside Cersei, and seemed to be almost enjoying the chaos she had found when she arrived, much to Margaery's annoyance. Reveling in it, and expecting Margaery to do the same.

Margaery could not be rid of the ball of worry in her gut, every time she saw a flash of red hair or thought of how little Sansa must be eating lately. Too much worry, and there was hardly room for anything else.

They hadn’t spoken since the day Margaery had force fed her, and Margaery couldn’t get her thoughts of that day out of her mind. Couldn’t stop wondering if Sansa was feeding herself now, if Shae was watching out for her.

She didn’t want to know the answer, though. She was afraid of what it would mean, if she inserted herself back into Sansa’s life to try and get her to eat. She was the one who had told Sansa to leave, after all.

Olenna waved a hand dismissively, picking up another slice of cheese, and popping it into her mouth. She chewed loudly, and Margaery bit back a smile, wondered if she would ever be half the woman that her grandmother was.

She sighed, reached for her tea cup again.

Olenna spoke up, then. "I dealt with that wrinkled shrew in Highgarden, and she was no more intimidating there where she was clutching the kitchen knives like daggers to ensure she kept out of Willas' bed than she is here. Pah! If Cersei Lannister wants to destroy me, she's going to have to find a god to make her smarter than she is."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. Her grandmother hardly needed encouragement. "She's been incorrigible since she got back." She picked at her food. "Smug."

Olenna rolled her eyes. "And so would you be, if your father had any sense at all and you were a half-crazed mother. It is no matter. I know what she plans, now."

Margaery blinked at her. "Oh?"

Olenna leaned forward, gaze intense. "She will try to implicate us in Lord Tywin's murder. He is no longer around to make her see that antagonizing the House most strongly defending her dear boy is foolhardy, and she has been dismissing Tyrells from the Small Council left and right and replacing them with Lannisters. No doubt she will find some way to make it look like we colluded with the Imp, and be rid of us all at once."

Margaery swallowed, appetite lost entirely as she thought of how diligently Cersei had been attempting to convince Joffrey to name Jaime as the Hand of the King. Margaery had a certain amount of influence over her husband, but it certainly didn’t hurt that he knew how dependent he was on the Tyrells, and there were enough of them in the Small Council, now.

"Do you think she killed him?" she asked finally, voice soft.

The question had been plaguing her mind since Cersei had come back. She couldn't even imagine it of Cersei, bitch though the woman was, but still, the thought would not leave her.

Olenna snorted. "She is a Lannister, dear. They don't touch their own." She tutted. "But I suppose it is for the best that the bitch is back with her pups, before she bit the hand that fed her. No, and we had best keep the blame from falling on us." She eyed Margaery. "Nor Lord Tyrion, if we want to keep you happy."

Margaery fought down a blush, hand shaking a little around her teacup. After all, Sansa had proven already that, despite needing Margaery to force feed her that one day, she didn’t need Margaery at all. Didn’t want her at all. "Grandmother..."

Her grandmother rolled her eyes again. "A roll in the sheets with someone with the same parts is inevitable in every child, unless they've their smallclothes too bunched up for that sort of thing, I have always said," her grandmother said with a small smirk. "Might have done Lord Tywin some good. She's a pretty thing, at least, even if she seems a bit naive."

Margaery shrugged, tried to figure out which of her ladies had spilt the news to her grandmother. She wondered if they had also neglected to tell her about Margaery’s mood swings lately, how she could barely string two sentences together without thinking of how Sansa had walked out of her chambers, that evening.

She forced herself also not to preen a little, at her grandmother’s words, even if they were a less than stellar recommendation. It didn’t matter, not if they weren’t together anymore.

"She suits me,” Margaery said, and hated how much she believed the words. It didn’t matter if Sansa suited her or not. She wasn’t going to be gracing Margaery’s bed sheets again anytime soon.

Olenna blinked at her. "Indeed." She clapped her leathery hands together. "Well, we have our work cut out for us. This little former maester Cersei dredged up may do us more good than ill."

Margaery shook her head, shivering at the reminder of the unsettling little man. There was something about him that rubbed her the wrong way, and it had nothing to do with the rumors that her ladies spread about him. It was no wonder, she thought, that he belonged to Cersei.

"He's Cersei's creature. He would never turn on her."

"Did you not see how surprised she was when he did, and in front of the court, no less?" Olenna asked. "In any case, one doesn't need to turn someone in order to use them. I would think you, of all people, might understand that."

Margaery blinked at her grandmother for a moment, and then shook her head. "I don't...what?"

Olenna smiled, and then invoked a topic Margaery hardly felt was worthy of smiling about. "Your brother Willas' predicament is growing worse by the day. The maesters worry about him."

Margaery bit her fist, stiffened a little in the armchair she was occupying. "Grandmama..." And then she blinked at her grandmother. "You said he was getting better." Her tone was almost accusatory.

Had she said that? Olenna had said he was on the mend, Margaery remembered. Perhaps she simply had mistaken her grandmother’s words. She wanted to believe that her brother was getting better, but her grandmother had merely said he wasn’t declining.

Her hands began to shake, and Margaery set the tea cup down on the table. It clattered a little as she did so, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek, settling her hands in her lap.

Her grandmother’s eyes followed the motions intently, something in her expression unreadable but terrible, but she didn’t mention them, and Margaery found herself relieved.

"And so I did." She waited. A beat.

Margaery’s brows furrowed, and she licked her lips as she attempted to piece together what her grandmother was planning.

Two poisons, and a knife. Overkill, done only by someone who had nothing to lose and a lot of anger to be rid of.

"I...I hate to use Willas' predicament like this," Margaery bemoaned, and Willas would hate it too. Unlike the rest of his family, he had never blamed Prince Oberyn for his crippling, and he had never understood their blind anger towards the man. He wouldn’t approve of this, as much as it seemed to light a fire in her grandmother’s eyes.

Margaery thought of Sansa, how she could barely eat out of her worry for her husband.

"He was...stable, when you left him?"

Olenna hummed. "I would not have left him otherwise, my little rose." She picked up Margaery’s hand from where it lay in her lap, patted it gently. "Your brother is stronger than any of us know."

Margaery certainly hoped so. She knew that, of course, from their childhoods, knew that Willas was a better man than the rest of them.

If Cersei had killed him, with the poisons she had gotten from her creature, Margaery would gladly rip her apart.

"If you're sure," she said.

Olenna nodded. "You leave it to me, my dear," she said. "Trust an old woman, for once." She hesitated, and that caught Margaery’s attention immediately, before she even spoke the next words.

After all, her grandmother never hesitated, not in choosing which husband she wanted, and not in talking to her grandchildren.

Margaery forced herself not to react, to appear blank as her grandmother opened her mouth.

“Has that twitchy little spider, Varys, been bothering you again?” she asked, which was not what Margaery was expecting at all.

She reported most of what she could about the goings on in King’s Landing and her own private affairs to her grandmother in code, in letters sent by ravens to the Reach when Olenna was not here. She had mentioned how Varys seemed to have taken an interest in her, how he was even helping her in the Small Council meetings.

And how she suspected he was involved with the Martells’ escape from King’s Landing.

Her grandmother had been less than pleased by that news, though Margaery still didn’t understand why. She told Margaery in no uncertain terms that she should be on her guard around the Spider.

Margaery had been on her guard around everyone lately. She felt too anxious not to be.

“No,” she said, and Olenna stared at her for a moment, before nodding.

“Good,” she said, and promptly changed the conversation back to how they were going to implicate the Martells in Lord Tywin’s murder.

But Margaery didn’t forget about the strange question.


	185. CERSEI

Cersei knew that Jaime's feelings with regards to her had somehow changed since their parting, no doubt from the influence of that pernicious giant who thought herself a man, and she hated him for it, in those first few days, when she had pined away in the Reach for months, wanting nothing more than to return to her family and get away from those wretched roses.

But he was her brother, her twin, and she could not hate him forever, nor could he resist the pull toward her, especially not on the night he came to her chambers and took her into his arms and sweetly apologized for his wrongdoings.

They fucked that night, the second time since he'd been returned to her and she'd so foolishly pushed him away, and somehow, the hand that wasn't a hand was the farthest thing from her mind as Jaime's lips ate at her cunny until she stifled her screams in his white cloak, hastily thrown aside earlier.

She wondered if he fucked that giant bitch as well as he fucked Cersei, wondered if his lovemaking, which until now she had been assured was only for her, and was half as ardent for that woman. She couldn't quite imagine that it was so, and bit into his shoulder until she drew blood and Jaime cried out in something that wasn't ecstasy.

Cersei came at the sound, and Jaime moments later, the both of them panting harshly as they collapsed unto her old bed, the one she'd had before she was sent to the Reach and forced to sleep on a horrid cot because she would not share her crippled husband's bed.

And when Jaime had asked if she still loved him, Cersei told her twin that of course she had never stopped, and didn't understand the ploy until his next words came along with kisses down the back of her neck, because Jaime had never possessed her guile before.

"Then free Tyrion."

Cersei jolted, pulled away from Jaime in disgust, allowing her gown to fall back around her ankles. She ought to have known.

The stinging slap to his cheek was not nearly as satisfying as Cersei needed it to be, not when Jaime didn't flinch and didn't even look surprised by her anger.

How dare he convince her that he still wanted her, just for that wretched half-man who had destroyed so much of their lives for so long.

"Get out."

"Cersei-"

She reached for the nearest thing to throw at him then, which happened to be her shoe, and Jaime hastily ducked out of the way just in time, giving her a glare worthy of their father.

She had never noticed how much Jaime resembled their father as much as she until this moment, and she hated every feature for that.

He reached forward, grabbed her by the arms and pulled her to him, didn't let go no matter how Cersei fought against him, until she was tucked against his chest and he held her, regarding her as if she were a madwoman until she stopped struggling.

"You know Tyrion didn't kill Father," he whispered against her golden locks, and Cersei let out a growl.

"You fucked me just to defend that wretched imp, who killed our mother and father both!" she shrieked at him, in as low a voice a shriek might manage. "Get your hand off me."

Jaime flinched at the reminder that he had but one hand, but didn't let go of her even as she resumed her struggling.

"You've proved your point," he snapped at her. "You've won. You can choose whatever family you want. No father. One fewer brother. You must be proud of yourself. There's really nothing you wouldn't do, is there?"

Cersei glared at him. "For my family, no, nothing. I would do things for my family you couldn't imagine."

Jaime scoffed. "Tyrion is your family."

She raised a brow. "He's not."

Jaime stared at her incredulously, dropped her arm. "You don't get to choose."

Cersei took a deep breath. "On the day our father told me I was to marry Willas Tyrell, I told him he could go to hell, over the idea. I told him that I would burn House Lannister to the ground, before I would leave my children, would leave you, before he gave me those horrible threats. I do get to choose. So do you. You can choose the creature that killed our mother to come into this world-"

"Are you really mad enough to blame him for that?" Jaime demanded. "He didn't decide to kill her. He was an infant."

"A disease doesn't decide to kill you," Cersei snapped. "All the same, you cut it out before it does." She moved forward, pushed herself into his arms once more. "What do you decide?" she whispered. "What do you choose?"

Jaime stared at her for a long moment, and she could see the conflict in his eyes, the way the arm grasping her own shook with the effort to pull away that he couldn't quite manage.

And, for a moment, she thought she had him.

And then Jaime pushed her away.

"Cersei, see sense," he snapped. "Tyrion isn't stupid enough to kill our father and stick around," he hissed at her. "You know that."

She ground her teeth. "Do I?"

Jaime shook her, jarringly hard, like Robert used to do when he was drunk and she refused him her bed. "Yes."

She shook her head. "I don't. I don't, I don't, I don't. He killed Father; he's the only one who had the motive. Likely he stuck around, as you said, because he wanted to see our pain from it."

Jaime had the gall to roll his eyes at her. "I told you, Cers, he's not that stupid."

She bit her tongue until she tasted blood. "The poison-"

"Tyrion has no real knowledge of poison," Jaime whispered, and then his lips were on her neck again, as they had been moments ago, before she'd realized he was seducing her, and Cersei simultaneously moved closer and attempted to pull away; Jaime held her fast.

"He could have-"

"Which means someone else was in on it, if at all," Jaime muttered, sucking on her breastbone until Cersei moaned into his touch. "And, even if you refuse to believe it, there are much better candidates. Dozens of them."

She shook her head stubbornly, as Jaime brushed her black and red gown off her arms and down to her waist, sucked at a pert nipple with the ease of a lover she hadn't known before she'd left for the Reach.

Cersei wondered if Brienne of Tarth's breasts were still pert and high on her chest, unlike Cersei's, if the giant bitch blushed prettily when Jaime sucked on them as he was doing to Cersei's now. If, when she came, she called Jaime's name in the way that Cersei was only ever allowed to do.

"I don't care," she whispered finally, breaths coming faintly, now. "You know he's hated Father all of his life."

She felt a jolt in her cunny, then, as Jaime's golden hand reached between them and plucked at it, and she bucked up against Jaime's hips.

"Don't..." he pulled away for a moment, "Don't you think it was the other way around?"

She didn't care, as she'd said. Tyrion had killed their father because he hated him all of his wretched, half life, and Jaime would understand that she had done the right thing, once the little imp's head was on the city gates and his influence over Jaime's heart gone.

Next would be that giant bitch, she was sure.

"At least consider it," Jaime whispered, the gold of his hand disappearing inside of her, and she stiffened, glowering up at him.

"Do you still love me," she whispered, "Or were those words for Tyrion's sake only?"

Jaime's hand retreated as it had arrived, his expression darkening. "The gods have bid me to love a hateful woman," he snapped at her, and some part of Cersei felt glee to see that violent expression, wanted nothing more than to provoke it further.

"Is that a yes or a no?" she asked coyly, and Jaime growled, shoved her back down onto the bed and yanked her dress down to her ankles, and Cersei reveled in the anger in his eyes, finally matching her own after so long.

He'd been such a shadow of his former self since he returned to King's Landing, but she saw a spark of that self in him now, in his anger as he fucked her hard and brutal, not stopping once to ask if it was what she wanted.

Gods, she loved him. She threaded her fingers through his hair as he took her. And she wasn't going to let that bitch Brienne of Tarth take him from her again. He belonged to her, as Tyrion never would.

Now, as she watched Prince Oberyn smugly suggest that someone would have to take over her late father's position as Hand of the King to the Small Council if Dorne was to feel once more protected by the King, she wondered if her twin perhaps was right to be suspicious.

Of course, she would not trust to Tyrion's innocence easily, and he would still stand a trial for what he had likely done, but there could be no doubt that the poisons that had killed their lord father had either come from Pycelle or the Red Viper, and she doubted Pycelle very much, no matter what the old bastard muttered about his stores depleting.

She knew about the young girls he brought to his chambers, what he did to them there. At least Quyburn only tortured them.

"Prince Oberyn," Cersei smiled coolly at him as they found themselves suddenly alone outside of the chambers of the Small Council after this most recent meeting, during which she had informed the Small Council that the King was still making a decision on the new Hand, and the Prince of Dorne paused to look at her, his dark eyes regarding her with something between wariness and amusement.

She never should have let him out.

"Might I have a word?"

She hated to think that he was amused at her expense, and clicked her teeth together.

"Queen Dowager," he nodded to her as they moved off into an abandoned corridor, just to rub salt in the wound, she was sure, and Cersei's smile became a tad more brittle.

"You have remained in King's Landing for quite some time," she commented. "My son's wedding was far and away some time ago, and yet here you still are."

Oberyn raised a brow. "Is this an interrogation, Your Grace? I did try to leave, if you remember."

Cersei smirked. "Of course not. But surely, you must miss your daughters, your family."

He nodded. "Your guards ensured that my lady was not allowed to return home any more than I am."

Cersei smiled thinly, for she had heard of that. "Yes. An unfortunate occurrence, that Ellaria and yourself so misunderstood Sansa's unhappiness of her marriage as a willingness to leave King's Landing."

Oberyn glowered, straightened. "But my lady will return home soon. And I am still on the Small Council, despite what I did. But indeed, I do miss my family, as I imagine you must miss your daughter, as you must have missed your son, while you were away. Tell me, how is your husband? I heard he was quite ill. My condolences."

Cersei sniffed. "His condition is unfortunate, and I was wont to leave him during it, but I ultimately believed that my place was here, what with my father's passing."

His lips twitched. This Dornish snake whom she might have married once was not so smart as he thought himself, though, nor as subtle. "One might argue that your place would be better served amongst the living, rather than the dead."

She raised a brow. "And one might argue that a Dornish Viper ought to belong in Dorne, with such a feeble brother, clinging to life still."

Oberyn laughed outright at her words, and Cersei strangled the urge to snap at him for doing so. "Good day, Queen Dowager," he said, dipping his head to her, and then turning on his heel.

Cersei ground her teeth as she watched him swagger away. "Prince Oberyn," she called at his back, and his guards paused.

After a moment, so did he, turning back to her with a raised brow.

"I will convince the King to allow you to visit your lady this evening," she told him, and smirked at the surprise on his face.

"Thank you, Your Grace," he said, and truly sounded in earnest.

She waited until his back was once again to her before grinding her teeth.


	186. SANSA

"When did you figure it out?" Sansa asked quietly as she stalked into Margaery's chambers, and Margaery glanced up from her needlework.

Her ladies were, for once, not around, and Loras had been her only guard on the door. Sansa was relieved to see that, for she didn't think she could face anyone else at the moment, thought she might lose her nerve if Margaery's ladies were all crowded around, watching her with their waspish gazes.

Loras had let Sansa through without comment, though he did glare at her as he did so. Apparently even he knew about what they had been doing, before, and knew now that they were doing it no longer. Sansa wondered what he had thought of that, of his sister with another woman.

It didn't feel strange, coming here unannounced, until she had done it, to come charging into Margaery's chambers unannounced, just as it hadn't felt strange the last time, when she had come to tell the other girl about Cersei and only realized after she was there how wrong and out of place she was.

Margaery's eyes widened at the sight of Sansa, but she didn't look displeased to see her. Not pleased, exactly, but not displeased either, and Sansa didn't know how she felt about that. There was once a time where Margaery would have lit up at the sight of her, smiling wide and divesting her of her clothes in seconds.

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask Margaery where the rest of her ladies were, but then she remembered why she was there. To do anything else but speak about why she had come here was a distraction she couldn't afford, standing in Margaery's bedchambers and looking at her pouting red lips.

Sansa swallowed hard.

Margaery looked beautiful today, the light from the windows of the Maidenvault streaming onto her, bathing her in gold. Whatever she was stitching lay crumpled in her lap, and she looked like she had barely been paying attention to it to begin with, from the way the stitches hung open and uneven.

Sansa wondered if she was glad of the distraction Sansa offered or annoyed at her interruption. She almost backed out the door then and there, but Sansa straightened her shoulders and forced herself to speak.

To not stare at Margaery's lips, and think of how much she wanted them.

But she couldn't think of that. She'd been thinking far too much lately, in lieu of eating as Shae was always nagging her to do, and her thinking had led her to a conclusion she did not necessarily like, about her escape to Dorne. About Margaery.

The two things she could never force from her mind these days, it seemed. And perhaps this was just the lack of sugar in her body, or something similar, but Sansa's conclusion made all too much sense to her, now that she had been thinking on it for days.

"I'm sorry?" Margaery asked, giving Sansa a little smile, small and fake, that Sansa could not bring herself to return.

Sansa shook her head. She was too tired for this, a bone deep sort of tiredness that had infected her since she had told Ellaria Sand to cut her throat.

"You weren't angry, when I came back," Sansa said, the words coming out slow at first, uncertain, and then with more conviction as she saw the look in Margaery's eyes. "And you had already convinced Joffrey of my innocence, which must have taken some effort," she continued, and she was not ungrateful for that, it was just... "Effort that you might have had to undertake the moment you heard I had run off with the Martells and knew that the Lannisters would catch them."

 _I knew_ , Margaery had said, and covered the words with the tale of how she knew that someone would steal Sansa away, whether it was the Martells or someone else, but that had not been what she had been about to say, when Sansa came back and they spoke of Margaery's saving her the Martells' fate. Margaery had known, had almost given herself away even then, but she hadn't, and Sansa didn't understand why.

Didn't understand why it had had to remain a secret on Margaery's end, when Sansa had spent so long trying to keep it from her, all the while dying a little inside.

"Well," Margaery said tightly, hands crumpling the work in her lap now, "It's nice to know that you think so highly of me."

She sounded genuinely offended, but Sansa merely shook her head, because she didn't have the energy for this, and she couldn't stand the thought of Margaery lying to her, even if the other girl was well within her rights to do so. She knew that Margaery had done this thing, and she wasn't...angry. She was just tired, and she wanted to know why Margaery had undertaken the task at all.

She didn't understand why Margaery would have known she had gone to Dorne and done nothing, said nothing, all of the time, but had saved Sansa a gruesome fate when she returned.

She wasn't trying to insult Margaery, Sansa wanted to say. She only wanted the truth. No more secrets between them, though she understood that she no longer had the right to ask for that these days, even if neither of them had ever been given it while they were still...whatever they had been.

"You knew that the Martells were leaving, the moment they left the capitol," Sansa said hoarsely. "And you knew that I was going to be with them." She eyed Margaery. "How long did you know beforehand that I was going to leave with them?"

Margaery gave her a small smile, but it was not a pretty smile, stretching her lips thinly over her teeth, pale enough to be almost white. "For some time," she said. "Weeks, at least."

Sansa stared at her, felt her face grow hot and her stomach twist unpleasantly. All that time, she had angsted over lying to Margaery, and, somehow, Margaery had already known. "How?" she whispered.

Margaery pursed her lips. "My family pays certain members of the city well to be informed," she told Sansa. "In this case, Prince Oberyn didn't pay enough attention to who was overhearing him when he spoke in confidence to his lady in a whorehouse."

Sansa flinched. "Then you're not going to tell me," she gritted out.

Margaery met her eyes. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "I would...like to," she admitted, and at least she did that, "but there are lives hanging on the line, Sansa, besides our own."

As if Sansa needed the reminder. She was about to lose her husband.

Sansa swallowed. "But you...pretended that you knew nothing, this whole time?" she squeaked out.

Margaery's eyes didn't change, but it took Sansa a moment to see the coldness in them. "So did you."

Sansa flinched violently at the words. "Margaery..."

"Sansa, I know you're angry, and I know you're confused right now," Margaery said, folding her hands in her lap. Once upon a time, she might have folded them over Sansa's, but she wasn't, now. "But don't come in here with words like these if it is not to give me hope."

Sansa swallowed harshly at that. "You're...you weren't angry that I left for Dorne?" she asked, needing to know.

Margaery shook her head, went back to her needlework, and this time, when she spoke, it was Margaery who sounded tired. There was a tremor in her voice that Sansa could not identify, "No, Sansa, I am not angry with you." She paused. "But there is something else I should tell you."

Sansa lifted her head, blinking up at the other woman.

"I..." Margaery hesitated. Then, "I was the one who told Joffrey to send Oberyn Martell back to Dorne before Tywin Lannister insisted that he stay. I was the one who convinced him that he should take Oberyn off the Small Council and have him leave King's Landing for good. Because..." she bit her lip, no longer meeting Sansa's eyes, and gods, Sansa wished that she would. "Because I knew you were going with him, and I couldn't bear the thought that, if you stayed longer, stayed because of me, you might never leave this place."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "You..."

"Nothing came of it," Margaery said, "because he ended up leaving anyway. But I thought...I think you need to know that. It doesn't mean I'm expecting you to..." she looked away.

And Sansa understood what she was and wasn't saying. That Margaery had expected her to go long before she had ever told Margaery about it, that she had tried to help her, in her own way.

And Sansa had thrown it in her face, and didn't know if she wanted to go back to the other woman or not.

And, whether or not they had left because of Margaery's words, she could read the guilt in the other woman's expression easily enough, because she saw it often enough in her own.

"It wasn't your fault," Sansa breathed out. "Our being dragged back, it had nothing to do with you. The Lannisters wouldn't...they wouldn't have ever let me leave King's Landing with someone else for good, anyway." She swallowed. "I am never going to leave this place."

It was time she said those words aloud, acknowledged them.

She had realized that when she knelt on the floor before Joffrey's throne and uttered the damning words against the Martells, but the words hit Sansa hard now, her breath stuttering as Margaery lifted her chin and gave her a sad smile.

"Maybe not. But I remember what you looked like, that day we went down to the water to swim," she told Sansa. "I remember the wistful expression on your face, the hope there, when you saw that little boat, and then I told you that you couldn't take it and run. And I...I didn't want to prevent you that small freedom again."

Sansa closed her eyes. "That's not your...that's not your responsibility," she said softly, because it was something she had finally realized, now that they were no longer... It wasn't Margaery's responsibility to protect her. Margaery could barely protect herself, and thinking of Sansa as her responsibility had only helped to speed along the end of what they'd had.

She needed to Margaery to understand that.

"Well," Margaery said, voice dry and cold, "it isn't now."

Sansa ground her teeth, unsure how to even respond to that. Margaery didn't look like she was expecting a response, intent on the work in her hands. Still, Sansa had to try. "I..."

"Sansa, please," Margaery said, looking up from her needlework. Her gaze was desperate.

Sansa took a step backward. "I should go," she whispered, and this time, it was her turn to say that phrase. It didn't pass by either's notice.

Margaery sighed. "Yes," she agreed. "Yes, you probably should." Her hands were shaking in her needlework, and Sansa swallowed hard at the sight.

It took everything in Sansa to turn around and leave instead of walking over and stilling those hands, squeezing them, feeling Margaery against her once more. It took everything in her not to keep staring at those beautiful lips, not to move forward and capture them in her own. For a moment, she wondered what it was even separating them, what they had been fighting about, if fighting was even the right word for what had happened between them the day Margaery had thrown her out.

In the coming days, Sansa would fantasize about that moment for long hours, the moment she stood in the doorway to Margaery's chambers and looked on the other girl, and wish that she had stayed. She would wish it so desperately that sometimes she would wonder if one could die from the wishing itself.


	187. TYRION

The trial did not pick up again for two more days, or at least, that was how long had passed according to Jaime. It wasn't as if Tyrion could see the sun, from where he was stuck in the Black Cells.

It had taken that long for the maesters to determine what had killed Tywin Lannister, that long for them to even decipher the poisons that Quyburn had discovered merely by looking over the body.

He didn't know what game Cersei was playing, having her pet figure out the one thing that might save Tyrion's life, but it had him suspicious, no matter how many times in the last couple of days Jaime had tried to assure him that Cersei'd had no idea what Quyburn was going to say.

Still, Cersei tried her damndest to work with what she had, during the trial.

"The knife wound most definitely was part of what killed him, Your Grace," one of the maesters told the King. "It was lodged just below his heart-"

"Well, I am not a maester," Joffrey said, "but that doesn't sound like a killing wound to me."

Tyrion shifted where he leaned against the accused's box, glancing at his nephew in some surprise.

The maester glanced nervously at Cersei, where she sat a little straighter in her chair. Tyrion tried not to think about the fact that his nephew had just defended him for anything.

"The knife still caused his lordship to bleed out, Your Grace, regardless of the poison already in his system. We believe, amongst us, that Lord Tyrion might have begun poisoning Lord Tywin some time ago, and, not being an expert in poisons, when the poison did not have the intended effect, he used the knife."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. Trust Cersei to spin any story to her favor.

Joffrey snorted. "Do these learned maesters not have real information for me, mother?" he asked, and Tyrion noticed the way he was clutching his wife's hand. As if he meant to tear it off. Her face was particularly white.

Cersei looked slightly less smug now, and she was glaring at the ten maesters she had dragged out of the woodwork pointedly.

Tyrion tried not to laugh. Cersei couldn't even keep from bungling her own farce of a trial. There was some irony in that, and perhaps he could die happy, if she managed to get her way.

He stifled the sound when one of his guards looked at him. No, because that would still mean Cersei winning, after everything she'd forced him to suffer through during their childhoods, their lives. He wasn't going to let her win this, even if he still didn't know how he himself would get out of it.

Varys had said that he had not forgotten Tyrion, but Tyrion still did not even know what that meant.

Another of the maesters cleared his throat. "The knife wound would be a killing wound, Your Grace. Considering the amount of time it took for anyone to discover Lord Tywin after he was stabbed, he would not have been able to be saved from bleeding out as he did."

Joffrey nodded, turning his cold gaze on Tyrion once more.

And Tyrion knew, then and there, that he was going to go down for his father's murder. He was going to be killed today, executed for Tywin Lannister, just as the old man had always wanted.

Well, he wasn't going to give the bastard the satisfaction. Tywin Lannister was dead, and there was no way, by the gods, that he was going to drag Tyrion down with him, not this time-

"The Crown would like to call another witness to the stand, who came forward in the interim claiming to have information about Lord Tywin's death," Grandmaester Pycelle mumbled out then, and Tyrion didn't refrain from rolling his eyes, this time.

Yet another sycophant pulled out to speak against him in suppositions and honeyed words, no doubt. Come here to say what a monster he was and how noble his lord father had been, how good for the realm he had been.

Joffrey leaned back in his throne, letting go of his wife's hand. He didn't look surprised by the announcement, which was all Tyrion needed to know. He sagged a little in his chains, and met no one's eyes.

"Of course," Joffrey said, waving a hand. "Bring her in."

Her. Thus far, Cersei had brought no women out to speak against him, content to rag out such respected figures as the Grandmaester and Lord Varys. And Tyrion, even as a man, understood why that was.

Dragging out Sansa and forcing her to speak against her husband certainly wasn't going to help her case, whatever she thought she might get Sansa to say about him.

Tyrion leaned forward, a thought occurring in the back of his mind that he didn't dare give attention to. He needed to stop thinking about her, stop letting her invade his memories every time he-

Cersei's nose wrinkled, and if Tyrion had not become an expert during his lifetime of reading Cersei Lannister, he might not have caught it at all, the confusion in her eyes, the annoyance in the twitch of her cheek before she buried it deep.

Joffrey had known this was coming, but his mother had not.

Of course, those thoughts left Tyrion immediately the moment he noticed the unassuming, plainly dressed young woman being escorted to the witness box by Jaime Lannister by the arm. Her face was pale as a sheet, her eyes downcast. There were surprised murmurs coming from the crowd.

Tyrion blinked, glancing at his brother in confusion, but Jaime ignored him completely, leaving the girl in the stand and taking a step back. Tyrion tried not to read anything into the fact that his brother was steadily avoiding Cersei's eyes, as well.

The woman in the stand had her back to Tyrion, but he had seen her from the front. Recognized her. His brows furrowed, and he bit the inside of his cheek.

She played with her tied up hair a little, nervously, and it fell out of its ties, the dark locks cascading down her shoulders and onto the thin pink gown she wore. Then she stopped touching her hair, let her hands fold in front of her, then unfolded them and rubbed them up and down her arms a little bit.

Tyrion could see from where he sat that she was shaking. He glanced incredulously up toward Joffrey, and did not miss the piercing glare of the Queen, where she sat beside her husband.

That was interesting. But one look at Cersei's face told him that his sister was just as surprised to see a Tyrell handmaiden on the witness stand as Queen Margaery was.

Which made Tyrion wonder whose game this was.

Grandmaester Pycelle leaned forward, positively leering at her from where Tyrion could see.

"Please state your name, my lady."

She swallowed, licked his lips. Tyrion could see her in profile now, but that was it. "Lady Rosamund Tyrell, Your, I mean, my lord."

Laughter from the crowd. The girl was blushing now, instead of standing in pallor. She couldn't have been more than six and ten. Tyrion glanced at Margaery again, unsure how she couldn't have known this was happening. He wondered if that was part of the game, her feigning surprise. He knew she was good at disciplining her emotions, but he couldn't quite believe that, at the moment.

So his eyes sought out the only other Tyrell in King's Landing capable of mastering the game, and no one was looking at Olenna Tyrell, where she sat close enough to get blood sprayed on her if Joffrey ordered Tyrion's head taken off his shoulders here and now.

She wasn't smiling. She didn't look shocked, either.

"Lady Rosamund, we are told by Ser Jaime Lannister that you claim to have some knowledge of the accused's part in the death of his father," Pycelle goaded her, and Lady Rosamund nodded.

Tyrion glanced incredulously toward his brother once more. Cersei did as well. They caught gazes in doing so and Cersei scowled, turning her attention back to her son.

"Yes, my lord," Lady Rosamund said quietly.

"Speak up, girl," someone from the crowd called, and Lady Rosamund frowned, lifting her chin and grasping at the witness' podium with white knuckles.

"I...it's not about Lord Tyrion, exactly, but about someone else," she said loudly, and gasps rang out through the chamber. "About who really killed Lord Tywin."

"Are you going to tell us, then?" Joffrey asked, sounding bored.

Lady Rosamund nodded, eyes flicking to the King now, flicking away from Margaery.

Which meant that she knew whatever she was about to say was going to anger Queen Margaery but, looking at the Good Queen now, Tyrion could not help but suspect from the cloudy look on her face that Queen Margaery, while surprised at Lady Rosamund's entrance, knew already what Lady Rosamund was about to say.

And disapproved of it.

He wondered if his original thought was correct, and the Tyrells had been stupid enough to off his lord father for the position of the Hand of the King. As if Cersei would ever give up the position of Hand of the King to the Fat Flower, for all that the Queen's wheedling might convince her husband, and Tyrion did have to admit that Margaery Tyrell seemed to have an art for that.

If this girl was about to tell the truth about it, in exchange for her life. Was about to save his own.

He hadn't quite the heart to hope for any of that, however.

"Then I bid you speak," Joffrey entreated Lady Rosamund, "And tell us all of how my uncle might be proven innocent of the grave charges brought against him."

Yes, Tyrion was very interested to hear what this young flower had to say.

Lady Rosamund lifted her chin, glanced back at Tyrion, before the dwarf watched her eyes move to Prince Oberyn, where he sat with the judges presiding over Tyrion's trial.

"Your Grace, I...overheard a conversation, some months ago, between the Lady Sansa Lannister and Prince Oberyn," she said, her voice pitched just loudly enough for the entire audience chamber to lean forward at the words.

Even as Tyrion's eyes flicked nervously to where Sansa stood in the balcony, he found himself wondering if all of the flowers had such good training in making themselves heard.

Sansa had gone very pale, where she stood just out of the shadows, and Tyrion felt his heart plummet.

Sansa. Sansa. What the hell had Sansa to do with any of this?

He thought about it, tried to piece the story together as Lady Rosamund waited for the crowd to settle down once more. Sansa had disappeared with Oberyn Martell the day Lord Tywin's body had been discovered. Oberyn Martell, who had made no secret his willingness to use Myrcella as a hostage, if he had to.

Tyrion swallowed, rubbed at his chafed wrists.

Had his little wife really managed to bring down Tywin Lannister?

"I do not think they thought that I heard them, for we were in a bustling street in the city and she had ordered me back a bit, but I did," Lady Rosamund continued. "He plotted with her, promised to steal her away to Dorne with him, and she agreed to it. This was...months ago."

Queen Margaery's hands, where they clutched the armrests of her throne, had gone white around the knuckles, but the cloudy look on her face was gone, carefully replaced by blankness, now.

Sansa was very pale.

Tyrion had forgotten how to breathe.

He didn't want to die; the thought came to him abruptly. He had thought, languishing away in his cell with the knowledge that his family had won everything and he had lost everything, that he had come to terms with it. That so much time down there, alone, with the knowledge that he was going to die imminently had softened him to the possibility.

It had not. He still had hope, and it was a terrible thing, fluttering in his chest as it was now.

But he did not want to live just so that his naive young wife could take his place, and Tyrion opened his mouth to speak up.

Lady Rosamund beat him to it.

"I did not hear all of their words," Lady Rosamund continued, clearly warming to her subject, "But their intent was...very clear. They spoke of their hatred toward the Lannisters, and Prince Oberyn called Your Grace a disgrace to Westeros." She paused, for effect, no doubt. The crowd voiced their displeasure.

There must be some school in the Reach, Tyrion thought. For teaching young women how to control a man, a room.

"And they have spent much time in one another's company since that day. I have observed that Lady Sansa spends more time away from her own husband's bed than she spends in it."

Tyrion closed his eyes. He couldn't stand by and let this happen.

"Your Grace," he interrupted loudly, "If I might speak?"

"This is ridiculous," Cersei spoke up at the same moment. "Are we to derail the entire trial to take down a guilty man on the idle words of a child?"

"Lady Rosamund, only speak of the things you have proof of," the Grandmaester said, disapprovingly. "This is no place for idle, women's gossip."

Tyrion cleared his throat, repeated his words.

Joffrey shut him a quelling glare. "If you speak again," he snapped, the words loud and causing his little wife to flinch, "I will cut out your tongue!"

Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek.

Lady Rosamund swallowed, hurrying out the next words, chastened. "I did not dare speak of it, Your Grace, because I did not wish to tarnish another great lady," Tyrion snorted at that, "But they were hardly subtle in their plotting together, and I felt that I must come forward and say so."

"What pushed you to do it so late?" Margaery asked suddenly, the words coming out hard and cool. Tyrion winced. Joffrey glanced almost appreciatively at his lady wife.

He wondered if this was yet another girl who was going to lose her life in order to save his. Wondered what the hell she was doing there, if neither Cersei or Margaery wanted her there.

"Because one day," Lady Rosamund said, soft now, and Tyrion opened his eyes for this, for her tone was far graver than before, "I overheard Prince Oberyn asking the Lady Sansa about a knife that Lord Tyrion always wore on his person. I overheard him asking her whether Lord Tyrion wore it all of the time, and not long after I overheard that conversation, the knife went missing. I..." she lifted a hand to her forehead, and Tyrion wondered if the little actress was about to faint on them. "I did not put two and two together until after the maester the other day mentioned that there had been poison in his poor lordship's system."

Joffrey blinked at her, but it was Margaery, yet again, who spoke.

"You seem to have overheard an awful lot lately, Lady Rosamund, for someone so steadfast in your service to me. A wonder you have the time."

Tyrion wondered if the Queen thought she was being subtle, with how angry her voice sounded, shaking slightly in the audience chamber. Her only fortune was that her husband had not noticed, because Cersei looked as if she had, even furious as she was that someone was speaking in her brother's defense.

Lady Rosamund lifted her chin. "I did not have enough information to report to anyone, my lady, neither you nor the guard, with what I had overheard, but that did not stop me from continuing to look into it on my own." She licked her lips. "But if Lord Tywin himself died because I stayed silent..."

"You needn't blame yourself for that, girl," the Grandmaester tried to assure her. "You needn't blame yourself for that."

The girl bit her lip, looking much younger and more innocent now. "I..."

Tyrion had not been paying attention to Joffrey, however, whose face was now puce as he glared at Sansa where she stood on the balcony. He abruptly remembered that his nephew was not a boy who employed reason when finding the faults in someone else.

Abruptly remembered that Sansa had avoided house arrest by saying the Martells had kidnapped her against her will, and now this Tyrell girl was making it sound as though she had helped in Lord Tywin's murder.

He closed his eyes. He didn't think he could survive whatever gruesome method Joffrey planned to kill Sansa in for this.

"So...what, my whore of a lady aunt let Prince Oberyn fuck her, and when my uncle found out, they framed him for Lord Tywin's murder after hiring a killer and running off into the sunset together?" Joffrey laughed, amused, as his eyes spun toward the ghostly expression on Sansa's face. Margaery, beside the King, flinched.

Cersei spoke up then, surprising even Tyrion. At least she could sometimes see reason. "Your Grace, this is all circumstantial at best-"

"Did you do it?" Joffrey demanded of her. "Did you murder my grandfather because you let that Dornish viper stick his hands up your cunt, lady aunt?"

Sansa's whole body flinched at the violent words. Tyrion could see her shaking, even from here. "Your Grace, I-"

Tyrion felt almost forgotten, in the accused's seat. He glanced wildly at Jaime, who was giving him a hard, easily readable look.

Don't speak up. Don't get yourself killed now.

But she didn't get the chance to defend herself, and neither did Tyrion, not when the gold cloaks at each end of the balcony started towards her, nor when Margaery opened her mouth as if to console her husband.

Because that was the moment when Prince Oberyn stepped out of the crowd, flanked by his two guards, and snapped, "It was not Lady Sansa's doing."

Which, Tyrion realized, Joffrey had been waiting for. Perhaps he was not as stupid as Tyrion had always thought.

It was not a comforting realization.

"Then you admit to it?" Joffrey asked, in almost bored tone. Tyrion had no doubt that he was bored now because he could not play with someone like Oberyn Martell. It simply wasn't fun, for him.

He couldn't quite find it within himself to pity his bastard of a nephew, however.

"I did not murder Tywin Lannister," Oberyn said coldly, though his voice raised in pitch as he continued.

Joffrey snorted. "Then are you calling the Lady Rosamund a liar?" he asked.

"No," Oberyn said, "for the conversations she recalled did happen."

"Then you admit that you killed him," Joffrey ground out through clenched teeth, leaning forward on his throne, now.

Oberyn shot Sansa a glance that might have been sympathetic, though Tyrion doubted that she saw it at all, before lifting his chin to the King.

"The Lannisters are not the only ones who repay their debts; I simply repaid mine. I brought justice for my sister, Elia Martell, for her children, Rhaenys and Aegon, whom Tywin Lannister let be slaughtered in the siege of King's Landing. Whom he raped. Whom he allowed half a hundred swords to run through before her child's corpse was dragged to the Iron Throne and presented to Robert Baratheon, who called it the spawn of a dragon. Tywin Lannister is dead, and his death was far more merciful than theirs."

Joffrey leapt to his feet, shouted for his Kingsguard to arrest this man, to arrest the Lady Sansa along with him for conspiracy to murder, and Tyrion closed his eyes once more, wrists chafing against the manacles holding them even as his brother strode forward and unlocked them.

He was free.


	188. SANSA

The door slammed behind Sansa as the guards shoved her inside a cell beside the one where Tyrion had been kept.

She remembered walking past it, grimacing at the horrid smell emerging from it, trying not to think about what it must be like, for Tyrion to be kept down here as a prisoner.

Sansa shuddered, wrapping her arms tightly around herself and scuffing her feet against the straw laid down on the floor. She refused to sit down, the rancid smell emanating from the floor piercing her nostrils.

And then it hit her, as if the shock had worn off, though Sansa could still feel her body shaking despite the cold.

She was in a Black Cell, where her father had been kept before they cut his head off.

Sansa stumbled back against the far wall, leaned against it, breathing hard.

This couldn't be happening. This wasn't real. It-

She didn't remember how to breathe.

Panic filled her, and Sansa sank down to her knees, leaned her head back against the wall. Her chest was rising and lowering in frightened movements, and yet Sansa couldn't feel any air entering her lungs. She felt sick to her stomach, and the only thing keeping her from being sick in the chamber pot across the room was the thought that the guards might not ever change it.

And the thought that she might not be able to will her legs to walk over there.

Sansa bit her lip, felt tears stinging at her eyes.

She remembered the day her father was imprisoned, remembered the terror she had felt, that these new friends of hers in the capitol, who had been so nice to her and her family, who had wanted Sansa for a queen, would imprison her father in such an unimaginable place, devoid of light.

She had been so naive then, and the fear had only grown, when she had been let down to the Black Cells to entreat her father to go against his morals and call Joffrey the true king, if only it might save his life.

And hers.

She reached up and wiped at her eyes. She'd had no right to ask her father to do that, she thought.

And now she was being punished for it.

Another tear slipped out of her eyes, and she sucked in a harsh breath, surprised when air wheezed into her lungs.

She was alive, she told herself. That was the important thing. When the Tyrells had brought her back to King's Landing, she had thought that Joffrey might do something like this, might try to kill her or imprison her for her part in the escape.

And she had saved herself, had said and done whatever she had to do to get out of it. The Lannisters needed her, to keep the North. Surely she could find a way to save herself this time, as well.

Except, she'd thought she could save Casterly Rock for Tyrion. She'd thought she could save her father, when he was kept down here. And she'd been wrong, both times.

Sansa swallowed again, felt her throat clogging. Her stomach churned. She reached down and rubbed hard at it.

She shook her head, tried to sit up, found her head aching at that, at the dizziness that swept over her, at the way her stomach roiled.

She hadn't eaten today. She'd been so nervous about the trial, about what might happen to Tyrion, that she couldn't bring herself to eat. She hadn't eaten since his last trial, in fact, more than a few bites that Shae had almost forced down her throat.

She bit her tongue. She didn't know when she was going to eat again. How dare the Lannisters take that away from her.

No, she thought. Oberyn had done this to her. A Tyrell girl had done this to her.

And now she was going to die for Tywin Lannister.

Sansa let out a wet laugh. None of this made sense. Oberyn hadn't even been here when Tywin Lannister died, had he?

She was sick then, at the thought of why Oberyn had taken her away at that exact moment, at the terror that perhaps there was a reason for that day being the day they left, after the Martells hemming and hawing and never leaving for so long before that.

She'd been so foolish.

Sansa hugged her knees, laid her head down on it, tried not to focus on the black spots at the corner of her vision. After all, there was only the light from a small torch in here, and surely that accounted for most of the darkness, anyway.

She bit her lip, dragged in another breath. She was well aware that wasn't the case, well aware that she could barely breathe and in a moment she could very well pass out.

She closed her eyes.

Why hadn't Margaery warned her? Why hadn't Margaery told her that a Tyrell was going to speak out against her?

Why hadn't Oberyn warned her, about all of this?

The air felt thinner down here. She leaned her head back against the wall and tried to still her rapidly beating heart, to calm her breathing.

It only partially worked.

And then, when she thought that she wasn't going to calm down, ever, there was a sound at the other end of her cell.

Sansa jumped, because it wasn't coming from her door. It was coming from a little area of the wall, from the stones there. A loud, scraping sound.

And then one of the stones moved.

She scrambled to her feet then, wiping at her eyes and staring at that spot in the wall of her cell incredulously.

Weren't these cells meant to be impregnable? Joffrey had boasted about that often enough.

The stone fell to the floor of her cell a moment later. It wasn't large enough to be significant, just a tiny spot of wall that had come loose, large enough perhaps for Sansa to go over and stick her finger through.

She didn't.

"Sansa?" a familiar voice asked.

Sansa closed her eyes. "Prince Oberyn," she whispered, and hated the way her voice trembled. "I...What..."

"Sansa," he said again, and she couldn't see him through the small hole in the wall, but she shivered nonetheless, scrambled to her feet and moved as close to it as she dared.

"I'm here," she whispered hoarsely.

A pause. "Are you all right?"

She let out a wet laugh in answer to his question.

He sighed. "Yes, I suppose that is a foolish question."

She licked her lips. "Do you know...did they put Ellaria down here, as well?" she asked.

"Ellaria wasn't implicated in the testimony," Oberyn said shortly, but she could hear the nervousness in his words.

"And yet I was," Sansa snapped, and silence reigned again. "And you didn't...you didn't deny that," she said. "I...I didn't kill Tywin, I don't understand. I wouldn't."

He sighed again, and she could hear genuine regret there. Or at least, she thought she could. She was beginning to wonder if she had ever understood Oberyn at all.

"If you don't wish to speak with me, Lady Sansa, I would understand."

She snorted. "It's not as if I have rats in this cell to speak to instead," she said again, and tried not to wince at how harsh her voice sounded.

He deserved it, she told herself. He had forced her down here, with his confession. This was his doing as much as it was anyone's.

"I don't wish to speak to you," she said suddenly, hugging her knees and leaning away from the small hole. "Leave me alone."

Silence met her answer.

"Very well, my lady," he said softly. "I will, if that is your wish."

And then she could hear him moving away from their shared spot, and Sansa lifted her hand and wiped at her eyes.

The cell felt colder, in the silence.

But she didn't ask for him to come back.


	189. TYRION

It felt good to be out of a prison cell, Tyrion reflected idly, even if he had traded his place in it for his wife's, however unknowingly.

He shook his head, still baffled by the whole affair. He knew that his little wife was hardly subtle in her hatred for the Lannisters, and certainly justified, but he couldn't see her being involved in the plot to kill Tywin. Couldn't see her teaming up with Prince Oberyn to kill the man.

She wasn't a fool.

He just didn't know why she had stayed silent at the trial, unless, after years as a captive in King's Landing, she understood better than Tyrion that Joffrey had no mercy in his bones.

Like him, she understood that Joffrey wouldn't have cared about her protestations. Would probably have found them amusing more than anything.

He sighed, taking another sip of his wine. He'd missed this, good Dornish red, down in the Black Cells. There wasn't a lot of it left, given the current state of their alliance with Dorne, but enough that Tyrion had been able to sneak some back to his chambers the moment he was loose from his chains.

The room felt all too large, after spending so many weeks within a small dank cell. Too large, with the knowledge that Sansa was no longer here to share it with him, for all that they ever really shared it.

Shae was around, but Tyrion had warned her off, because she was Sansa's lady, not his, and Cersei had enough fuel to hate and to hurt him at the moment. There was no sense in giving her more.

Jaime had come to see him, for a little while. Jubilant that he was free, Tyrion could tell, but also looking distant, and he wouldn't tell Tyrion why.

Tyrion wondered if Cersei had banned her brother from her bed again, and took another sip of his wine.

There was a knock on the door, and Tyrion straightened, set down the tumbler he was drinking directly from.

"Come in," he called, and wished for an errant moment that it was Sansa on the other side. Of course, she wouldn't knock. And she was in the Black Cells, taking his place.

He swore under his breath just as Pod stepped hesitantly inside.

"Ah, Pod," Tyrion smiled at the young man. "I was beginning to think I would never see you again."

The boy looked suspiciously misty eyed, and Tyrion reflected that he was a good lad. He knew that very few people would have mourned his own passing, had he been put to death for killing his father, but he suspected that Pod was just one of those.

Tyrion wondered if Sansa would have mourned said passing.

"It...It's good to have you back, my lord," Pod said quietly, handing over a cask of wine.

Tyrion nearly groaned in pleasure. "Ah, fuck, it's good to be back, lad," he muttered, uncorking the cask and drinking directly from it. He pulled back, letting out a sigh. "That was far too long to go without some good wine in my belly. My brother Jaime smuggled some in for me a time or two, but I've almost gone sober, now."

He took another sip, and pretended everything was fine. He had enough experience with that, after all.

Pod looked slightly amused. "There's no more Dornish Red coming in, my lord, but I'll make sure you get some anyway."

"There's a good lad," Tyrion said, winking at him and setting the cask down. "Now tell me everything that has happened in my absence."

The boy was strangely knowledgeable on the subject, in a way that Jaime wasn't. Tyrion found it faintly disturbing, that he should know so much. He supposed that information came from the...lady friends he was so popular with.

There was another knock at the door. Tyrion had never felt so popular.

The door opened without whoever was outside waiting to be announced, and Cersei stepped primly into the room, two members of the Kingsguard behind her.

Tyrion rolled his eyes.

"You can go," she said, and Pod took one look at her before scurrying out of the room without so much as a backward glance toward Tyrion.

Tyrion sighed. "Then you can leave your brutes out in the hall, Cersei," he told her jovially, and Cersei ground her teeth before waving a hand. One of her brutes closed the door behind Pod.

Tyrion almost wished that he had said the brutes could stay, instead.

"What can I do for you, sweet sister?" he asked pleasantly. "Besides giving up my inheritance to you without a say."

Cersei glared. "I see you've made yourself at home here again," she said, gesturing toward the wine bottle.

Tyrion frowned at her. "If I still had a Rock to claim, I might not be here to bother you at all."

Cersei rolled her eyes. "We both know that isn't true. You're a cockroach, always trying to destroy what is rightfully mine. The Rock," she told him, "your wife was smart enough to realize that it was rightfully mine, hence why she signed it over to me."

Tyrion smirked, trying not to let on about how much those words stung. "I hardly think you should be lecturing me on drinking, sweet sister," he told her, and Cersei ground her teeth rather noisily.

"I understand that your husband is quite ill," Tyrion said amicably as Cersei glared at him. "How strange, to see you here in King's Landing rather than at his side."

Cersei sniffed, not meeting Tyrion's eyes. "Our father is dead. Of course my place was here."

Tyrion hummed.

"And you likely killed him," Cersei spat suddenly, with vengeance gleaming in her eyes. "You ought to be crushed under the sword of Gregor Clegane, not fucking with Jaime's head-"

"You heard what our lord and king decreed, Cersei," Tyrion said, rather too jovially. "And out of the two of us, I don't think I could ever be the sibling accused of fucking Jaime in any way. Are you questioning the judgment of your beloved son?"

"I don't know how you did it," Cersei hissed at him, "Or what it had to do with that Martell, but I won't let you get away from this unscathed."

Tyrion raised a brow, rubbing at his wrists. "You never do, sister," he said, brushing past her to reach for his wine tumbler once more.

"I've sent for Ser Gregor," she said into the silence that followed.

Tyrion blinked at her. "He's fighting in the North for a reason, Cersei," he told her. "Father wanted-"

"As if you give a fuck what Father wanted," Cersei snapped, silencing him.

Tyrion rubbed the back of his neck. "I didn't kill him, Cersei."

She scoffed. "Ser Gregor is coming back to be named into the Kingsguard," she told Tyrion. "Joffrey is in need of more protection, clearly."

"You think Prince Oberyn might ask for a trial by combat," Tyrion surmised.

Cersei lifted her chin. 'It's a possibility we must be prepared for," she told him, before reaching into the pocket of her gown and pulling out a round, golden object that had Tyrion's eyes widening.

"Here," Cersei thrust the signet of Hand of the King in his direction with the typically disgusted look she usually reserved for him when she was more than angry with him.

Tyrion bent down and picked it up off the floor carefully, as if he was afraid it might explode in his hand. "And this is...?"

"Are you blind now, as well as horribly deformed?" Cersei snapped. Then, "Uncle Kevan is busy trying to put down the insurrection of the armies that we lost when Father died, and told me to appoint someone else, and Jaime has refused me. I won't have the damn thing falling into the hands of Mace Tyrell. He's practically salivating over it, and his whore of a daughter has almost convinced that he would be a good choice."

Tyrion chuckled blandly as he pinned the thing to his chest. So that was why Jaime and Cersei were so at odds of late. It was almost nice, to be the lesser hated brother. "And I suppose there is no one else, as you can hardly take on the title yourself."

He knew why Jaime had done it. Knew that, as long as Cersei wanted to keep the Hand of the King out of Mace Tyrell’s hands, Jaime was going to make sure she had no other choice than to ensure that Tyrion had a place here in King’s Landing.

He was almost touched, that his brother had put that much thought into politics. But then, he was always smarter than he seemed, when it came to that sort of thing, as long as he had the proper motivation.

Cersei sniffed. "There will be an official ceremony, with Joffrey naming you before the Court tomorrow at the noon hour. Try not to ride in on a horse that shits everywhere, like Father did."

Tyrion smirked, glancing down at the pin in his hand. Such an innocuous little thing, but carrying so much power. He hadn't thought he would want it, when he touched it, knowing it had been pried off of his father's cold finger.

But, in that moment, Tyrion realized that he very much did.

He may have lost his birthright and inheritance with Casterly Rock, but he had gained something that Cersei could never take away from him, because of what lay between her legs.

He grinned, pinning the thing to his chest. "I think it looks rather good, don't you?"

Cersei's jaw twitched, before she turned on her heel and strode for the door. She paused in the entryway, turning back to him.

"I don't know how you got away with this," she told him through slitted eyes, "But your freedom won't last. I'll see that the gods rain judgment down on you in whatever way I have to." She nodded to the pink she had just handed him. “Don’t expect it to last. I’ll see that Jaime changes his mind.”

Tyrion licked his lips. "I expected nothing less," he told her, and the door slammed behind her on her way out.


	190. MARGAERY

Margaery threw the shoe and watched it slam into the wall with a loud crash, the glass heel shattering as she grunted out in frustration.

Her ladies exchanged nervous glances, and then Elinor cleared her throat. "Girls, why don't you..."

"No," Margaery snapped, sinking down onto the edge of her bed and glaring at one of those girls in particular. "No, you're not sending them away, Elinor. Did I ask you to?"

Elinor raised a brow, not particularly impressed with Margaery's ire. "If that's what Your Grace wants," she said, voice a little too sweet.

Margaery tried not to roll her eyes. She glanced down at her hands, realized there was a shallow cut from the glass of the shoe she had just thrown. She wondered if she had been digging it into her palm.

She examined it for a moment, and then looked up at Elinor again, sighed.

Elinor released a shallow breath of her own. "Ladies, your mistress is tired of you, and you're becoming a headache for me as well, to be honest. Go find something else to amuse yourselves with."

Margaery's ladies fled toward the door.

"Lady Rosamund," Margaery snapped just as they were walking out, "Stay behind."

Rosamund lifted her head, eyes going wide as the other ladies stared at her in varying degrees of pity and annoyance.

"My lady-"

"It's Your Grace," Margaery snapped at her. "Now stay behind."

The girl lowered her head. "If that's what you wish, Your Grace."

"It is," Margaery ground out, and the rest of her ladies fled at that tone.

Margaery had never had a temper before she came to King's Landing. She wondered if it had been the same for Cersei, for Queen Rhaella before her.

She wondered if that was why the woman had dismissed Joanna Lannister from her service.

She sighed, running a hand through her hair. She was never more painfully aware that her ladies were her servants, and her friends no longer, than when she was angry enough to blow up at any of them.

And that...hurt, more than she had expected. She wondered, abruptly, if that was the real reason that she had gravitated toward Sansa.

She bit her lip, forced herself not to think about Sansa now, trapped down in the Black Cells, alone and scared and not eating-

And all because of the young woman standing in front of her, fidgeting nervously.

Margaery straightened where she sat, eying Lady Rosamund with a look that she hoped was impassive but she rather suspected wasn't.

"You know that my brother Loras is very important to me," she told Rosamund, and watched with some degree of satisfaction as the girl blinked in confusion.

Good. That was exactly how Margaery had felt, when the little traitor walked to Joffrey's chambers while he calmly ate his breakfast with his wife, and told them that there was something important they needed to know, on the day of Tyrion's trial.

She was Margaery's lady. She should have come to Margaery first, so that Margaery could deal with this, instead of forgetting her place and going directly to the King, when Margaery could do nothing about her accusations.

And she should have done it when Margaery still had time to do something about, still had time to at least warn Sansa.

"I...I know that, Your Grace," Rosamund said carefully, forehead still wrinkled.

"I am not as close to him as I am to my brother Willas," Margaery said, and thought that perhaps her grandmother was right and Willas' predicament was useful, much as she hated to do so. "But he is very dear to me, and I make a point to look out for him."

Rosamund licked her lips. She may not know what was going on, but she knew that it boded ill.

Good. Let her be left in suspense, as Margaery weaved her own tale.

"His position on the Kingsguard was given to him to honor me, and to show how well he fought during the Battle of Blackwater," Margaery continued. "I remember the day they put the white cloak on his shoulders. He was so proud."

"My lad...Your Grace, I don't understand," Rosamund said, and Margaery lifted a hand.

"Interrupt me again, and you won't have a tongue to do it with," she said, an echo of the threat Joffrey had thrown at Tyrion during his trial.

Rosamund fell silent, swallowing hard.

"Good," Margaery said, then continued, "Loras and indeed, the rest of my family, would be horrified if anything were to happen that would jeopardize his position in the Kingsguard. There are only so many things that a member of the Kingsguard can do before the King takes ear."

Rosamund swallowed. "Your Grace, please, allow me to explain myself, about the trial. I..."

"I don't care to hear how you would explain yourself," Margaery snapped at her. "I really don't. And I told you I would be rid of your tongue if you interrupted me again. Did you think that was a shallow threat?"

Rosamund licked her lips, swallowed.

"Now," Margaery said, "As I was saying, my brother's position on the Kingsguard is a great honor to our family. And as a member of the Kingsguard, he is meant to be celibate." She raised a brow at Rosamund, watched as the girl paled, figuring out her game before Rosamund needed to speak it.

Sometimes petty revenge was worth it, Margaery thought snidely.

Then she thought of Sansa again, and the satisfaction was gone again in the next moment.

"So imagine my surprise when my brother, who has never shown the slightest interested in breaking his vows with any young tart, came to me the other day, and told me of your...inappropriate advances on him."

Rosamund gulped. "My lady, please-"

"I told him that no, surely he must be mistaken," Margaery said, standing to her feet now, circling Rosamund. She could practically smell the fear on the other girl.

She wanted to taste it.

"That sweet, innocent Lady Rosamund could never have done such a thing, that you have never shown the slightest interest in a man, that you would never betray me in such a way."

Her very real anger bled into her voice, with those words, and Rosamund flinched and took a step back.

"But my brother insisted that it was you," Margaery said. "That you came to his chambers in the White Tower, in the middle of the night, and asked him to fuck you," she spat the cruel word, and Rosamund flinched again. "That you touched him before he could spurn your advances, that when he did, you still persisted."

Rosamund dropped to her knees on the marble floor and clasped her hands in front of her, the way Margaery had not been able to when she cited her accusations against Sansa. "My lady, I beg of you, please..."

Margaery crossed her arms over her chest. "I can't have such a strumpet amongst my ladies, influencing their young minds," she told Rosamund. "I can't have it said that one of the Queen's own ladies is a whore."

Rosamund lowered her head. "Please don't do this, Your Grace, please..."

"It seems you finally remember my title," Margaery said coldly. "Get up, Lady Rosamund; it's undignified for you to be on your knees like this, in a bedchamber."

Rosamund flushed, climbed to her feet. "I..."

"You will leave King's Landing by tomorrow morning," Margaery told her. "You will return to the Reach in shame, and tell everyone in your family exactly why you have been sent home in disgrace. Because you tried to convince the Queen's celibate brother to fuck you like a whore."

A tear slipped down Rosamund's cheek. "You can't do this," she whispered. "My lady, I have never betrayed you. I was only trying to..."

Margaery leaned into her space. "I think you'll find that I can," Margaery told her. "In fact, I could order you killed for this, or anything else I wish. You should be glad that this is all I will do."

And this only because she didn't think Sansa would forgive her for anything more, for all that Sansa herself might die because of this little traitor.

Rosamund wetted her lips. "I...The King will know that..."

"You ought to thank me, Lady Rosamund," Margaery interrupted her, tapping her fingers against her elbows impatiently. "After all, for an unmarried lady like yourself to slut around like this, well...you could have lost your life so easily, if I went to the King about this matter."

Rosamund flinched. "Thank you, Your Grace," she whispered, eyes on the ground.

Margaery smirked. "You're welcome, darling. Now," she waved a dismissive hand, the way Joffrey did when he was bored. "You had better go and start packing. I'm not averse to throwing you out of this Keep if that's what it takes."

And she would, Margaery thought. In a heartbeat.

Fuck, she thought, the moment Rosamund fled her chambers.

Because this hadn't helped Sansa. It hadn't made her feel better, as it had for Margaery, for only a few moments.

She buried her face in her hands and sighed.


	191. TYRION

"I am the Hand of the King," Tyrion said idly, staring down at the pin sitting on the table between them, and Jaime snorted, reaching for his wine with his good hand. Pod had the good sense not to try and pour it for him this time, before Tyrion sent the boy away that they might be alone, and Tyrion was relieved to see that his brother seemed to be getting better at doing so himself.

The Hand hung in the air by his side, and Jaime wasn't looking at it at all, but according to Bronn, he had as least learned enough in using his left not to get himself killed the first time an Iron Islander took a swing at him.

That had been a relief, when their father sent Jaime off to fight in the Islands, though Tyrion hadn't dared to voice that worry to their father, convinced as he was that his son would simply have to deal with it, to adapt as Tywin expected all of his children to do.

Well, expected Jaime and Cersei to do. Tyrion, he had probably wished would never adapt as well as he had.

Tyrion grimaced, and took another sip of his wine. His father was dead, and even in death, Tyrion could not dredge up one positive thought towards the bastard. He wondered if that said more about his father or about him.

But still, he supposed, if his father had not died, he would never have seen this damn pin again. And this time, it was for him, and he did not have it as a mouthpiece for his father, however long that was going to last.

For a moment, Tyrion almost wished that Cersei had given in and gave the damn thing to Mace Tyrell. Tyrion had yet to attend a meeting of the Small Council since his new appointment, but he could just imagine the scowl on the man's normally jovial features the moment Tyrion walked in.

He had enough enemies in King's Landing to worry about the Flowers.

But he was not going to look a gift horse in the mouth today, even if that horse was his pernicious sister and the pin did have a sharp edge to it. He was the Hand of the King, even if Cersei had stolen the Rock from him, and that had to be worth something.

It meant he could finally do something about Joffrey, even if he couldn't free his little wife from the Black Cells, or convince Cersei that there was more to Oberyn Martell suddenly jumping up in the trial and claiming that he had killed Tywin Lannister.

"Congratulations," Jaime muttered, and Tyrion snorted, too. He downed another cup of wine, watched closely as Jaime did the same.

His brother had never been as prone to drink as Tyrion. Cersei had not started drinking until after Robert died, out of some sick attempt to become like him.

And now Jaime was drinking as if he were as much of a heavyweight with alcohol as Tyrion. It was...disturbing to witness. He wondered when that had started.

They were sitting in his chambers, the ones that had once seemed so small and were now too large without his little wife inhabiting them. Tyrion could sense her, all around them, could see fleeting images of her trying to smile as they played a game of cyvasse, could see her surreptitiously sliding his wine bottle away from him when she thought he had drunk too much.

Had felt her imprint on the bed last night, as he laid down in it for the first time since they had been wed. He hadn't had the stomach to take the couch again, as he had been doing, after spending so long in a Black Cell.

Tyrion heaved a long sigh, ignored the knowing look his brother sent him.

And then there was Shae, and her absence in this room was as loud as Sansa's. Shae wasn't speaking to him, not after he told her he didn't know that Sansa would be freed, and that after Cersei's smear campaign during his trial, he didn't think they should risk spending so much time together.

She'd found herself a job in the kitchens, gossiping with the other ladies, he thought, though of course he didn't know. It wasn't as if she'd told him. He only knew that as much from what Pod had told him, his relationships with the ladies in the kitchens rather helping in that regard. She was as cold to Tyrion as she had been the first few days in which she had realized he was going to marry Sansa, her jealousy cropping up.

And he didn't know how to fix that, because he would do everything he could to help Sansa, and he just wanted to keep Shae safe, no matter that she always resented him for such things. He had resolved to simply wait, but it was proving harder than he had thought.

Jaime was the only one he had left, Tyrion realized abruptly, and hated the way his throat closed off at the thought.

That was the way things had once been, some time ago, but it felt strange to go back to that certainty, unnatural in a way that it had never been, before.

Tyrion tapped his fingers on the table, looking away from his brother. "It should have been you. Cersei wants it to be you. Father is no doubt rolling in his grave. Cersei has made no secret of her contempt for me."

He didn't add the rest of what he was thinking, that there was no way that Cersei was going to let him live with this victory, for all that she had given him the Hand of the King.

He was well aware that he was her last choice above Mace Tyrell, and she had sworn that she would bring him down for their father's murder.

He winced a little at that thought.

Jaime shrugged, flippant. He stared down at his golden hand, and Tyrion followed his gaze and grimaced. The gaudy thing that Cersei'd had made for him was obnoxious, and Tyrion wondered if there was any doubt that it was part of the reason Jaime so loathed the loss of his hand.

"She appointed you. Convinced Joffrey it was a good idea," Jaime said.

"How the fuck did she manage that, by the way?" Tyrion asked. He was genuinely curious. He'd have thought Joffrey's little wife would have convinced him to choose her own father, instead.

Perhaps Cersei still had more control over the son she was tug of warring her gooddaughter for, after all. And of course, Tyrion wanted to know exactly how that was.

Jaime snorted, didn't answer. "She'll just have to get over it." He licked his lips, glanced at Tyrion. "And I don't suppose Father can come back and haunt us now, can he?"

The words were light, but the look in his brother's eyes was anything but, and Tyrion eyed him in concern. He couldn't remember the last time Jaime had seemed so flippant about their sister, couldn't even remember the last time they had fought enough that it had been obvious that was what they were doing, and not merely playing another one of their games with each other. "You and Cersei..."

Jaime took a long gulp of wine, and Tyrion let the subject drop. It was a strange situation, for as much as he wanted to support his brother, he didn't want the details anyway. 

"Do you have a plan to free your little wife?" Jaime asked into the silence that followed, taking a long breath.

Tyrion sighed. "She is my responsibility," he said tiredly, hands clasping for the wine bottle yet again, but he didn't pour it. Instead, he met his brother's eyes. "If I tell you, will Cersei hear of it?"

Jaime looked affronted, but he didn't hold Tyrion's gaze for long. "She's a child, Tyrion," he said dryly.

Tyrion shrugged. "That's not an answer, Jaime," he reminded his brother, and Jaime ground his teeth.

He was no fool. He knew that Bran Stark had lost the use of his legs because he was able to climb walls, remembered Catelyn Stark chastising her son for that.

And Tyrion Lannister had known what his brother and sister were doing that day, what felt like ages ago now, with the rest of Winterfell occupied by the hunt and Robert blissfully uncaring.

Jaime shot him a wounded look. "No," he said, sounding close to sheepish. Tyrion wondered if he regretted what he had done, or if he still thought it necessary. "She will not hear of it from me."

Which was more than Tyrion needed to know, about the state of Jaime and Cersei's relationship at the moment.

Good.

He leaned back in his chair, grabbed up his and Jaime's wine glasses and poured them both more. Jaime's lips twitched, as if he knew exactly what Tyrion was doing, but he didn't speak up.

He just took another sip of wine, and Tyrion hated watching it. It seemed he was going to have to do something about that, too.

Tyrion nodded. "I don't know what to do," he confessed, because Jaime was his brother and there was no use lying to him.

Cersei lied to their brother enough for the both of them. He wondered if she had told Jaime about Lancel, yet. Moonboy.

He doubted it. Jaime would not look so beaten down and attached to her side once more if she had.

"I could help her escape, but Joffrey would know that it was me, and so would Cersei. I would..." he hesitated, not wanting to voice the words.

Jaime lifted his head, looking alive for the first time since he had come to Tyrion's chambers today. "You would have to go with her," he surmised, voice dark and eyes pained at the idea.

Another pause. Tyrion nodded.

Jaime blew out a breath, slow and long, and leaned back in his chair. "Varys?" he asked.

Tyrion lifted a brow, though he had been thinking something along the same lines. "What about him?"

"He seems awfully attached to the Dornish cause," Jaime said. "When I was..." he licked his lips, "In the Small Council yesterday, I think he almost showed an emotion, talking about what we'll do with Dorne now."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "As if we'll be able to do anything with them now," he muttered. "Dorne's impregnable, and Myrcella is still there."

"I don't think Joffrey remembers Myrcella," Jaime said, contemplatively. He didn't even sound like he was joking.

Tyrion snorted. "Do you think he remembers how much of an idiot he was when he alienated the North by chopping off Ned Stark's head?"

"Are you going to approach Varys?" Jaime asked, not to be deterred.

Tyrion hesitated, looking at his brother again. He wanted to believe that Jaime would do nothing, that the oath he had told Tyrion about, the one he had made to Catelyn Stark, that he would protect her daughters, was one that he would keep.

He knew how seriously Jaime considered his oaths.

But he couldn't trust him, not now, and that hurt more than the knowledge that he had traded his freedom for Sansa's. Not seeing the way he had attached himself to Cersei since she had returned from Highgarden, as if the thought of losing her again was too much to bear.

And if Jaime did have to make a choice, between his little brother and his twin sister, Tyrion honestly didn't know which way he would fall. And he didn't want to push such a thing into happening.

"Not yet," Tyrion said. "I'm not quite desperate enough to make a deal with the Stranger."

Jaime snorted. "Just because he doesn't have a cock..."


	192. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I hope my American readers had a Happy Thanksgiving and didn't get killed on Black Friday.

"We want to do whatever we can to help," Alla told her, and Margaery blinked at the girl, at the rest of her ladies crowded around her in Margaery's parlor, wondered how her ladies could be at times so disappointing and so wonderful to her.

She didn't know which ones of them she could trust, any longer. When she sent her lady to spy on Cersei, it had been in the knowledge that she trusted all of her ladies equally, though perhaps Elinor a bit more than the rest.

Rosamund had proved that perhaps she couldn't trust any of them.

But then here they were once more, surprising her.

Things had been tense with her ladies, since she had banished Lady Rosamund back to Highgarden. They walked on pins around her, afraid of setting her off again, Margaery couldn't help but think. And gods, did she hate that thought. That her ladies felt the fear around her that she felt around her husband.

But she didn't regret what she had done, even if it had gotten her nothing, in the end. She would have no disloyal ladies amongst them, much as the thought of how she had reacted to Lady Rosamund's betrayal ate at her.

And that was another issue. If Lady Rosamund knew about her liaisons with Sansa, as she surely did, sending her back to Highgarden might not have been the smartest choice. If she opened her mouth to anyone...

"Are you sure?" she asked, the question encompassing all of her ladies, standing there as if ready to head into a war.

Margaery wondered if it would come to that, if she was stupid enough to do something about Sansa's arrest.

Megga nodded. "Yes," she said instantly, before the others. "We're your ladies, after all."

Margaery forced herself to smile. "Thank you," she said, and was surprised by how much she meant it.

Janna smiled. "Of course. We all adore Lady Sansa," she said, and Margaery knew that at least in Janna's case, it was true. The other girl, too young to be a wife but one before Margaery, seemed to have made it her personal mission to make Sansa smile at least once in her company, something that had once been Margaery's own goal.

She sighed at the thought, doubting that Sansa was smiling now. Wondering if she was ever going to smile again.

"All right," she said, feeling slightly overwhelmed. "Right. I'll need you to find out anything you can about Lady Sansa's current situation. Figure out who her guards are, when the changing of the guards happen, when she is fed. Figure out whether what Rosamund said was the truth from the serving girls. And by the gods, figure out who convinced Rosamund to speak up at the trial."

As angry as she was at the other girl, Margaery had recognized the uncoordinated movements, the fear in her eyes as she spoke.

Cersei would never have bid her to speak, but clearly someone had.

"Anything else?" Elinor asked, sounding somewhere between amused and faint.

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "Lady Sansa is still an important asset, because she is the North," she told them. "I am going to attempt to persuade my husband to make sure that she stays that way."

The loss of her battle against Cersei to name her father the Hand of the King still stung. Margaery had been sure she had almost convinced her husband to name him within a few days, and that had been a complete failure.

She still wasn't sure how Cersei had done it, knew only that she had gone into her son's chambers for less than an hour and emerged with the pin belonging to the Hand of the King in her grasp.

If Margaery couldn't even convince her husband to name whom she wanted as Hand of the King, how was she going to convince him to free Sansa?

She licked her lips, ignored the worried looks of her ladies. "Well?" she asked. "Off you go."

And then she herself was standing, finding her way to her husband's chambers.

It was midday, and he wasn't there when she arrived. Still, the Kingsguard knew to let her pass regardless of whether her husband was there, and he didn't react when she did exactly that, brushing her sleeve against his arm as she did so. She had complained to Joffrey once that she could not even sleep in his chambers if she so wanted, and he had insisted on it.

"Be sure to let the King know that I am here when he returns," she told the man sweetly, and he eyed her, lifting a brow.

Margaery shut the door pointedly the moment she was through it.

Margaery glanced around the room in distaste, wanting nothing more than to turn around and leave. Sansa was in the Black Cells. Sansa was a prisoner, alone, and-

She walked over to the bed, and tried to remind herself that she was a queen, that it was her duty to birth an heir, and that Joffrey would expect nothing less than her enthusiasm when it happened.

She stripped out of her gown, letting it fall to the ground in a white pool, and then from her smallclothes, climbing naked onto her husband's golden blankets.

She closed her eyes, pretended she was back in her own chambers, or, better, in Sansa's.

She shook her head. No, it was best not to think about Sansa now. If she did, she didn't think she would ever be able to perform the way she needed to when Joffrey returned.

She bit her lip, pressed her index finger between the lids of her cunt, and tried to think of something that might arouse her enough for when her husband returned, something that wasn't-

Sansa, pressing kisses against her skin. Sansa, laughing at something stupid Margaery had said. Sansa, smiling at her as if she was the sole light in Sansa's world.

Sansa gritted her teeth as she felt tears stinging at her eyes, even as she gasped a little, inserted another finger.

She heard the door creep open silently, pretended she heard nothing as she let out another gasp.

"Starting without me?" Joffrey asked, and she could hear the grin in his voice, for all that she affected surprise and jumped up, forced herself to blush.

It was such a careful line, she thought, playing to her husband's fantasies of both wicked partner and blushing maiden.

"Your Grace, I..." then she smirked at him. "I don't suppose you'd like to join me," she said, reaching up to brush at the hardened nubs of her nipples. "It's ever so lonely, preparing myself like this without Your Grace's cock inside of me."

Joffrey smirked, walking forward. "Is it?" he asked.

Margaery nodded, tried to look desperate but not too desperate. "Oh, yes," she said, running her palms in small circles now. "I was beginning to wonder if Your Grace had forgotten all about me."

Joffrey moved forward, crouching beside her on the bed. She moved over for him, laid back down. "My damn uncle Tyrion is so insistent about these Small Council meetings," he told her, reaching out and brushing a hand through her hair. "As if his King doesn't have more important things to do than to hold his hand now that he is the Hand again."

Margaery tried not to pout. She didn't want to think about that loss, just now. Not with Sansa's life on the line. She reached for his hand.

"No," Joffrey pulled away from her. "I want to watch you," he said, leaning back on his haunches.

Margaery raised a brow. Her husband had never asked for that before. Not that he was exactly _asking_ now.

She leaned back, wondered if she was supposed to feel self conscious, with her husband's eyes on her. She had felt a little so in the past, with her lovers in Highgarden, and most recently with Sansa, for all that she had enjoyed it immensely.

Margaery loved having an audience.

But this was...different. Disappointing, almost.

She touched herself, and tried to feel alive under her own fingers in the knowledge that her husband was watching her.

Margaery forced herself not to react as he fingered the crossbow, seemingly paying more attention to it than he was to her, but she wasn't a fool.

She wondered what he had looked like, the day he came out of his mother's womb. If his mother had looked on him and saw some foul monster, and somehow found it within herself to love him anyway.

"Your Grace," she said casually. He looked back up at her face. "What are you going to do about the traitors? I know Prince Oberyn ought to die, but killing Sansa might be...more annoying than it's worth."

Joffrey snorted. "If only the North weren't so traitorous, we wouldn't have that problem at all, and I could finally get rid of the annoying little bitch."

"Of course," Margaery agreed placidly. "But it is."

Joffrey sighed. "Yes," he said, seeming no longer interested in Margaery now, which was a relief, because she didn't think she could fake an orgasm, not today.

She sat up a little. "What are you going to do, then?"

Her husband sighed, sounding put out, now. "The gods will have to decide their fates," he said.

"Yes," she said, running a hand down his arm, "but what about you?"

He eyed her. "I'm going to fuck you now," he said, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek.


	193. SANSA

"Food for the prisoners," the guard said, tossing a plate of bread and meat in her direction, and Sansa grimaced as she picked it up.

For a moment, the food wavered before her eyes like a mirage; the bread was moldy, the meat swimming, a dozen little worms climbing out of it, and then, it wasn't. The bread was stale but white, the meat cool but firm.

She threw it across the room, anyway.

And, a few moments later, she felt her stomach roiling, moved to a corner of the cell that she had not inhabited, and emptied whatever was in her stomach into the straw.

She could not remember when she had last eaten, what it had been, did not know how she was able to empty so much of her stomach, until she could feel her body protesting, until she was sure that she would hack up her lungs and stomach itself.

"Sansa?" she heard Prince Oberyn call out, when there was nothing left and she lay trembling in the straw, feeling groggy and dirty. "Sansa, are you all right?"

He'd done as she wanted until this moment, not speaking to her because she had demanded it, but Sansa was absurdly grateful to hear his voice, just now.

She swallowed, grimaced at the taste in her mouth, wiped at her lips.

"Sansa?"

"I..." she took a deep, shuddering breath. "I'm here."

She couldn't bring herself to utter more than that, looking at the food and seeing molding flesh, her father's rotted head on the spikes of the Keep, her mother's flesh, colorless from being thrown in the river and left there.

She felt sick.

"Sansa," Oberyn's voice was gentle, and she wondered if he almost knew what she was thinking. Well, perhaps he didn't, but being trapped down here in her own silence was indication enough that something was wrong with her.

After all, he knew what had become of her father.

"You will need to eat," Prince Oberyn told her, soft as she imagined he talked to his mares, now. "Keep your strength up."

Sansa shook her head, turned her face away from the food before her. "I don't think I can."

"Sansa..." his voice was gently reproving. "Eat."

She swallowed hard. "Did they imprison Ellaria down here as well?" she asked, because she wanted to be cruel, in that moment, and because she wanted to distract him from the topic in any way that she could.

It worked.

Oberyn's voice was darker when he next spoke. "The guards will tell me nothing," he said, the words reminiscent of what Ellaria had said the day Sansa went to visit her, and she felt a sharp spike of guilt, that she still had never tried to figure out how Oberyn was doing after that.

"I would think they would mention it, if she were down here with us," Sansa said softly. "Perhaps they left her under house arrest. After all, Lady Rosamund didn't mention her in her accusations."

There was another pause, hesitant now, and Sansa wondered how carefully the Viper weighed his words, whenever he spoke with her. "Did you know Lady Rosamund well?" he asked her. "It seemed to me that she took many liberties, to find that information, liberties she should not have had the time to find."

He was asking her if she knew Margaery well, Sansa realized. If she thought that Lady Rosamund had been acting under her queen's orders, because her queen should have noticed if one of her ladies had been spying for so long on the two of them.

Sansa shook her head so violently it hurt.

Margaery wouldn't have done that. She had nothing to gain. She...cared about Sansa, cared about her enough to...

To be hurt when Sansa chose to continue moping about Dorne rather than to return happily to Margaery's bed. To help Sansa leave for Dorne with the Martells, only for a Tyrell ship to drag her back here. To kiss at Sansa's mutilated neck and vow revenge on the one who had made it so.

Sansa glanced up sharply. None of those things meant that Margaery would have done something like this, though. Yes, she had thrown Sansa out, but she wouldn't have gotten her revenge by having Rosamund spy on her all this time...

Sansa forgot how to breathe.

Margaery had proven that she was very good at getting revenge on the people who wronged her, if she so chose, with Ser Osmund Kettleblack. If she wanted revenge on the Martells for stealing Sansa, she would have it. If she wanted revenge on Sansa for not choosing her...

She could have that, too.

And who was to say she had not had her ladies spying on Sansa since the beginning of their relationship, if not before? Sure, she might have excused it as wanting to look out for Sansa, but even if that had been her intent, her ladies might have found out things that they could use against her readily enough.

Sansa's chest was beginning to hurt.

She stumbled over to the corner of the room, the sides of her vision darkening, and emptied dry air and spit into the chamber pot that hadn't been cleaned out since she had arrived down here.

Granted, it had only been a day and a half, if the bringing of food was anything to go by, but it felt like much longer.

Distantly, she could hear Prince Oberyn calling her name. She hadn't been able to hear it before, Sansa realized, through the rushing sound in her ears.

"Sansa?"

She licked chapped lips. "I didn't know her well," she told Oberyn. "She was one of Margaery's lower ladies. I didn't even..."

She didn't understand what the girl would have had to gain at all, from speaking against them. Cersei wouldn't have induced her to speak up, not when everyone could see how excited she was to see her brother killed for their father's murder.

No one had anything to gain from accusing the Martells of anything, not when they were already at war with Dorne. Save for Tyrion, but that hardly made any sense.

Her husband may not love her the way a husband was meant to love their wife, by her choosing more than his, but he would not have sacrificed her for his own freedom, surely.

Surely not.

She realized abruptly that she was a foolish little girl who didn't even know whom she could and could not trust. She had thought she was getting better at playing this game, and now, as she sat in a Black Cell, she didn't even know who was responsible for putting her here.

Save for Oberyn.

"I'm fine," she whispered into the darkness, but Oberyn must have been waiting patiently for her to speak, for his answer was prompt.

"I don't believe that," he said gently. "Sansa, there is nothing wrong with feeling angry that you are here. I regret that I did not try to do more to keep you from being arrested when I was, though I confess I don't think it would have mattered, the way that boy was carrying on."

It took Sansa a moment to realize "that boy" was Joffrey. She cracked a wry smile. It faded quickly.

Sansa reached for the plate of food. Her hand shook a little as she brought the piece of molding bread to her mouth, tore off a piece that looked passable enough.

It tasted like ash in her mouth.

"Will you tell me what it was you stayed so long in King's Landing for?' she asked into the darkness. "What it is we are to die for?"

Oberyn was silent for a long moment, and Sansa almost didn't think he would respond. And then, voice soft, "I'm not going to let you die down here, Lady Sansa."

It wasn't an answer. Sansa turned her back on the hole in the wall between their cells, and let her shoulders shake in silent sobs.

Oberyn didn't try to make her talk, simply waited in the silence, and Sansa closed her eyes and breathed in deep.

Tried to breathe in deep.

She couldn't breathe.

The world was sinking in all around her, getting smaller and smaller, and there was nothing that Sansa could do about it.

She had felt like this the day she watched her father's head be cut off, as one of the guards held her back and she screamed and screamed, but Sansa wasn't screaming now.

She couldn't force the air past her lips.

Her father had died after spending time in a cell like this, and was it selfish of Sansa that her biggest fear was to die in the same way, to lose her life after spending her own time in this cell where her father had languished?

"Sansa," a voice said, a voice she vaguely recognized, but she couldn't place it at the moment, and Sansa feared that, her back stiffening and her breaths coming in strangled gasps. Her head was starting to hurt.

"Sansa, you need to breathe," the voice was more insistent now, and Sansa's mind more insistent that she recognized it, though it was not telling her whether or not she ought to trust it.

Sansa swallowed, sucked in a breath of wet, tangy air. She gagged, then breathed in another.

"That's it," the voice said. "You're doing well."

Sansa tried to smile at the praise, but she couldn't bring herself to manage even that. Instead, she breathed, and that itself was hard enough, when she remembered why she was having such a hard time breathing in the first place.

Sansa closed her eyes, breathed in deep and counted to three, let it out slowly.

The breaths were coming easier after that, and the voice was no longer coaching her on when she should breathe and when she should not.

Sansa opened her eyes, and was still sitting in this horrid Black Cell. She sucked in another breath of the putrid air, forced herself to keep it and her stomach down.

Silence filled the room once she had gotten her breathing under as much control as Sansa thought she was going to manage in that moment, and she wondered how long she had been struggling for breath, that Oberyn had forsaken his promise to leave her alone in order to try and talk her through it.

She blushed at the thought.

And then words were pushing their way past her lips, and she didn't know why she was sharing them with Oberyn Martell, but it was a relief to spit them out, once she had done so, and Sansa couldn't hold them back.

She needed to tell someone, or she wasn't going to be able to breathe again.

"This is where they kept my father, all alone, until they took him to the steps of the Sept and cut his head off," Sansa whispered, her words somehow loud and harsh in the Black Cells, and she knew that Oberyn could hear them.

She needed someone to understand why she couldn't breathe, someone who wasn't going to treat her as a child for it.

Oberyn had never treated her as a child. As a pawn, perhaps, but everyone in King's Landing had done that at some point, even Margaery.

"I know," he said softly.

She knew that he knew that. Everyone in Westeros now knew of the fate that had befallen her father; it was the reason war had happened in the first place. Well, she didn't think it was the reason Renly and Stannis Baratheon had called up their arms, but it had led to war, nonetheless.

She licked her lips. "I..." swallowed again, her mouth terribly dry. She glanced at the dripping walls of her cell and swallowed again. "They let me visit him only once, while he was kept down here."

Oberyn was silent. She was glad for the silence, glad for the way it filled the cells, hers and his.

"I remember thinking how horrid it was, how my father didn't deserve to be kept in a place like this and surely if I explained the conditions to Cersei, and got him to say what needed to be said, that Joffrey was the rightful king, surely they would take him from this place as soon as possible."

Oberyn, thankfully, did not snort or mock her words.

"I remember..." Sansa sucked in a ragged breath. "I remember thinking this place was unfit for animals, let alone my father." She let out a short bark of laughter. "And then I consigned him to a worse fate."

"Lady Sansa..."

She talked loudly over him, because she didn't want to hear him say that it hadn't been her fault. "He was so filthy, when I came down here. I remember that, most of all. He hugged me, and he stank, and I wanted to pull away from him, but I didn't." She swallowed. "And now..."

She glanced down at her clothes, filthy already, from sick and sweat and the dirt of the cell she was in.

She didn't speak for a while. Oberyn didn't either.

When he did speak again, his voice sounded so loud in the otherwise silent cell that it made her jump.

"When Elia married Prince Rhaegar, I thought he was undeserving of her," he said, and Sansa blinked at the change in topic, though a part of her was grateful for it. "He hardly took more than a few glances at her, and she wasn't a Targaryen. I didn't want her to go so far from Dorne, when she had always loved her home so much and there was no guarantee that the Targaryens who tried so hard to show their disdain for anyone who wasn't them would love her in turn."

Sansa licked her lips. "Prince Oberyn..."

"But Doran insisted that it was such a great honor, because everyone knew that Tywin Lannister wanted his daughter married to the Prince, and Tywin Lannister had refused Elia for his son."

Sansa hadn't known that Elia had been offered to Ser Jaime.

"She hated it here," Oberyn said. "Oh, she never complained, because she was always so careful to be sweet," he said, and Sansa thought about how she was always so careful to say the right things around the Lannisters, wondered if it would have ever mattered if she had complained. "But I could see that she hated it here, every time I came to visit her. She was wasting away, as it was. Her husband held no love for her because she could not give him the third child he wanted, and she had tried hard to love him in turn."

Sansa licked her lips.

"And then came that damn tourney," Oberyn said. "When Rhaegar crowned another other than his wife, a fucking child. And finally, my sister told me the truth of her situation there."

"What...what did she say?" Sansa asked.

"She called King's Landing her prison, and I begged leave of the Prince to take her home to Dorne for a time. He refused, because she hadn't birthed him another child, and he didn't think it wise for her to travel far when she was so...ill," he sneered the words. "As if this wicked air and wicked place hadn't made her so to begin with, when she was never ill in Dorne.

"And then Rhaegar abandoned his duties to his wife and ran away with Lyanna Stark," he said, poison bleeding into his voice, and Sansa wondered if he remembered that he was speaking with a Stark, now.

Was she a Stark anymore? Not so long ago she had been convinced there was nothing left of her as a Stark, that she had taken the name Lannister and that was what she was now, for better or worse.

It absolved her of so much, she thought.

"And he left her and her children with the Mad King, who wouldn't let her leave this shithole at all," Oberyn said. "She was his hostage, to ensure the Martells didn't turn on the Crown and join the Rebellion. And she died here, without ever seeing her homeland again. Without ever seeing her brothers again."

Sansa felt tears clogging in her throat. She wondered if she was going to die here now, without ever seeing her homeland again.

"I took you from this place because I could not save my sister Elia," Oberyn said softly into the darkness that followed her thoughts, "And I won't apologize for it, Lady Sansa, even if it has brought you to this state."

Sansa swallowed. "I..." she didn't know what to say to that. She wondered if, knowing everything she knew now, she still would have accepted his invitation to flee to Dorne with him.

She turned her back on the Prince even as she thought the answer was likely yes.


	194. TYRION

"Who was that Pod, and what the fuck did they want?" Tyrion asked idly, glancing up from his papers.

He remembered thinking that as Master of Coin, he had been nothing more than a glorified bookkeeper, though Joffrey and Tywin had been happy enough not to glorify him.

Now, as Hand of the King once more, he couldn't help but wonder why he hadn't remembered all of this damn paperwork.

He pressed Joffrey's seal into yet another proposed legislation that Joffrey had likely never looked at and never would, and pushed the heel of his palm into his temple, glancing up at Pod as the boy closed the door on the courtier standing outside it with a shallow bow.

Still, it was better than languishing as Master of Coin, this job, and it was fucking better than spending his time in that damn dungeon.

The one Sansa had taken his place in.

He swore softly under his breath.

"The King requests that you come to dinner with him and the rest of the family," Pod said. "Well, maybe his mother does." He glanced at the bottle of Dornish Red, one of the few left in the Keep, what with them being at war, apparently.

Gods, what a fuck up.

"More wine, sir?"

Tyrion snorted. "Know me so well, do you boy?" he asked, and couldn't help some of the bitterness that bled into his voice.

He had asked Bronn if the man would represent him, if it came to a trial by combat. The thought had been on the tip of Tyrion's tongue to demand one anyway during his trial, if he might have forced the words out with Joffrey's threat to cut out his tongue.

He had almost demanded one anyway, just to keep Joffrey's attention of Sansa, but Joffrey's little wife had failed to keep his attention off of Sansa since the beginning.

Tyrion railing wasn't going to stop that, and he'd known that from the moment Joffrey had threatened to rape Sansa on their wedding day.

Bronn had refused him. Had laughed in his face and told him about how Cersei had offered him a duchess and a little castle off the coast. He'd taken it, even if he seemed to feel vaguely guilty about it.

Tyrion wondered if he knew anyone the way he once thought he had been so good at reading them. He hadn't known that his little wife was capable of killing, hadn't known Bronn would give up their friendship for the first highborn bitch Cersei offered, hadn't known Oberyn would drag a little girl into the fray after railing for so long about his sister's treatment.

He shook his head. He did know one person still, and he knew that if he had asked Jaime to represent him, Jaime would have agreed. And promptly gotten himself killed, of course.

Tyrion shook his head, pushed aside the letters, wondered what in the seven hells his sister wanted, inviting him to sup with her family. It wasn't as if she had ever cared to extend such an invitation unless forced by their father or Jaime in the past.

Of course, refusing would mean the chance for her to convince Joffrey he was nothing more than a sad drunk.

Tyrion sighed, getting up and pushing his chair in behind him. He could worry about Sansa and these damned articles later. It was time to start playing the game again.

He passed Pod, told the boy to take a little time off. "I know the ladies in the kitchen have been mourning your loss since I got out of the cells," he told Pod.

Pod blushed, as he always did when Tyrion teased him about this. "I'm just glad you're back, my lord," he told him, and Tyrion almost rejoined with the thought that perhaps he was the only one.

He didn't, merely reached for his overcoat and marched in the general direction of the King's chambers.

Tyrion paused outside the door, raised a hand to stop the herald before the man could announce him, as he could tell the man wanted to.

He looked in on the supposedly happy, golden family gathered within. They didn't look like a family mourning the loss of anyone; everyone in that room seemed to fit into a puzzle that would be incomplete alone.

They pretended to be happy together, and all wanted to stab at least one person at the table in the throat. Save perhaps Tommen.

Even the King's new little wife seemed to fit into this strange place so easily, in her shining, skin tight golden gown and with her hair billowing over her shoulders.

She almost looked like a born Lannister.

Though Tyrion supposed she was not exactly new now, for all that she should seem out of place.

He bit back a sigh, glanced at Tommen, where he sat beside Queen Margaery, and thought perhaps she had usurped his spot in the family, for out of everyone in the room, he looked the most out of place, if such was the right word, fiddling with his fork and trying to avoid whatever healthy vegetables his mother had insisted be placed on his plate.

Tyrion snorted. Sometimes Cersei missed the point so completely that he almost pitied her.

He stepped inside just as the herald called out his name, not to be put off any longer, not even by the Hand of the King.

Tyrion supposed that, were he in the other man's place, King Joffrey's herald, he wouldn't want to be seen as shirking his responsibilities, either.

Then again, Tyrion was the Hand of the King. He wondered what Joffrey might do to him if he failed at that, and resolved that this could never be allowed to happen. Not because he feared what Joffrey might do, but because he was the Hand now.

He'd had less power before, when he was merely his father's mouthpiece in King's Landing, and Cersei could run crying to him if she felt that Tyrion wasn't doing his job right.

Cersei had given Tyrion this job of her own volition, and Tyrion wasn't blind to the power that gave him. That Cersei literally didn't have another choice for this position, and therefore couldn't foist him out.

Tyrion smiled as his family turned to face him, Tommen alone smiling at the sight of him. The little boy called out, "Uncle Tyrion," and made as if to get out of his seat.

Cersei glared at the servant behind him, who pushed the little boy's chair in a little pointedly.

The boy pouted, but sent Tyrion a wave nonetheless.

Tyrion couldn't resist winking at him, which sent the little boy into a small giggle that not even his mother's glare could suppress.

Fuck, if only Joffrey had been the one killed, and then Tommen would be King.

Tyrion glanced at Margaery as he took his seat, saw the smile she sent at Tommen, and amended that thought. Between her and Cersei, they would eat the little boy alive. He alone in the kingdom was lucky Joffrey lived to keep that burden from him.

Tyrion took his seat at the head of the table, glad of the little, identical frowns Joffrey and Cersei sent him over this, and reached immediately for his empty glass, beckoning one of the servants to fill it.

Cersei rolled her eyes, leaning a little harder on Jaime's arm where she clung to it, the pernicious bitch, as if she expected Tyrion to try and tear him from her in front of the whole room.

Still, she wasn't wrong, and Tyrion gritted his teeth and resisted making a comment about Jaime being attached to his sister's skirts.

He didn't like the sight of Jaime, sitting down next to their sister with a small smile on his face, not flinching back as she laid her hand atop his golden one.

He didn't like the sight of Jaime anywhere near her. As much as he'd missed his brother, he'd been a lot happier when Jaime was off fighting in the Iron Islands, spouting off about their father's stupidity and blushing over that big blond woman still stuck in the White Tower.

Jaime reached over with his hand, rubbed the pad of his thumb along Cersei's wrist until his hand disappeared beneath the table. They weren't even trying to be subtle.

Then again, Tyrion supposed there was no one left alive who still believed their fiction, so why should they be?

He wondered if his brother thought he could have everything, now. Tywin may be dead, but he had Cersei, willing to show how she felt about him no matter who was looking, at the moment, and Tyrion, freed from his cell.

Again, Tyrion thought idly as Cersei sent her brother a small glare, at the moment.

Margaery smiled, seeming to notice the tightness between Cersei and Tyrion, trying to defuse the situation.

He applauded her continued desire to do so. Tyrion had long since given up on the idea of the Lannister family coexisting peacefully.

"I was so glad to hear that you were not guilty of the crimes against you, Lord Tyrion," Margaery said in that soft, cooing voice she used that Tyrion was rather surprised worked on Joffrey. "That the family could be reunited."

"Yes," Tyrion said idly, "a family like every other, sitting down for dinner. Madness, the Mother of Madness, and the cripple. And, of course, the supposed kinslayer. Forgetting, of course, my wife."

Margaery paled a little, looked down at her plate. Tyrion couldn't help but notice that it was almost empty. He wondered that she wasn't hungry, thought of the way she had looked at Lady Rosamund when the girl had stood to speak up for Tyrion.

He should have paid closer attention to her friendship with Sansa.

Cersei ground her teeth so hard he was surprised she didn't break one. "You will apologize to the King for saying such things," she said, before Joffrey could draw breath.

"How cruel of you, to assume I'm talking about Joffrey there," Tyrion said, smirking as he reached for his wine glass. Then, abandoning that, he took up the whole wine bottle from the hands of the servant standing behind him.

Sniffed it, because it would be just like Cersei to see him freed from prison only to poison him at a supper table.

Hadn't she done something similar with the Starks, after all?

"So, Tommen," Margaery said loudly, and everyone turned to stare at her, Cersei, for once, not glaring at her. "How are your studies?"

Tommen blinked up at her from his plate of food. Tyrion saw that he was moving the beets around with his fork, rather than eating them. He tried not to smile, knowing how the boy hated them.

He'd been quietly ecstatic, throwing his arms around Tyrion and crying, when Tyrion found his way out of the Black Cells, perhaps the only person besides Jaime who had been.

Well, Shae had been as well, but there had been some sort of pain in her eyes, knowing that Sansa had only taken his place.

Of course, Cersei had disapproved at once, snapping at Tommen that he should let his uncle at least bathe before he went near him, though they both knew that wasn't the reason she was protesting.

It must kill her, Tyrion thought, to know that two of her children actually cared about their imp of an uncle.

"They...they're going well," Tommen said quietly, a small blush creeping its way into his cheeks, and Tyrion blinked at that, wondered if Margaery had ever addressed the boy at all before.

No, he was quite certain that she had, which just made this all the more strange.

"Your studies?" Cersei asked, shrill and disapproving.

Did she think her son learned nothing, Tyrion thought, merely because Joffrey had never retained anything from his own studies?

"I'm learning about the army now, Mama," Tommen told her, smiling a little. "Joffrey thought it might be important, as the Prince."

Cersei raised a brow, forgetting Tyrion altogether now, eying Margaery where she held possessively to Joffrey's left arm in distaste. "Did he?" she asked.

Joffrey smirked. "He ought to know something of importance, the little idiot," Joffrey muttered. "It's not like he's learning anything important in the entire histories of the Rock."

"Tommen is going to be the Lord of the Rock, someday," Cersei said, sending a triumphant smirk in Tyrion's direction, and damn, did that still burn. "It is his duty to learn such things."

Joffrey waved a hand, took another bite of the fig that Margaery held up to his lips. "I am the King, and I ought to say what it is his duty to learn, as my brother," he told her.

Cersei opened her mouth, perhaps to let Joffrey know that Tommen was her son first, but Margaery beat her to it.

"A noble idea," she said, and Cersei's brow furrowed, and she glanced down at the table where Margaery was still clasping Joffrey's arm.

Tyrion blinked at that as well, surprised that the girl was advocating for Tommen to take his place as crown prince. Wondering if she was barren, or she thought her husband impotent.

Tyrion certainly wouldn't have blamed her, if she did. It had been months since their marriage, almost a year, and still there was nothing to show for it.

Still, she was rather obvious here, showing her hand to Cersei. Tyrion couldn't help but wonder if perhaps the girl was greener to the game than he'd though, with a grandmother like Olenna Tyrell to guide her.

He said nothing, took another sip of his wine as he watched in idle amusement while his family slowly ripped itself apart.

It was better than thinking about his little wife, trapped down in the Black Cells.

He knew that Joffrey wouldn't kill her; Cersei had allowed him to kill Ned Stark, and the mistake had never left her mind, with the North rebelling against them. She wasn't going to let him kill Sansa, as well.

And neither was Tyrion, as the new Hand of the King.

He just had to find a way to get her out of there which wouldn't involve Joffrey losing face.

He licked his lips, took another gulp of wine.

"This stuff tastes like piss," he told the servant behind him rather loudly. "I suppose we won't be ending the war with Dorne soon?"

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "A wonder Mother thinks you're fit to be my Hand," Joffrey muttered.

Tyrion smirked. At least he knew Joffrey wasn't completely uncontrolled, though he would pay all of the gold that wasn't inside the Rock to see how Cersei had done it.

"I suppose it might have something to do with the fact that the last Hand was killed, Your Grace," he said cheerfully, and tried not to think about how he was talking about his own father.

How, if anyone had the right to kill the old bastard, it was him, not Oberyn Martell or whoever had really done the deed.

Fury spiked across Joffrey's features. "You won't speak of my grandfather that way," he said, as if the brat hadn't been terrified of the man his entire life and probably relieved when the old bastard finally dropped.

Tyrion dipped his head. "Of course, Your Grace," he agreed. "My apologies."

Margaery expertly changed the subject, reminding her husband that the Reach was sending more barrels of wine and grain to the Keep to help with the war effort in an almost shameless attempt at reminding him of the power her family had.

It went right over Joffrey's head. It did not go over Cersei's.

He had a full plate, Tyrion thought idly, staring down at the sausage on his own. Freeing Sansa from the Black Cells, freeing Jaime from their sister's influence, figuring out what the hell Margaery Tyrell was planning.

He sighed, took another gulp of his drink, and slammed the bottle down on the table. Cersei jumped, where she sat across the table from him, and then glared at him.

It felt good to be back in the game, Tyrion thought, smirking down at his plate.


	195. SANSA

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A/N: In this fic, Jeyne Westerling was married to Robb, not Talisa Maegyr, but she still died pregnant at the Red Wedding alongside him, instead of remaining at Riverrun barren because of her mother's potions. It hasn't been important before now, but I didn't want anyone to get confused here.  
> Also head's up, Sansa's in sort of a rough place here. I promise things will get better for her before too long.

The Black Cells grew cold when one only had one dress to wear, and it was beginning to tear around the hem before Sansa ever found herself down here.

It had not been a particularly warm dress, either; one of the summer gowns she'd had made when she thought she was still going to be Joffrey's Queen, pink and cool and far too cold for this place.

She hugged her knees, leaning her chin down onto them and closing her eyes as she tried not to shiver.

She had cried earlier, had heard Prince Oberyn calling through the space between their cells to ask her if she was all right, if the guards had hurt her when they opened the door the last time and found her puking up the food that they had gone to the trouble of getting for her.

Sansa supposed it was a wonder they were not on the Kingsguard, as she stared down at the purple bruises lining her biceps.

She didn't want to gain Prince Oberyn's attention again. It would mean listening to him tak to her again, when she wasn't sure what to think of him and whether she wanted anyone to know of her down here like this at all.

But she wasn't sure how much longer she could stand the silence, imagining her father sitting across the cell from her, hair filthy from the amount of time he'd been forced down here, clothes ripped and sodden, looking despondent as he tried to decide whether to impugne his honor for the sake of his daughters' lives.

"Joffrey was the one to tell me about my brother's death," she said then, and she heard Oberyn shift in the cell next to hers, but he didn't speak.

She was almost glad of that, glad of the silence as she spoke out into it, for when she looked across the dimly lit cell, her father was no longer staring back at her.

And there was a thought. How much longer was the light going to last down here, alone in a cell where it had already kept up for several days?

The guards did not seem particularly interested in keeping the cell lit. She shivered at the thought of being left alone down here in the dark.

She doubted she would be ungrateful for Oberyn's voice, then.

She swallowed. "My lord husband thought he was, so I pretended that I hadn't heard the news already. Joffrey told me first of how the Freys sewed my brother's direwolf's head to his shoulders and stabbed his child within Jeyne's womb. He wanted it to be a surprise. He was so displeased when I didn't cry." She sucked in a breath. "But I didn't cry. I tried to, when Lord Tyrion told me, because it would have been easy in front of him, but I haven't, not since then."

"Lady Sansa..." Oberyn took a deep breath. "I'm sorry for what I said earlier. And for knowingly taking you into danger. It was cruel of me, when you are but an innocent in this situation."

Sansa snorted. "I'm not an innocent," she whispered, and could almost hear Prince Oberyn straining to hear her. "I'm not."

He made a tutting noise that might have been disapproval. "Sansa..."

"I told Cersei that my father was planning on leaving," she said, and it felt good to confess it to someone. "I told her that he wanted to leave King's Landing when he bade me keep it a secret, because I wanted to be queen and I was such a foolish fucking child-"

"Yes," Oberyn interrupted her, and Sansa blinked, rant cut off midway. "You were a child, Sansa. An innocent child who didn't know about the risks of politics, the cruelties of it."

Sansa's throat clogged up. She couldn't breathe for a moment, but the moment passed. "I wasn't a little girl when I heard that Robb had married Jeyne Westerling," she whispered hoarsely.

This time, Oberyn didn't hear her. "Pardon?"

But she didn't repeat the words, merely kept going, because as long as she was down here for something she hadn't done, she needed to be down here for something, or else this whole thing was just unfair, and she couldn't bear-

"I was jealous," she said, a little louder, this time. "Because I was stuck here in King's Landing while my brother didn't take the arrangement the Lannisters demanded I write for him, and then Jeyne...he was happy with her." She swallowed thickly. "He was happy with her, and all because he didn't make an arrangement with the Freys, either."

Joffrey had told her all about that. About how the Freys had made an agreement with Robb, that he would marry one of Walder's daughters in exchange for marching across their land, and then Robb had turned around and married some highland girl from the Westerlands, spat in their faces without remorse.

The Freys had been happy enough to take revenge at what the smallfolk called the Red Wedding, another thing Joffrey was happy enough to recount to Sansa.

And as much as a small part of her was happy that Robb had managed to find love with someone at a time when she was beginning to think she never would, Sansa had also hated this girl.

This girl who swooped in and had Sansa's brother, and Sansa had never met her and never would, because Robb was willing to incur the wrath of the Freys but unwilling to march on King's Landing and bring one hostage home.

It was too much of a risk, Joffrey had told her, even for her foolish brother.

Sansa sniffed. "I know her family made some sort of pact with the Lannisters," she told Oberyn softly. "That she and her family would live, unharmed by their treason, if they handed Robb over to the Freys without question. And I hated her for that, too."

But Jeyne had gone anyway, pregnant with Robb's child and determined not to leave his side no matter how her mother attempted to keep her behind, and had died.

And Sansa...had still hated her, a little bit, unreasonable though she knew it to be.

"I know it wasn't her fault," Sansa whispered, "that she was just as much of a pawn as I am, and the Lannisters were to blame for all of this. But..." she sucked in a breath. "I still hated her. I hated her, and I hated the Lannisters, and I imagined them all dead in so many different ways, the way they killed Robb. And...now I'm in a cell for killing Tywin Lannister."

Oberyn was silent for several long moment afterwards. "Sansa..." she heard him suck in a breath, even between their two cells. "That isn't..."

She shook her head. She didn't want to hear it.

"That isn't your fault, either," Oberyn continued.

Sansa snorted. "Isn't it? I would never have agreed to go with you if it hadn't been out of hatred for the Lannisters," she said. "I never would have gone if it wasn't...so I could know that I'd won something from them, one damn thing."

And that was the truth of it, wasn't it? She hadn't known what awaited her in Dorne. Hadn't known if she would ever see Winterfell again, once she left for the beaches of Sunspear, but she had gone anyway.

Had gone because it meant getting away from the Lannisters, and that was worth never seeing Winterfell again, after everything they had done to her, to her family.

And she had done those things, too. Had hated Robb and his wife, had betrayed her father.

She bit her tongue, lowered her head into her crossed arms, and blew out a low breath.

"I killed Tywin, Sansa," Oberyn said abruptly, voice ringing loudly in her cell, and Sansa jerked her head up, surprise blooming across her features.

"I...what?" she whispered.

He repeated it. "Tywin Lannister. I did kill him. I stole your husband's knife the night Ellaria and I came to eat with you in your chambers, and I stabbed Tywin Lannister with it because I planned on being long gone by the time he was found, and poison is my method of choice. It would cast just enough doubt that I wouldn't have brought war back to Dorne with me."

His voice was a cold monotone as he spoke, and Sansa shivered.

"I did it hours before we left on that ship," Oberyn said. "Because the old lion had few friends who would have come into his chambers before we were gone, and I knew I could get away with it."

Sansa shook her head, felt a desperate sob wrenching its way up her throat, but she didn't dare let it out.

She thought of how excited she had been, when Lord Varys asked her to sneak through the tunnels of the Keep with him, pulling a shawl around her features to conceal them, worried that she was leaving Margaery but uncaring, because she was leaving King's Landing.

She was leaving King's Landing because the Martells were desperately fleeing to avoid suspicion as they murdered the head of House Lannister.

Sansa hugged her knees a little tighter to her chest.

"Then why did you take me at all?" she whispered. "It would have been easier," and she could barely speak, from the way her throat was clogging, "to just leave me behind. Joffrey wouldn't have...retaliated the way he did."

She didn't want to believe him, Sansa realized abruptly. Didn't want to believe that he wasn't lying to her, for all that his words were cold and factual and ringing too damn true.

"Because I made you a promise," Oberyn told her again. "And the Martells keep their promises as well as the Lannisters pay their debts."

Sansa choked.

"You should have just left without taking your revenge," she murmured finally, for the lack of anything else she could think to say. "Without endangering the rest of us just so you could kill a man."

He paused. "I know," he said finally, the words more damning than his confession.

She turned away from him.

"Sansa," he called after her, but Sansa ignored him, closing her eyes and reaching up to cover her ears.


	196. TYRION

"Good of you to join us, Your Grace," Tyrion said, smirking, as Joffrey shuffled into the Small Council chambers, dragged along by his little wife. The meeting had started nearly a quarter of an hour earlier. Tyrion could not say he was surprised, by the boy's tardiness.

They weren't meeting in the Tower of the Hand this time, as Tywin had enjoyed doing while he was the Hand, a subtle display of his power over the Crown. Instead, they were meeting where they had been before, closer to Joffrey's own chambers.

The boy was a fool, but even he could understand the significance of that. Unless, of course, he still managed to be late, as he was today.

Joffrey lifted his chin, unapologetic. Tyrion noticed how mussed his queen's hair was, and understood why.

The King took a seat at the head of the Small Council table, directly across from where Tyrion himself sat, his queen sinking into one of the two empty seats beside him. The members of the Small Council were accustomed to her presence after all, these days, even if the Grandmaester still grumbled about how little a woman could contribute to such proceedings.

Tyrion noticed he never said such things about Cersei.

The other empty seat in the Small Council chamber sat unused still, and Tyrion pursed his lips staring at it. No one was addressing it, of course, the empty chair. Or, they all were without doing so outright.

It belonged to Prince Oberyn, after all, and they were addressing what to do about him.

"Well?" Joffrey demanded, when the conversation stagnated.

The Grandmaester cleared his throat. "The situation in Dorne now that the Prince has been arrested," he informed Joffrey. "Things are all the more tense, where we were closer to negotiations with them before."

"Negotiations?" Joffrey snapped. "I don't want to negotiate with them. Aren't I fighting a war with them?"

"Hmm, that's odd," Tyrion said pointedly, "I was not aware that you were fighting in Dorne, Your Grace. You seem to be quite content hiding here in the Keep, while others fight your battles for you."

"I...I-The King cannot be seen going off to fight in trivial battles," Joffrey sputtered, voice rather high in the thin air of the Small Council chambers. "I have far more important things to be doing here, and it would upset the smallfolk."

Mace coughed. "Yes, His Grace is correct," he said, and all eyes turned on him. "We oughtn't be negotiating with the Dornish when they have so clearly shown their disdain for our King and for the rest of Westeros. The Princess Myrcella remains still in Dorne, and we ought to demand her back and set fire to the rest of it."

Tyrion barely refrained from rolling his eyes. "Has it escaped your attention, Your Grace," he said, not addressing Mace at all, "that Dorne is yet part of Westeros, and as long as they belong to us, you would rather be ruling a kingdom than a charred, barren rock?"

Cersei's glare grew harder.

"Indeed," Varys said, sounding amused. "And I understand you wished to address the Small Council about something else, Your Grace."

Joffrey sat up a little straighter. "Yes, I did. I mentioned some time ago that the dragon bitch across the sea hasn't been dealt with, that I wanted her to be. Why hasn't anything been done about her since?" His fist clenched.

The little queen reached out and placed her hand over Joffrey's, rubbed at it in a soothing manner, and a little of the red hot fury in Joffrey's face receded.

Tyrion couldn't make up his mind about her, and that frustrated him. He was always able to read people, and he hated that he couldn't, with her.

He couldn't tell if she was very good at what she was doing, or if she wasn't as good as she thought she was.

Margaery glanced up, as if she sensed him watching her, and their eyes met, for a moment. He thought he saw something flash in hers, but she didn't look away. He cleared his throat, turning his attention back to Joffrey.

Tyrion leaned back in his chair, folding his hands on the table. Cersei glared at him, where she sat near her son. Or perhaps she was glaring at Margaery, because he couldn't tell.

"Because, Your Grace, as Hand of the King," he couldn't help but rub it in, noticing the way Mace Tyrell huffed and how Cersei was definitely glaring at him, now, "I reminded the Small Council that we do not have the resources to deal with Daenerys Targaryen. Do you have some army over in Pentos that we do not know of, Your Grace? At the moment, she is not your largest issue. She is not even an issue, across an ocean from us."

Joffrey sneered. "She has a hired army," he said, hands flapping as if it were that easy to do so . "We could buy one just as easily."

"I do not know how much my father kept from you, as the previous Hand of the King," Tyrion said, treading into the tense territory without so much as batting an eye. Lord Varys looked amused, at least. "But the Crown does not have the funds to deal with Daenerys Targaryen, Stannis Baratheon, and the Martells, all at the same time. Now, given that Stannis and the Martells are closer, and that you refuse to negotiate with the Martells for peace, they are, at the moment, the more pertinent threat, so why don't we get back to this war that's being fought for you, Your Grace?"

Joffrey ground his teeth, shrugging off his little wife's warm touch on his hand. She frowned, and now she seemed annoyed with Tyrion, too.

"Be careful, Uncle," Joffrey growled out. "I could just as easily put you right back where you were a few days ago."

Jaime, where he stood guard in the corner of the room, straightened at the threat, but Tyrion merely waved it off. He wasn't impressed, knowing how desperate Cersei had been to give him the position.

"And then you would be out two Hands in as many months, Your Grace," Tyrion said coolly. "I don't suppose you want it known throughout the realms how difficult you find it for anyone to take that position."

No, Mace was definitely clenching his fist underneath the table, now. Tyrion bit back a grin.

Joffrey snarled, "I can name whoever I wish to Hand of the King. I am the King."

Tyrion snorted, and when Mace's eyes widened, spoke. "We are not sending an army we can't control with more than gold over the sea to fight a girl who is only rumored to have an army and dragons of her own," he said, and wondered, in this moment, how much he sounded like Tywin, from the way the Grandmaester was looking at him with something resembling respect. "Not until we have secured your rule for you here. However, we will send an emissary through the fleet failing to take Dorne to speak with Prince Doran about the situation. And when that's done, we will send the soldiers of that fleet to fight Stannis Baratheon. Will that suffice, Your Grace, or do you wish to spread your soldiers out even more thinly and lose your pretty crown?"

Joffrey was grinding his teeth so hard Tyrion was surprised they weren't cracking in his mouth. His wife was trailing soothing circles along his arm, but they didn't seem to be helping.

Cersei spoke up, then. Tyrion was surprised she had been silent for so long. "And when the smallfolk are concerned that whatever deal you wish to make with Prince Doran will impact the outcome of the trial of his brother?" she asked coldly.

Tyrion smiled. "The smallfolk won't be concerned about that, dear sister," he told her, however much it was true that the smallfolk loved a good trial. "Because this is the King's invitation being sent to Prince Doran, and the King's judgment is blessed by the gods, is it not?"

Cersei looked like she was sucking on a sour lemon. Tyrion smirked again.

Joffrey lifted his chin. "And if the King dislikes this?" he demanded.

Tyrion lifted a brow. "I don't think you understand quite how the monarchy works in this kingdom, Your Grace. Allow me the chance to enlighten you."

A vein on Joffrey's forehead jumped. He reached out and paused the queen's hand on his arm, squeezed it tight in his own.

The little queen grimaced, forced it into a smile when she realized her husband's eyes were on her, now.

Tyrion almost felt sorry for her.

"In Westeros," Tyrion continued, and almost stood up to continue his little lecture. He could feel the smile splitting his face, despite Cersei's glare and Jaime's vaguely horrified look, where he stood in the back of the room.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd had this much fun.

"The King has a great amount of authority, it is true," he said, and Joffrey stared at him, brows furrowed suspiciously, because he was smart enough to know, if nothing else, that the conversation was about to turn. "But he is held accountable by the nobles, and by the gods. It was both who turned against the Mad King, as you are aware from your studies."

Tyrion almost regretted that they had that in common, that interest in the old Targaryens. He wondered if that explained the madness that had overtaken Joffrey, or the disgust with which everyone else looked at Tyrion.

"And so the King has a council, to help him make decisions that won't get him slaughtered in his own city," Tyrion continued. "And the Hand of the King, whom you have generously appointed as myself, is in charge of carrying out the King's wishes. In any manner that he sees fit."

Joffrey's hand on his little queen's wrist was like a vice. At the other end of the table, Mace looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Do not lecture me on how to do my duty, Uncle," he snapped.

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "You are my nephew, as you have just pointed out, and as my nephew, I will lecture you on whatever I see fit."

Joffrey ground his teeth. "But I am also your King," he reminded everyone present, as if they needed any reminding.

"Of course you are, my love," the little queen interrupted the circular conversation, reaching out with her free hand and running it through Joffrey's hair, despite the awkward angle. "And the Hand of the King does not forget that, does he?"

She turned then, and met Tyrion's eyes once more.

Tyrion paused, considering her. "No, Your Grace," he said calmly. "He does not."

Margaery smiled, a little too widely. "There," she said, as if she were settling a dispute between two stubborn children.

Tyrion blinked at her. He wondered if that was her secret, for dealing with Joffrey.

Joffrey grumbled under his breath, but did not push away his wife's hand when she reached for him again.

The meeting wrapped up quickly after that. Tyrion got his way, Joffrey did not, and the boy didn't throw another fit about it, just sat in gloomy silence as it was decided who best to send to Dorne.

That was one job that Mace did not jump at the chance to get, Tyrion noted, and almost sent him spitefully because of that, before reminding himself that they did want to make peace with Dorne.

Joffrey was the first to leave, followed by his lady wife, and a slightly amused Cersei.

That should have been Tyrion's second warning.

Soon enough, he was alone with only Lord Varys, as the Grandmaester grumbled his way out of the room, muttering under his breath about Tyrion.

Tyrion mopped his brow, eyed Lord Varys. "Did you forget to contribute something during the meeting?" he asked the man tiredly.

"You ought to be proud," Varys said, in that oily tone of his. "For a moment there, I thought the Old Lion had been returned to life in his son."

Tyrion snorted. "You oughtn’t to let him hear you say that," he muttered. "He might just return from the dead to prove you wrong."


	197. TYRION

Tyrion was getting tired of this. Not that he’d ever been for it, ever since he saw something he shouldn’t as a child and Uncle Kevan pulled him aside to explain why he must never breathe a word about it to anyone, especially not his father.

He remembered the first time he'd realized his brother and sister loved each other in the one way a brother and sister were not meant to. Remembered walking in on them, together in a way that had one of Cersei's septas wringing her hands, where she stood banished outside Cersei's chambers at the Rock.

They hadn't been doing anything especially wrong then, just sitting a bit too close together, Jaime's lips brushing along the shell of Cersei's ear, and Tyrion had understood, as young as he was.

Looking back, it was almost amusing, the lengths Tywin had gone to, convincing himself that what everyone else saw in his eldest children did not exist. Not when it had been obvious to Tyrion from the age of a child.

But Tyrion had never been blind to his siblings' faults as his father had been, for all that the Targaryens might not have found incest to be a fault.

He grimaced, staring down at the note in his hand, for it was just another one of those, another piece of proof that he had been complacent in the game for far too long now, and it just might have cost him his brother for good, however much Tyrion wished to believe otherwise.

Yes, Cersei had won this round, and won Jaime. And Tyrion had his answer, and he hated it.

It had been simple enough. A test, so that he could understand who his allies were in King's Landing, the way he had done when he married Myrcella off to Dorne to see who would tell Cersei of it first.

Except this one had only been with his brother, and Tyrion had half-hoped Jaime would keep it to himself, rather than running to their sister about it.

By the gods, Tyrion had almost been ready to ask Jaime for his help in freeing Sansa from the Black Cells.

But the note in his hands warned him otherwise.

The test had been simple enough. Tyrion merely told Jaime, in passing while they both drank far more than was good for either of them, that he was thinking of offering the Martells the chance to wed Myrcella to their son immediately, as a way to induce them to stop the fighting.

He wasn't, of course. He didn't even know if she'd had her first bleed yet, but he wasn't going to force her into the marriage at such an age, not the way Sansa had been.

He hesitated at that thought, going pale, and then crumpled the note in his hands up.

_If you finalize the agreement to sell my daughter to the traitors we are at war with, I will go down to the Black Cells myself and rip out your little wife's throat. And then I will find whatever whore is filling your bed tonight and do the same with her._

He believed the threat, written in Cersei's sprawling, ladylike hand.

Tyrion tossed the note to the ground, irritation bubbling up inside of him as he reached for his shoes, shoved them on.

He ignored Pod as the boy stepped into the room with another bottle of wine, stepped out into the hall.

Angry as he was, everyone moved out of his way as he passed them, until he was standing at the base of the White Tower.

Loras Tyrell lifted a brow as he passed him, but didn't say anything, intent on sharpening his sword in the armory offered to the Kingsguard, for all that Tyrion wished to point out any squire could manage that. He wondered if Loras had a squire, if the Tyrells could convince some silent boy to be his.

Of course they could. They had more money than they knew what to do with, just like the fucking Lannisters.

Tyrion pushed the thought aside, walking to his brother's room at the top of the Tower and entering before he knocked.

This was reason enough to be angry; after all, for all that Tyrion was angry at himself for expecting more as much as he was at Jaime.

"Jaime, we need to talk," Tyrion said as he stepped inside, and then froze at the sight that greeted him, cursing and slamming the door behind himself.

For all that he was not blind to his siblings' faults, Tyrion could not say that he had expected this.

Jaime was not in the room.

Cersei, however, was. She was laying lazily back on Jaime's bed, in all of her naked glory, one hand reaching up to brush through her hair before she stopped at the sight of Tyrion standing in the middle of Jaime's chambers.

Disgust filled her features at the sight of him, and Tyrion wondered which one of them was more disgusted, in that moment.

Tyrion checked behind him once more to make sure that the door really was closed. Loras Fucking Tyrell was sitting just outside, and if he suspected for a moment, ponce or not, that he had proof of Cersei and Jaime, Tyrion had no doubt he would go running to his grandmother about it.

"You," Cersei snapped, pulling the white sheets up around her throat and glaring. "What the fuck are you doing in here?"

He smirked, surprised that they would fuck in the White Tower rather than in the Queen Mother's far more comfortable chambers. "Looking for Jaime. I should have known you would have reattached him to your hip the moment you returned, though. And how is the lovely Brienne of Tarth?"

"Far from here," Cersei hissed, for a moment looking pleased before she remembered that she was in Jaime's bed and Tyrion was looking on, presumably. "Still fighting brutes in the Iron Islands because she thinks she's a man. But far from here. As you should be, you wretched beast."

"And here I thought you thought yourself a man," Tyrion muttered, holding back a smirk to hide how uncomfortable he was at the sight of his sister, nearly naked in his brother's bed.

She glared up at him before tossing Jaime's sheets off her body and standing shamelessly to her feet.

Tyrion grimaced, looking away and studiously staring at a spot on the wall. His brother's chambers were rather stark, he thought, though he shouldn't be surprised.

Fuck. He needed to think of descriptors other than stark, because that certainly wasn't helping with the fact that his sister was-

Cersei glanced at him sharply. He released he'd rather failed to keep those words in his head.

She gave him a look of disgust as he tread rather purposefully over the ends of her gown where it lay on the floor, and he rather hoped that she would burn it in a fit of pique for that alone.

It was rather too Lannister red, for the scant amount of Lannisters still remaining in the world.

"You look awfully gleeful," Cersei snapped suddenly, as she pushed her hands through the sleeves of the gown and reached around for the ties. "Aren't you concerned for your little traitorous wife?" She didn't give him the chance to respond. "I suppose you don't care about anyone or anything, to let her take the fall for you like this."

Tyrion flinched, turned away before his sister could see it, though he doubted she didn't notice. She loved to see such reactions in him, the way his son loved to watch a broken bird be beaten.

At least Tyrion was better sport.

"She is just a child," he told her finally, through gritted teeth as he stared once more at that spot on the wall. "Even Joffrey cannot believe the shaky evidence against her that she had any part in our father's death. Besides, she's his favorite toy. He won't part with her, or the North, unless someone," he eyed Cersei, "incredibly foolish persuades him to. And I'll thank you not to threaten her again. "

Cersei snorted. "He can if it came from the lips of his beloved queen's handmaiden. I wonder if he's fucking all of them now, as she is." She paused. "If you're going to threaten my daughter, I will threaten whom I please. This is a hostage situation after all, is it not?"

Tyrion raised a brow, didn't bother to respond about Sansa. They both knew she would not go through with that threat. "That is quite a slanderous accusation to make against our Queen," he murmured, and Cersei glared at him.

"As if the little tart doesn't fully deserve it," she told him. "You'd be amazed at the stories I've heard from some of her-"

Tyrion straightened. "I don't suppose you're planning to part our young queen from her besotted husband," he told Cersei. "I don't think that would be wise."

Cersei may have won her latest round against Margaery, of naming Tyrion as Joffrey's Hand, but the little queen seemed to have enough influence over her husband that losing her due to his mother might just turn Joffrey against Cersei.

And Tyrion did not want to live in a world where no one had control over the little brat.

"As if I should listen to you about what is wise and what is not," Cersei snapped. "I think I understand what happened. Your little whore, that Eastern bitch, convinced Lady Rosamund to free you. I suppose it was rather cold of you to convince her to turn on her supposed Lady Sansa, but as we've already established, you're-"

"We don't have time for the two of you to sit here fighting," Jaime said suddenly, and Tyrion turned around, watched as Jaime came barging into the room in full Kingsguard regalia. Cersei blinked at him, pulling the gown around her a little more tightly.

Tyrion snorted.

"Why not?" she snapped, and Tyrion raised a brow. Trouble in paradise, he supposed.

Jaime snorted. "I've just received a raven, while the two of you were in here bickering. And for fuck's sake, I could hear you all of the way across the hall. Thank the gods no one else was around."

Tyrion raised a brow, and wondered if Jaime had really heard them, or if it was simply a good guess. Well, not even a guess. Cersei and Tyrion were in the same room, after all.

"Stannis is turning from the North and making a move on Casterly Rock. The Freys are fighting them, and the Westerlings are suing for peace. Apparently, they've remembered their grievance against the Freys, and convinced the Mormonts to help them."

"The Westerlings have no reason to defend us," Cersei said, bemused, and Tyrion wondered if she had even listened to what Jaime had just said.

"The Mormonts and the Westerlings are fighting on the same side now?" he asked incredulously. "How the fuck did that happen?"

"The Mormonts want the castle for Stannis," Jaime said. "It seems they've convinced the Westerlings not to stand in their way. They marched across their territory like Robb Stark never managed."

"Those fucking traitors," Cersei spat out. "We should have ruined them when they sided with Robb Stark instead of letting them escape unscathed."

Tyrion swore, didn't bother to point out to Cersei that the Westerlings hadn't exactly escaped their pact with Robb Stark unscathed, and had every reason to turn against them, if they so wished. He doubted his sister would manage to understand why even if he did bother to explain it to her.

"With Father dead, everyone will be assuming us weak, will want to take the castle while we grieve." Especially Stannis, if his men were dying off in the cold beyond the Wall and he had found a better target. "What of Winterfell?"

Jaime hesitated. "He's found it impenetrable, at the moment. That won't last for long, if this is a diversion to get our soldiers to the Rock."

Cersei glowered at him, as if by voicing the idea, he was somehow party to it. "We cannot allow that to happen."

"That's the first thing you've said today that I agree with," Tyrion said with a smirk. Even if Casterly Rock was no longer his, there was perhaps one worse alternative to Cersei Lannister taking it, and that was Stannis Fucking Baratheon.


	198. MARGAERY

"I don't suppose either of you have come to tell me you actually found out something about Sansa's guards," Margaery muttered, tossing aside the book in her hands. Neither of her ladies commented on the title on the cover.

Megga and Elinor stepped into the room, closing the door behind themselves. They didn't speak for a moment, and Margaery sighed, standing to her feet.

"Well?" She was tired of playing games. Sansa was down in the Black Cells, alone and frightened, and Margaery could do nothing to help her until she had the information to do so.

"Something better," Megga said, and Margaery ground her teeth, waited for them to continue.

"We know why Joffrey agreed to name Lord Tyrion the Hand of the King," Elinor said, exchanging a look with Megga.

They both knew how it had vexed Margaery, losing the Hand of the King's position to Cersei when she had been making such great progress towards convincing Joffrey to name her father.

She didn't know how Cersei had defeated her there, but that niggling worry had been lost the moment Sansa had been shoved into a Black Cell, on Margaery's end.

She swept her hair out of her eyes. "Well?"

Elinor hesitated; it was Megga who spoke, looking somewhere between amused and disgusted. "Joffrey's serving boy told one of the ladies in the kitchen that-"

"Yes, yes," Margaery interrupted impatiently. There might have been a time when she was interested in knowing all of the hows and whys of the information she was given. Now, she only knew who she could trust to deliver it, and her ladies seemed to sense this, for the smile died a little on Megga's face and she nodded.

"Cersei told Joffrey in front of the servant that if Lord Tyrion turns out to be a failure of a Hand within the month," Megga said quietly, "she'll help Joffrey devise a reason to have him killed."

Margaery sucked in a breath. It made sense, she supposed. Of course Joffrey would jump at the chance to have his uncle killed, if he couldn't blame him for Lord Tywin's death. And Cersei would too, the pernicious bitch.

"Why in the seven hells would she suggest that?" Margaery demanded. "She's vicious, but she's not that stupid."

Elinor exchanged another one of those damn _looks_ with Megga. "She still believes Tyrion killed her father. She told Joffrey as much, and he doesn't believe it, but..."

"But he also doesn't care, if it means he has her permission and her smarts to kill Tyrion," Margaery surmised. The girls nodded.

Margaery wondered what it must be like, to a hate a member of your family so much that you were willing to kill them out of sheer spite when they couldn't be found guilty of a capital crime.

"Well," she said, "I suppose that explains it."

Elinor chewed on her lower lip. "Perhaps he was lying, Your Grace?"

Margaery held up a hand. "He wasn't," she said. And, under her breath, "And one would think she would wonder instead about who his protector was, the last time anyone tried to have him killed."

"What, Your Grace?" Megga asked.

Margaery shook her head. "Never mind. Thank you, girls, for finding this out for me. Now, if only Alla would return..."

The door opened, and Alla stood in it, dwarfed by the size of it in a way Margaery had not noticed her being before. Gods, but she was just a child, and Margaery would never quite sweep away the guilt she felt at bringing Alla here.

"I've found out about Sansa's guards," she said, and Margaery forced herself not to react to the look on Alla's face, not quite like defeat but not quite happy, either. "She's...I snuck down there, with one of the serving girls who said she would be willing to bring someone down there to pass a message to Sansa."

Margaery straightened.

Elinor put an end to that thought before Margaery could give it a voice. "No, Your Grace," she said, stepping forward and then hesitating. "Us ladies are not noticeable enough to catch the attention of guards in the Black Cells, but the Queen, however she may be dressed, will."

Margaery sagged. She knew that, of course. Knew what a risk it would be, to try something so foolish as that. But she hated the thought that while her ladies were scurrying around on her orders, Margaery herself was doing nothing to help Sansa.

It rankled.

"She's the one who delivers food?" Margaery asked. Anyone else wouldn't be able to get into Sansa's cell to sneak a message, but she had to know the details.

It helped, a little.

Alla nodded. "She said she could sneak me down. In her baggy clothes, the guards won't realize who I am."

Margaery protested. "You're a child, Alla, you can't be expected to..."

"I'll go," Elinor interrupted, and all eyes turned to her. "You're right, Alla is too young. But I'm of the appropriate age, and..."

"And if anything were to happen to any of you down in the Black Cells, I would not forgive myself," Margaery interrupted her. "Elinor, you're betrothed. If the guards..."

Alla's eyes got very wide, and Margery fell silent.

Elinor lifted her chin. "I'll go," she repeated. "And that won't happen. But even if it does, it doesn't matter." She didn't meet Margaery's eyes then, and Margaery struggled not to smile.

"Very well," she said. "You'll go. But, by the gods, be careful. If they suspect you're a spy, or someone's agent, they could..."

"I know," Elinor repeated, and now she was meeting Margaery's eyes. "What else did you figure out, Alla?"

Alla chewed on her lower lip. She looked so young, then. "The servant says Lady Sansa isn't in the best condition," she said. "She won't eat much that the serving girl brings and takes away, and she seems ill."

"Haven't they sent a maester down to see to her?" Margaery asked, going pale.

Alla shrugged. "The serving girl didn't say."

"Well don't you have anything useful for me, any of you?" Margaery demanded, crossing her arms. Knowing that Tyrion's position as Hand of the King was tenuous at best was interesting, of course, but not if she didn't know what to do with the information.

Alla cleared her throat. "I wasn't finished," she said. Then, "One of the guards in the Black Cells has a child. The serving girl overheard him telling another of the guards about it."

Margaery straightened. "I must go and speak with my brother at once," she announced, reaching for her shawl. "Elinor, you'll accompany me."

Elinor dipped her head. "Of course," she said, and started to follow Margaery out of the room, patting Alla on the shoulder as she went.

Once they were in the hall, Margaery took up their conversation. "While I'm relieved you wouldn't be placed in dire straits by your betrothed if anyone were to find out you do not have a maidenhead, I don't much appreciate the fact that you believe me so little your friend I would be relieved to hear you wouldn't get into trouble if you were raped by the guards."

Elinor clasped her hands together in front of her. "I knew you wouldn't be relieved at the thought, Margaery." A pause. "I alone know how much."

Margaery closed her eyes, tried to still her hands where they shook at her sides. She fought the urge to look around and make sure they were not overheard, but Elinor would not have uttered those words without doing the same.

"You have no idea what it is like, Elinor, and I pray that you will never have to find out," Margaery reprimanded her, and Elinor lowered her head, shamefaced. "If one of the guards accosts you, and you do not think you can get out of the situation without destroying yourself, then I don't care what message I want you to pass to Lady Sansa. You will leave before it comes to that." A pause. "Swear it."

Elinor swallowed. "Margaery..."

Margaery paused in the hall, turning to face her. "I sent Lady Rosamund home not several days ago, because she failed to obey in my commands, and those were only implied and not given. Swear it, Elinor, or I will do the same to you."

Elinor lifted her chin. "I swear it, Your Grace. By the Seven."

Margaery looked at her for a moment longer, and then nodded. "Good."

"Are we really going to see Ser Loras?" Elinor asked hesitantly, once they started walking again.

"Yes," Margaery said. "He is a Kingsguard, and can change the lower guards' shifts," she reminded Elinor.

"You want that guard with the child on shift when I sneak in the message," Elinor surmised.

"No," Margaery said, a little gratified that she could still surprise the other woman. "I want him on shift when we do whatever it is we will have to do to help Sansa. I know you know it will come to that."

Elinor paused. "Your Grace..."

Margaery shook her head. "We're here, look," she said pointedly, and walked up the narrow steps of the White Tower.

Behind her, Elinor heaved a sigh and followed her dutifully along.

They made it to Loras' chambers, in the large barracks where most of the Kingsguard slept. Jaime Lannister slept there most of the time, too, though he also had his own private chambers, as the Lord Commander.

But Margaery was not there to see Jaime, and she had only come here a handful of times to see her brother. Two of the Kingsguard, sitting at a table drinking their mead and playing some game of sticks, glanced up at her and Elinor's approach.

They immediately ambled to their feet, though perhaps a bit drunkenly.

Margaery ignored them. "Wait out here," she told Elinor, and knocked on her brother's door.

He answered in an instant, shirt unbuttoned, but she was relieved to see no one within. He appeared to be writing a letter, judging by the half finished page on the desk behind him.

"May I come in?" she asked, giving him her sweetest smile.

Loras groaned and opened the door a little more, waving a hand to admit her.

Margaery swept into the room, taking in the state of her brother's room. Rather more clean than usual.

"I take it you haven't had any clandestine meetings lately," she observed. She glanced down at the letter, saw that he was writing it to Willas, and something in her heart broke a little.

She needed to write her brother another letter, herself. Her grandmother's warnings about his health vexed her, and the uselessness she felt only grew with Sansa's imprisonment.

"I took your advice," Loras said, sighing. "Now what do you want, Marg?"

She let the smile drop. "I am going to need your help with something, in the near future," she said. "And it isn't something you're going to like."

Loras raised a brow. "Do you want another whore brought to the Keep? I thought that was for Lady Sansa."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling and encouraging his behavior. "No," she told him. "It has nothing to do with...any of your connections there. I know you can change the guard rotations in the Black Cells, as a member of the Kingsguard."

Loras stiffened. "Margaery..."

"And there is something else, that you as a man and a member of the Kingsguard can do that I cannot, and which I will need you to do at the same time," Margaery said.

Loras bit the inside of his cheek. "Margaery, have you talked to Grandmother about this plot of yours? I have a feeling she won't like it."

Margaery lifted her chin. "Then you won't do it?"

He sighed. "You know I would do most things for you, Marg," he told her, reaching forward and pulling her into a shallow embrace she felt no need to reciprocate. "But not if it does not have Grandmother's blessing, in such a serious endeavor."

"You would kill Joffrey for me, Kingslay, without Grandmother's permission," Margaery pointed out. "But you won't do this?"

Loras pulled back, his comforting smile dropping. "Not when that is to save you, and this risks you being killed," he told her. "No, Margaery, I won't do it."

Margaery glared at him, gathering her shawl a little more tightly around her shoulders. "Then I suppose there is nothing more we need to talk about," she said icily.

"Oh, come on, Marg-"

She slammed the door behind her.

Elinor and the two Kingsguard sitting outside stared at her with wide eyes. At least they hadn't heard what she was talking to her brother about; only saw the annoyance in her features as she stormed out of his chambers.

Margaery sighed. "Come along, Elinor, we have nothing more to discuss here," she said coldly, and Elinor winced, following along behind her as they left the White Tower.

They did not make it far.

Olyvar, the pretty blond whom Loras so relied on and who had so graciously given them the information about Oberyn's planned abduction of Sansa, was standing at the base of the Tower.

The sight of him filled Margaery with white hot annoyance.

"My brother has no need of you today," Margaery said, and could she help it if some annoyance bled into her tone? Her brother was pitching headfirst into a downward spiral with this boy, for all that he'd lied to her moments ago about taking her advice, and she missed the brother she'd had before.

The one who would have heard her plot before deciding not to help her with it.

Olyvar blinked at her, and then dipped into a bow, lifting his head with a lazy smile. "I know, Your Grace. Your brother is not the only one whom I visit in the Keep personally, Your Grace."

Margaery almost pointed out that he didn't need to call her "Your Grace" every time, but refrained. "I see," she said, and hoped he wasn't lying. If he was, she was going to have to have another less than pleasant conversation with Loras.

Or with her grandmother, when news spread through the Tyrell ranks that Loras was seeing his whore again.

She bit back a sigh, forcing herself not to look at Elinor.

"Well then, don't let me keep you," she said, and Olyvar nodded, bowed to her again, and then stepped _past_ her. Still going to the White Tower.

How dare he lie to her face. Her brother doing it was one thing. This boy...

Perhaps, another other day, Margaery would not have let her annoyance get the best of her. It was hardly worth blackmailing a Kingsguard for using a whore, when the lions all had sharp teeth and knew of her brother's own interest in the same man.

But Margaery turned back and walked with him anyway. Elinor raised her eyebrows, turing to follow. Olyvar faltered, realizing she was following him, and turned once more, hesitated as if he wasn't sure whether or not he should bow again.

"I'm sorry, Your Grace," he said, "I didn't realize you were coming back this way."

The words were an obvious question, and she ought to have him whipped for his impudence, Margaery thought. He had no right to be questioning his queen.

Elinor ground her teeth, and looked like she was going to reprimand him herself, and so Margaery spoke first.

Still, Margaery only smiled. "I forgot my gloves in my brother's chambers," she told him, a pointed reminder and an excuse all at once.

Olyvar smiled blandly at her, allowed her to pass in front of him with a gesture of his arm. "I hope you are not too cold without them, Your Grace," he told her. "It is quite chilly today."

It was not, as evidenced by the short sleeves of his tunic after presumably coming into the Keep from the city, but Margaery did not call him out on his lie.

She was almost mortified that she was so transparent, in this moment. "Thank you," she said coolly, and then stepped up to Loras' chamber, knocked delicately on the door.

Elinor was staring at her as if she thought her quite mad, but she said nothing, standing beside Margaery and trying to look like a bored attendant.

Her brother was not within, much to Margaery's surprise. One of the Kingsguard at the table opened his mouth to tell her as much regardless, but Margaery ignored them, watched instead as Olyvar the Whore stepped up to another Kingsguard's door.

She blinked as it opened, and an annoyed looking Lancel Lannister peeked out of it. He froze, at the sight of Olyvar, and then tried to shut the door again, but whatever Olyvar muttered that Margaery could not hear, in that small window of time, staid Lancel's hand.

Lancel shoved the door open, and Olyvar stepped triumphantly within. The door slammed rather loudly behind him, and Margaery jerked a little, where she stood.

"Figures that at least one Lannister would be a fuckin' ponce," one of the glorified guards muttered, and the other laughed.

Margaery shot them both a scorching look, and they fell silent, glancing at one another guiltily.

"Forgive me, Your Grace," one of them said, surging to his feet and setting aside his cup of mead. "We meant no disrespect, to speak in such a way in front of you."

Margaery tried not to roll her eyes. Instead, she clasped her hands in front of her and blushed, the picture of maidenly virtue.

"Well, I should hope it will not happen again," she told them, "that I might have to speak to my King on the matter."

That shut them up, as she needed them to be, and they exchanged another glance before the other stood and they both bowed before her.

"Do you know where my brother has gone?" she asked, as if she did not herself know.

"I believe...he went to the training fields, Your Grace," she was told, and Margaery nodded and made her departure, annoyed that she was so out of practice at spying on others.

She had a feeling she was going to need that skill, in the near future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last day of finals here, so have a chapter totally written out of my stress, haha.


	199. SANSA

The door to Sansa's cell opened, and she scrambled back. She'd learned enough by now, trapped down here, not to be anywhere near the door when the guards came by to deliver her food.

The guards had yet to do anything approaching untoward with her; her status as a lady and the aunt by marriage of the King protected her from that, but Sansa wasn't foolish, for all that the Lannisters thought her to be.

The longer she remained down here, the more likely it was to happen.

She shivered, hugging her knees and remembering how terrified she had been when Joffrey called to her his chambers. When Margaery tried to convince her to sleep with Janek.

It wasn't a guard who stepped through Sansa's door.

Sansa had one serving girl who came to see her each day, to take away her chamber pot and deliver her meals, the same girl, always wearing the same thin brown robes and not meeting Sansa's eyes.

Her face was a familiar one, because it was etched into Sansa's mind as the only one not craggy and cruel which she saw, these days.

So she recognized that the girl in front of her was not the one who had been delivering her meals for some days before she even realized that it was Elinor Tyrell standing in front of her.

"Sansa," Elinor was saying, her voice a far ways off, and then she seemed to catch herself, at the same moment that Sansa did. "Lady Sansa," she corrected.

Sansa bit her lip, watched as Elinor advanced into the room, the door swinging ominously shut behind her.

Sansa whimpered at the sound, and then flushed when she realized Elinor had heard the sound.

Elinor was wearing the serving girl's usual outfit, the faded brown tunic and sandals, and Sansa blinked at the sight, for she looked so ordinary in them, her auburn hair lazily pinned away from her eyes, but not with the bejeweled pins Elinor Tyrell wore.

She didn't look out of place, though, for all that she had first called Sansa by her name. No, she looked like the picture of an easily forgotten servant, and Sansa was impressed despite herself.

When she had snuck down here to speak to her husband, she had looked far more conspicuous, Sansa was sure. She'd been certain that at any moment, one of the guards was going to recognize her.

"Sansa?" Elinor's voice was a bit more tentative, this time.

Sansa cleared her throat, stood to her feet. "What..."

Elinor stepped further into the room, and Sansa realized that whatever she was holding in her hand, a bowl, Sansa noted, smelled far better than the usual fare brought down by the servants.

Soup, Sansa realized idly, as Elinor set it down on the dirty floor by their feet.

"Are you...do you need anything?" Elinor asked quietly. "I can't be sure that I will be able to come down again unnoticed, but I will do my best." She glanced around Sansa's dark cell, grimacing.

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek. "I...How did you get down here?"

Elinor smiled, faintly, but there was some sadness in her smile. Some worry too, and Sansa wondered if she wasn't making any sense, if that was why Elinor was looking at her like that.

"Lady Alla is very good at making friends with the servants," she supplied, and they fell itno another silence again. "You should eat your soup before it gets cold. I also brought you..." she hesitated, and then shrugged, reaching under her tunic.

Sansa recoiled at the sight, but Elinor only pulled free a small, square blanket that had been bound up beneath her loose fitting tunic. She held it out to Sansa, movements carefully telegraphed.

She was trying not to frighten Sansa, the girl realized. She didn't know how she felt about that realization.

Sansa reached out, took the blanket. It was coarse, between her fingers, but thick, and she knew it would be warm. She pulled it a little closer, dipped her head.

"Thank you," she whispered, glancing up and meeting Elinor's eyes.

Whatever she saw in Sansa's eyes had Elinor's face pinching up, her eyes going impossibly sadder.

"Sansa..."

Sansa was suddenly aware of Oberyn sitting in the cell beside theirs, clearly able to hear them.

"Thank you," she repeated, a little more loudly that time.

Elinor glanced around the room, and seemed to take the hint, though Sansa didn't think she was looking in the right direction.

"I'm sorry, Sansa," she said, softer now, stepping right into Sansa's space.

Was it her space anymore? Sansa thought idly. She didn't know. This cell was her cage, her space, surely.

Elinor waited, but when Sansa didn't respond, she bit her lip, stepping closer still.

Sansa closed her eyes, warmed by Elinor's breaths against her chin. She swallowed.

"Her Grace expressed some concern about your needing to eat," Elinor said, and there was disapproval in her voice, clear as day. She was staring down at the soup bowl now, the steam rising in the little cell, and Sansa couldn't help but glance down at it with her.

Sansa had almost forgotten what the day looked like. She cursed herself for the fact that she had stopped going down to the harbor to look at the ships there, at the sunset. Before she was imprisoned and might never get the chance to do so again.

Her lower lip wobbled, and she forced herself not to think of that, nor of how worried Margaery had been the last time she thought about Sansa not eating, enough to come to her chambers and force food past her lips.

She couldn't think of what it had been like, kissing Margaery. Not if she wanted to survive this without breaking down in front of one of Margaery's ladies.

"Is Margaery coming for me?" Sansa whispered hoarsely, and didn't even care that Oberyn could likely hear her anyway, through that damned hole he had made.

Let him hear. He was the reason she was going to die down here anyway; it was not as if he needed more damning information against her.

Elinor smiled gently, moving forward until her lips brushed the air around Sansa's ear, pushed at her auburn hair where it had begun to fall around her shoulders, greasy and no longer held back by the elaborate tie it had been in.

"She's trying, my lady," she promised, voice much quieter, and Sansa doubted Oberyn would be able to hear that.

She sat back with a sigh of relief, closed her eyes for a few scant moments to avoid allowing the younger girl to see the tears pricking at them, even if she doubted Elinor would have been able to in the dim light of cell.

"But you need to keep your strength up," Elinor said, a little louder this time. "You have a trial coming up soon."

Sansa straightened at that, glanced at Elinor in alarm. Did Margaery mean to keep her here until the trial, then?

She thought of how long Tyrion had languished down here, as the Lannisters collected their evidence against him. Swallowed thickly.

"I..."

"All right, that's enough," there was a knock on the door, and Elinor stepped away from Sansa and towards it, leaving the tray of food on the floor at Sansa's feet. "Time's up."

Sansa swallowed hard, forced herself not to get down on her knees and beg Elinor not to leave her, not to leave as the first friendly face that she had encountered down in these cells, unable to see Oberyn's, unsure if he could even be that, anymore.

Wanted to beg her to explain what the hell she had meant, when she said that Sansa needed to keep her strength up for her trial.

The door slid shut behind Elinor, and Sansa let out a sound halfway between a keening wail and a scream.

"Sansa?" Oberyn called to her, but she ignored him, couldn't listen to him, not now, not after he had consigned her to this fucking place-

She swallowed hard, forcing down the bile threatening to rise in her throat.

Margaery had a plan, Sansa reminded herself. Margaery had sent Elinor down here to tell her to keep her strength up because she had a plan.

Sansa needed to trust her now, like she never quite had in the past.


	200. TYRION

"Why did you call me here?" Cersei asked, barging into the Tower of the Hand as if she owned it. Well, she owned the Rock, Tyrion thought miserably, and that was close enough. "Insisting that I come without Jaime? I am not some servant to be called when you wish for me, nor a whore-"

"Your Esteemed Grace," Tyrion muttered, looking up from his quill, "I am so glad to have been able to request your most precious time for a few moments, in order to save the Lannister name from falling into rubble and Stannis' sword."

Cersei glared at him, waited for the Kingsguard following along so closely behind her to pull out the chair in front of Tyrion's desk.

It took Tyrion a moment to recognize Lancel, despite the shock of blond hair. He had been doing that lately, not recognizing people. Shae said it was a product of being kept in such isolation for as long as he had been.

He shuddered to think of how she knew that, or of how his little wife was now faring, in the same fate.

Cersei sat rather heavily in the chair. "Well?" she demanded. "And how are you going to do that?"

Lancel, where he sulked along behind Cersei, gave Tyrion a baleful look, clearly remembering the times Tyrion had pumped him for information in the past.

And wasn't that thought intriguing, Tyrion realized. After all, Lancel was a part of the Kingsguard now, and not just Cersei's fuck toy while Jaime was away.

He noticed the stiff way Lancel walked behind Cersei as she entered the room, and wondered if she was still fucking him on the sly. If she thought she could keep such a secret from Jaime forever.

He smirked a little at the thought, and when Cersei caught him smirking, her eyes narrowed, for she ever hated being the butt of his jokes, even if he never shared them with her.

"Well?" her voice was a tad shriller now. It was like poking a sleeping dragon, Tyrion thought, hiding a grin, but he supposed he ought to stop now, if he truly wanted her to back his plan.

"I wrote to Uncle Kevan," he told her. "With Stannis leaving Winterfell alone for now, he thinks he can secure it and head after him to Casterly Rock, but there is a worry that the bulk of our army won't make it there in time."

Cersei ground her teeth. "Do we not have men fighting at the Rock?" she asked, and Tyrion cocked his head.

"Your son wanted to order them brought back to King's Landing to deal with the riots," he told her. "If he had succeeded in forcing that out of my little wife, we'd be facing a battle we wouldn't be able to win."

Cersei held her ground, glaring again. He wondered if those eyes ever got tired of glaring, or if Cersei was just especially good at that.

"Your little wife is a traitor and a murderer, brother," she reminded him. "I would not go crowing now about any lost honor she has at Joffrey's hand."

It was almost a warning he could heed, Tyrion thought, and wondered that his sister would even bother.

"We ask the Boltons for their help," Tyrion said. "Their numbers are depleted as ours from holding off Stannis for so many weeks, but they'll agree to it, or turn around and stab us in the back once they have our army between Stannis and their own."

Cersei waved a hand dismissively. "Stannis would never take on traitors," she said, lips curling. "He has too much...integrity for that."

"He took Renly Baratheon's men on quickly enough, after killing his brother," Tyrion pointed out.

"That great woman, Brienne of Tarth," and oh, there was the loathing in her eyes at even being forced to mention that name, "Killed Renly Baratheon, the only good thing she's yet done for our side, what with her crowing about Sansa Stark's treatment, not that the little traitor deserved it."

Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek. He rather doubted that. Jaime claimed that Brienne said there was a shadow that snuck into the tent and killed Renly, but it hadn't been hers.

He wondered if all the women in his life were mad, these days.

"The men at the Rock should be able to hold off Stannis for a few days," Tyrion pointed out. "But there is something you should know about the Rock, something that might help our chances of staving him off."

Cersei perked up at that. "Well, considering it is mine now and I don't much like the idea of you knowing something about it that I don't, you might as well tell me."

Tyrion smirked. "You don't like the idea of anyone knowing something you don't when they are in the same room as you, sweet sister," he reminded her, and her lips pinched together again.

Tyrion forced himself to be serious. "There are tunnels underneath the Rock," he told her. "I used them to sneak my..." he coughed. "Well, that's hardly important."

Cersei rolled her eyes. "I know about those," she told him. "Jaime and I used to..." she cleared her throat, seemed to remember how much she loathed the creature in front of her. "That's not much use to us. If Stannis finds them, though..."

"Stannis is still en route," Tyrion told her. "If we can get a raven around him, to the Rock..."

She pursed her lips. "And if he intercepts it, he'll know about the tunnels and have a way to take the Rock before Kevan gets there to save it. Or is that your intention, brother dear?"

Tyrion rolled his eyes. He didn't take note of the way Lancel was glancing between them as if watching a particularly boring game of cyvasse.

That boy was an idiot, Tyrion reminded himself, and got back into the game.

"Anyway," Cersei said, "I don't understand the use of the tunnels, unless you mean to block them off before he gets there. We don't have time for that."

"I don't," Tyrion said, perfectly amiable. "I mean to flood them."

Cersei blinked at him. "And when we run out of water?"

Tyrion picked up his ever present glass of wine, and saw the way Cersei's eyes followed it. "Didn't Father have a particularly good collection of Dornish Red, for all his hatred of those Martells?"

Cersei's eyes gleamed. "I don't think our men would appreciate that," she pointed out. "They might even turn against us."

Tyrion waved a hand. "Then we promise them more, when the battle against Stannis is done. Fuck knows he's never had a stiff drink in his life, or perhaps he wouldn't have been so boring at Robert's parties."

Cersei was gritting her teeth again. "Do you think you can get the raven around Stannis?" she asked.

Tyrion didn't hesitate. "Yes."

She eyed him. "How?" It wasn't a question, but a command.

Tyrion obliged. "There are a group of Silent Sisters headed to the Westerlands, to bury our father in his castle. They're traveling by boat, into Lannisport," he said, and allowed some of the bitterness to seep into his voice.

He had gone to visit his father, in the Sept of Baelor, pushing past the rioting smallfolk outside the Sept and that damn barefoot preacher.

He could barely stand to be in the same room with him, now that he was dead. The smell had overpowered any feelings of anger Tyrion might have had, however buried deep they were, at the thought that he had not been there to mourn his father when he was at his best.

Learning that Cersei had Tywin's rooms in the Tower of the Hand burned had not worked in her favor, either, when he knew it was she probably most responsible for his hardships of late.

The rooms they had given him in the Tower of the Hand were the only ones left still untouched, besides where the Small Council meetings had taken place. They were still magnificent in comparison to the paltry chambers he was given as Master of Coin, but hardly to the standard of the second most powerful man in Westeros.

Tyrion grimaced at that thought. Hardly.

Cersei's eyes narrowed. "No," she said instantly.

Tyrion sighed. "Cersei, do you want to run the risk of losing our father's corpse to a bunch of soldiers with a grudge, or do you want to lose the fucking Rock you took such pleasure in gaining for yourself?"

"Oh, you would like both of those things, wouldn't you?" she demanded, getting to her feet and sneering at him. "For our father's body to be spirited into Stannis Baratheon's hands, that he might better desecrate it, burn it for his fucking Lord of Light, and for me to lose the Rock just because you can't bear the thought that it is rightfully mine, and not yours." She was breathing harshly now, in the otherwise silent chamber. "Father would never have left it to you."

She was shaking with rage.

Tyrion took another calm sip of his drink to mask his own anger. "And he would never have let it to you, either, Cersei," he told her, voice almost gentle.

She ground her teeth. He hoped she broke one of them, and it fell out of her mouth when she opened it to spit at him.

Ah, well.

"Do you have a better idea? The odds are that Stannis won't let his men approach the Silent Sisters. They are revered and feared throughout the realm-"

"Do you think he cares about anything to do with our civilized worship?" Cersei snapped at his. She still hadn't sat down. "He cares for nothing but the flame, and he would sacrifice our father to it in order to further his own-"

"You seem to know an awful lot about the flames he worships, Sister," Tyrion said, quirking a brow.

She lifted her chin, sitting back down. "We have a Master of Whispers, do we not? Is it not his duty to figure out such things?"

"He seems to have done a paltry job with finding out who really murdered our father," Tyrion drawled.

Her fingernails scraped against his desk. "Do you think I ordered that little Tyrell bitch to save you from the sword?" she asked coldly.

Tyrion forced himself not to react. "No," he said easily. "But I can't see why you would suspect Lord Varys."

She chewed on the inside of her cheek. "I want it to be a decoy," she said finally. "This would crush Jaime."

Tyrion snorted. "As if you give a fuck about Jaime's feelings."

The scraping of her fingernails was louder now, and he winced at the sound. So did Lancel. Tyrion almost felt embarrassed, then.

"Father is dead," Cersei said quietly. "Now I can." She tapped her hands together. "I always cared about him. Too much, you said once."

Tyrion eyed her. "Fine," he gritted out, and her eyes shot up to meet his. "A decoy. But you had better make it good, within the next day. If you can't procure one by then, one that Stannis Fucking Baratheon would recognize, we send Father."

Cersei swallowed. "Agreed." She cleared her throat. "The Westerlings. Tell Uncle Kevan I want them destroyed for this. They were impudent enough to turn on us when they married their little daughter to Robb Stark, and now this. Father was blind not to do something about them earlier."

Tyrion nodded, though he felt a little sick to his stomach at the thought. “And the Boltons,” he added. “That’s an ambitious list, Cersei, with our soldiers so few and far between.”

She rolled her eyes. “What about the Boltons?”

“Well, you are the one plotting being rid of someone before they are a problem,” he said, and Cersei’s eyes gleamed. Fuck.

“The Boltons are our allies,” she pointed out.

“The Boltons took Winterfell when they helped us lure Robb Stark and his family to the Freys,” he told her. “They had a lot to gain from that. They have little to gain here. And even if we do somehow manage to defeat Stannis...”

“His army is as depleted as ours,” she said. “His men aren’t made for fighting in the snow.”

“There’s snow in the North now?” Tyrion raised a brow.

She glared at him.

"Who’s to say that the Boltons won't turn on us the moment they're free of Stannis?" Tyrion asked. Cersei never thought of these things.

Cersei lifted her chin. "We named that Snow boy a true born of his father," she said. "Stannis won't name him that, if he wins the war."

"And if Lord Bolton wins the war after we finish taking each other to pieces?" Tyrion asked, staring her down.

Cersei glared right back. "Then what do you suggest?"

He'd thought about this. Thought long and hard about a way to keep the Boltons from turning on them, and had come to the sort of solution his father would have decided on.

Tyrion did not know what to make of that. He did not know what to make of the guilt he felt, either, at the thought of what this might do to his little wife.

"We give them something that they can't refuse," he said, and Cersei blinked at him. The anticipatory silence hung in the air.

"I don't suppose you have an idea about what that might be?" she asked finally, grinding her teeth.

Oh, he loved to make her wait. But they didn't have the time for that, not if they were going to win this war, and as much as Tyrion hated his family, he was going to ensure that they won the war.

"A marriage," he said, and waited for the other shoe to drop.

It didn't. Tyrion supposed he should have expected that. Cersei was always stupider than she thought herself to be.

"Whose marriage? I swear by the gods, if you say Myrcella again..." Cersei half-rose in her chair, and Tyrion rolled his eyes.

"Not Myrcella," he promised her. "As you know, she is to be married to a Martell, assuming we can stop the war we have going on with them."

Cersei's jaw twitched. "Well? I don't suppose you can figure out a way to get rid of Joffrey's little wife. I would ever so love to see her freezing away in the North."

Tyrion shook his head. "Considering the proof of your son's consummation has been...so loudly proclaimed to anyone throughout the Keep, I think not. No, I have a different lady in mind." He paused. "The Lady of Winterfell."

Cersei sat back down, rather hard. "Isn't she already spoken for?" she asked, but there was a cruel gleam in her eyes, and Tyrion rather regretted that he had played coy so far.

"One of them is," he told her outright, and Cersei blinked at him, leaned forward across his desk, smacking her lips together.

"As you so like to remind me, brother," she said, spitting the last word out, "we lost Arya Stark. The little beast disappeared the moment we killed her father, and I doubt we'll find her soon enough to assuage the Boltons when they realize we don't have her. She's a wild animal, and even if we were to find her, I doubt she would agree to a marriage as...placidly as your little traitorous wife did."

"Yes," Tyrion said, ignoring the baiting in her words, "And for once, sister, your ineptitude may have saved us."

Cersei cocked her head, neck cracking as she did so. "You have called my ability into question quite a few times lately, brother," she reprimanded him. "Remember who it is who gave you your current position."

Tyrion gave her an innocent smile. "As if I would forget." His eyes narrowed. "I am still trying to figure out why you did it, after all."

Cersei lifted her chin, and if he didn't know her, he would say she was preening. "Isn't it enough to know that you're saving the Crown from the embarrassment of having Mace Tyrell as Hand of the King?"

Tyrion eyed her. "Do you think the Boltons will agree to that?"

"I cannot see why they would, when you have yet to produce the little wildling," Cersei pointed out.

Tyrion smiled. "Father had a solution for that, as well." His father kept a surprising amount of notes on the subject. "Do I have your blessing to contact them?"

"You need the King's, for that sort of thing," Cersei said airily.

Tyrion leaned forward. "I know."

Cersei was practically beaming, by the time he finished. "Very well," she said. "Send your ravens to the Boltons, and get our soldiers to my Rock before Stannis Baratheon ruins us."

Tyrion nodded, gritting his teeth.

And with what she seemed to think of as a victory, Cersei turned and walked out of the room.

Her Kingsguard trailed nervously behind her, until Tyrion called out, "Lancel, if I might have a word."

Cersei turned back, eyes narrowing, and Lancel froze.

"Just to let you know of your father's situation, off fighting Stannis," he said. "I recieved a raven just this evening."

Lancel looked miserably back at Cersei. She eyed Tyrion again, clearly not believing his lie, and Tyrion inwardly winced, sure that she was going to check on all the ravens that had arrived in King's Landing recently.

The door swung shut behind her.

Tyrion waited.

Lancel shifted nervously from foot to foot.

"Lancel," Tyrion grinned at the young man, who went a bit pale at seeing him. "Take a seat."

Lancel slipped into the seat Cersei had sat in moments before.

"You have news of my father?" he asked nervously.

"It has just occurred to me that we have neglected our relationship for some time." He smirked, ignoring the question. "And the both of us now with such a lucrative position within the court."

Lancel stiffened. "I have nothing to say to you," he whispered, and Tyrion wondered again if Cersei had fucked the boy since she and Jaime had both returned to King's Landing.

"I am sure you believe that," Tyrion said, reaching for his quill again. "I don't suppose you'd like to chat about it anyway?"

Lancel grit his teeth, starting to stand. "I have duties. To the King."

"As do I, as the Hand of the King," Tyrion reminded him. "Sit the fuck down."

Lancel eyed him. "Just for a chat?" he asked, and Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling more widely.

"Indeed." Tyrion nodded. "Just a friendly chat between two loyal servants of the King."

Lancel went a bit pale. "My lord, I'm sure the King has places he wishes me to be..."

"Do you know that I am Hand of the King now, Lancel?" Tyrion asked pointedly, for the boy could hardly have failed to realize that. "And that, as such, my power rivals only the King's and the Queen Mother's?" He jerked his head for Lancel to come into his chambers. "I'd suggest you step inside before I have you demoted to scrubbing the chamber pots of every Kingsguard for the rest of your life."

Lancel swallowed thickly. "As you wish, my lord," he whispered to the ground, damned coward that he was.

"What...what is that you wished to talk about?" he asked hoarsely.

Tyrion looked him up and down, and wondered if he was still fucking Cersei, despite Jaime being back in the picture. He almost believed it.

"I want to talk about my sister Cersei," Tyrion said. "The last time we had such...conversations, we were able to come to an arrangement, were we not?"

If possible, Lancel paled further.


	201. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't going to update until tomorrow, but you guys' response to the last chapter really floored me, so have an early, sad Sansa chapter.

Sansa heard the clanging of the door to Oberyn's cell being opened, and she sat up abruptly, turning on her side and blinking at the little hole between their cells, as if it could tell her anything.

She waited with baited breath; wondered if today was the day that they were going to be dragged before the King, to answer for their crimes in a trial that Sansa did not even know how to prepare herself for.

Not now that she knew the reality of Oberyn's guilt, and that thought had her turning her back on the hole between their cells again, for why should she care who came to visit Prince Oberyn when he had been the one to drag her down here?

"Ellaria," Oberyn breathed abruptly, and Sansa licked her lips, tried not to hear the wanton want and need that that tone described, listening in.

She had seen the way the two of them cared for one another, after all. She needed no more proof of it.

She felt like a voyeur, able to hear them through the cell, and wanted to speak up, to warn them somehow, though of course that was foolish, for Oberyn already knew.

"My viper," Ellaria responded, and then Sansa heard the sound of them kissing, tried not to flush as she instantly thought of Margaery.

She swallowed hard, suddenly jealous that Ellaria, placed under house arrest, had come to visit Oberyn before Margaery had bothered to come to visit her.

That wasn't fair, she reprimanded herself, as the kiss grew deeper in the other room. Margaery had sent Elinor to her, to let her know that not all hope was lost. And Elinor had told her that Margaery was trying her best to help get her out of the situation the Martells had gotten her into.

"How did you convince them to let you down here?" Oberyn asked hoarsely, into the silence that followed a clear embrace.

"I...paid dearly for it," Ellaria said quietly, and Sansa heard Oberyn suck in a breath, wondered if he was about to start shouting his rage to all who would hear it. "It doesn't matter. I don't want to speak of that in the few moments that we do have together now. Please."

"Ellaria..."

"Please, Oberyn."

Oberyn sighed. "Did you figure out..." And then he fell silent. Perhaps he did remember that Sansa was nearby, that she could hear them.

Sansa couldn't help but wonder what difference it might make, at this point. She already knew they were guilty of Tywin's murder.

Then, Ellaria's voice, contrite and sweet in a way that Sansa had never heard it before. "I'm sorry," she whispered. She said something, though Sansa couldn't understand the quiet mumble she spoke in, beyond, "powerful friends, or enemies, as it seems."

A long pause. Sansa heard the sound of something slamming, the way a fist might slam against the wall, and she jumped.

"Oberyn..."

"No," Oberyn interrupted her. "It's not your fault, Ellaria. I'm sorry. This fucking place, those fucking backstabbers...we should have expected nothing less than failure. I never should have approached him in the first place."

Another long pause. "I hate to think that I've failed you," Ellaria said finally. "And I would try again, but for our daughters. I do not know how skittish he has become."

And then there was the shuffling of clothes, and Sansa found herself flushing again. She dearly wanted to call out, to remind them that she was here, that she could hear them.

"You've not failed me, my love," Oberyn said softly. "You are the only one in all of Westeros who..." she didn't hear what he said then, but when he spoke again, his voice was gruff. "I haven't lost hope yet, and I am the one down in here in a cell."

"Don't be strong for me, Oberyn," Ellaria said. "Please, I can't bear the thought of you suffering alone down here. The guards who keep me locked in my chambers; they will tell me nothing at all about you."

Sansa wondered why Oberyn had not told Ellaria of the hole in the wall between their two cells, hugged her knees a little more tightly, and remembered the day Ellaria had almost killed her.

Another pause.

Oberyn's hitched breathing. "You mustn't try this again, Ellaria."

"I...I can try something else," Ellaria said, seeming to agree to his wish. "Approaching him again. Or, try to find another ally. Perhaps V-"

"Don't do anything foolish," Oberyn said shortly, reminding her, "You have our daughters to think about."

Ellaria scoffed. "Our daughters are behind a blockade in Sunspear," she reminded Oberyn. "It's not as if they are any safer there now than they would be if their mother did something foolish."

"And if you did?" Oberyn's voice was hard. "Do you honestly think they would not find their way here, to be placed into the hands of these vultures? No, Ellaria."

She let out a long sigh. "Then I would ask the same of you, my viper," she said to him, voice breathy and soft. "Your daughters need you, as your brother and all of Dorne need you. Make sure that you can return to them."

He paused. "I will avenge them, Ellaria. Them, Elia, as I came here to do."

"Fuck your revenge, Oberyn. It has led you here, to this fucking cell, and I can't bear to think of where it will lead you next. I know what you came here to do, but I can't lose you because of that revenge. I'd rather...I'd rather half a man than a dead one. Please, just promise me..."

"I can't," he said, and Ellaria choked on a loud sob. "I can't promise that I will set aside this revenge, for it has become part of me, Ellaria. You know that. But it won't hurt you, or the girls," Oberyn told her. "That, I promise."

"Swear it to me."

"On what should I swear?"

"On something that matters."

He paused. "I swear to you on my brother's life that you and the girls will not lose a thing. That we will be together again. I swear it."

Another long pause. "Good. For I would hate to bring your severed head home to your daughters, only to tell them that your stubbornness led to another Martell dying at the hands of the Lannisters. Do whatever you have to to survive, my love."

It was a low blow; even Sansa recognized that, but then the guards were calling that Ellaria'd had enough time "for what she'd paid for" and Sansa heard the sound of Ellaria shouting something to her lover, before the door slammed again.

And Sansa couldn't help but think, in the silence that followed, about how Oberyn had made promises to her, too, and she wasn't going to see the beaches of Dorne now anymore than she imagined he planned to.

It was not a good thought, and she turned her back on the hole in the wall for good. Tried to think of anything else that would not send her into hysterics.

Unfortunately, there was only one thing on Sansa's mind.

Once she'd told Oberyn how she felt about Jeyne, Sansa couldn't stop thinking about her.

She couldn't stop thinking about this goodsister whom she had never known, who had died pregnant but a queen, in love with the man she had wed.

Sansa already knew she could not have those things. She would never be a queen, because Margaery was the Queen, and Sansa no longer envied the other woman for that. She could never love the man she had wed, because while she could admit that he no longer frightened her as he had, if there was anything she had learned at Margaery's side, it was that loving a man had never been in the fates, for her.

But she had been foolish to spurn Margaery's attempts to give her a child. If she had just been less squeamish, with that whore boy Margaery had brought to her. If she had let Margaery take care of her while it was happening, if she had just...

She could have been the Lady of Casterly Rock, could have denied the charges against her and a good reason to swear her loyalty to her husband at his trial. She could have used the child within her womb to save herself.

Jeyne had died pregnant, because the Freys were monsters, but not even the King could afford to execute his aunt, if she were pregnant with an innocent, Lannister babe. He would have been forced to keep her alive for so long as there was a child within her, and, Sansa thought, rocking a little where she sat, Margaery would have found a way to save her, given that time.

She should have trusted Margaery about this from the start. Margaery, after all, was willing to spend her nights in Joffrey's bed; for all that it repulsed her. Sansa could have learned to do the same, if she had not been so damn stubborn.

But she hadn't understood the necessary ruthlessness of such a plan, then. Using a child in such a manner had seemed as repulsive to her as being with Janek, for her parents had loved their children, not seen them as pawns, like Margaery had seen the child she wanted to put inside Sansa's belly.

But Margaery was Joffrey's Queen now, and Sansa was here, in the Black Cells.

She swallowed hard, drew out a breath slowly. There was no use dwelling on what ifs, now, of course, but still, Sansa could not get the thoughts of Jeyne out of her head.

"Sansa?" Oberyn called, moments later, despite Sansa's attempts to block him out of her thoughts. "Ellaria is gone now. I didn't...I supposed the illusion of privacy might be nice for us all, just then."

Sansa bit her tongue. "I see," she said, and did not respond to Oberyn's further attempts to bait her into conversation. She was beginning to suspect that his talking was to keep her from madness, but then, the jape was on him.

She was already mad.

 


	202. MARGAERY

"Tommen," Joffrey called out, voice loud in the audience chamber, and Margaery watched the way his little brother flinched, where he stood behind one of his septas in the crowd, before stepping forward.

She grimaced, wondered how many times the boy had been the attention of an entire room. Judging by the harsh flare of red up his neck, it wasn't often.

Joffrey was bored, though, and he didn't have Sansa to abuse, in order to entertain himself. He was also still angry about Tyrion getting the upper hand, during that Small Council meeting, Margaery could tell.

Not as angry as she had expected him to be, but angry enough.

He was such a fucking child, she thought, pulling at the wings of a butterfly until it was dead.

Tommen's septa gave him a gentle push forward.

"Your Grace?" he stammered out, and Joffrey sneered.

"Come here," Joffrey snapped, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek as his little brother stepped nimbly up the steps of the Iron Throne, stood before his brother, shifting from foot to foot awkwardly.

This close to him, Margaery could see how much of a little boy young Tommen really was. His cheeks still hung with the fat of youth, his eyes, though red rimmed and watery, were still bright, and she wondered how a little boy who was brothers with Joffrey managed to retain even the amount of innocence she thought she saw in him now.

She supposed Cersei might have the right idea about, keeping him isolated. It at least usually kept him from Joffrey's attention.

Of course, he was on his way to his lessons just now, no doubt. The ones Margaery had insisted he take.

She bit the inside of her cheek.

"You've been crying," Joffrey announced finally, and Tommen let out a little sniffle, loud in the otherwise silent room, before shrugging one shoulder. "Is it because of our grandfather?"

Joffrey's voice sounded deceptively kind to Margaery's ears, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. That was never a good sign.

She just hoped that he meant it, with his own brother. That there was one shred of goodness within her husband.

Margaery bit back a laugh at the thought.

Tommen nodded.

Joffrey rolled his eyes, and Margaery couldn't hear a sound in the throne room.

"He's been dead for weeks, brother," Joffrey sneered. "Do you know who cries for the dead after weeks have gone by?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Little boys and women. You're the brother to a King, not either of those."

Tommen stared up at him, wide eyed. "I..."

"If you might be King one day," Joffrey said, slouching in his throne, "Though I doubt my wife won't provide me with a far more suitable heir, so at least the Lord of Casterly Rock as our grandfather was, you'll need some balls, Brother."

Tommen swallowed thickly. "I-"

Joffrey cut him off. "Guards!"

Margaery laid a hand on her husband's arm. "Joffrey, my love..."

He turned, grinning at her, not seeming to notice the reticence in her features. And then he turned back as the guards dragged a young woman, dressed in torn rags, into the throne room.

Margaery felt bile rise into her throat. Not this again.

Tommen jerked at the sight of the woman, glancing nervously back at Joffrey.

For someone who had grown up with Joffrey for a brother, Margaery thought, he certainly hadn't learned to control the emotions flitting across his face.

The guards deposited the girl on her knees before the throne, and she cried out as they hit the hard stone floor, glancing up at Joffrey before quickly lowering her head again.

"Part of being the lord of a place means making hard decisions, Tommen," Joffrey said, voice sing song. "It means doing things that you're not going to like, because stupid people," he gestured down to the girl, "break the laws you set into place."

Tommen licked his lips. "I-I know that," he whispered hoarsely. "I..." He glanced hesitantly down at the girl.

"Oh?" Joffrey said. Then, "This woman broke the law. She betrayed her king, betrayed the trust that I have in my people, and she needs to be punished for it. If you were the King, what would you do?"

Tommen swallowed hard, glancing desperately around the crowd for allies, but they ignored his searching gaze, the lot of them cowards.

Margaery reached out for her husband's arm again. "Joffrey, are you certain that this is a good idea? He's still quite young to be-"

Joffrey spun on her, fire in his eyes, and she fell abruptly silent. She loathed herself for it in the next moment, for revealing enough fear of her husband to stop speaking when he glared at her.

That was the first thing Sansa Stark had ever done wrong, and she was paying dearly for it. Margaery could not afford to make the same mistake.

But then Joffrey was no longer paying attention to her.

"Well, Brother?"

Tommen licked his lips again. "I...I suppose I would have to know what she has done wrong," he whispered.

"What was that?" Joffrey asked, smirking, though he could damn well hear him from here.

"I would have to know what he had done wrong," Tommen stammered a little louder. He flushed as the words reverberated through the throne room.

The girl on the ground glanced up at Tommen with an unreadable expression. Margaery wondered what it was she saw in Tommen, to look at him like that.

The girl had red hair, Margaery noticed. She looked very much like Sansa.

Joffrey snorted. "If you think the King always has the luxury of knowing the crime the convicted has committed, you're mistaken, brother," he said harshly. "But...I suppose, just this once."

He smirked, lounging back a little further in the Iron Throne. "She was seen by soldiers whoring herself out for Stannis Baratheon's army," he told Tommen. "Who then recognized her when she came here. She's likely a spy for him."

"Your Grace, please, they have the wrong woman, I swear I did not, I have never left King's Landing-"

Joffrey thundered to his feet. "Are you calling soldiers of the King, your betters, liars?" he demanded, and Margaery felt a chill run down her spine.

She shifted in her seat.

The whore slumped a little further. "No, Your Grace," she whispered hoarsely.

Joffrey turned triumphantly to Tommen. "Well?" he asked the boy. "What do you think her punishment should be?"

Tommen swallowed. "I...I don't know," he whispered.

Joffrey scoffed. "Come now," he said. "My wife tells me that you are excelling at your studies. Surely you've reached this, by now?"

Tommen bit down hard on his lip. Margaery saw a small trickle of blood run down his chin. "I..." he shook his head.

And Margaery knew that he knew what such a punishment generally entailed. She knew it because she had asked the maesters to not go over it in too much detail, but told them that the Prince needed to know.

Gods, this was her fault.

"Well, I'll tell you," Joffrey said, magnanimous. "Generally, whores like this get a beating. Forty lashes with a whip. It's more than she deserves, honestly."

Tommen swallowed. "F-forty?" he stammered out.

Joffrey nodded. "But you have to be the one to order it," Joffrey told Tommen. "As the King."

Fuck, was Joffrey this worried that they weren't going to have children? Margaery's father had been harping on her about this for weeks, but surely, things were not so desperate yet.

And she recognized, now, the desperation in the stubborn line of Joffrey's shoulders, as he did his best to impart some knowledge of his position to his little brother.

She supposed that, in Joffrey's mind, he was being kind.

Gods, she needed to have a child. Needed to have one soon, it looked like, unless she was willing to sacrifice her position here.

Tommen shivered. "I..."

"Come on, Brother," Joffrey said, getting impatient now. "I've told you what you have to do. Being King is not always fun, you know!"

Tommen's lips wobbled. He looked dangerously close to tears again, as he glanced at the waiting guards.

Margaery had not even noticed the whip in one of their hands until now, and she hated herself a little for not having done so.

"F-forty lashes," he told the guards, and Joffrey grinned, sinking back into his chair.

One of the guards stepped forward, brandishing the whip.

"Here?" Tommen asked, eyes very wide.

Joffrey's grin widened. "Yes, here. I ordered Ned Stark's head cut off, and I watched it happen. It's best, as the King. The people will respect you more for it," he said, gesturing to the people all around them.

Tommen swallowed. "H...Here then," he whispered to the guards, still waiting.

The guard let the whip crack across the whore's back in the first strike, and the whore screamed, the noise loud and desperate in the hall.

Margaery clenched her hands around the armrests of her chair. There was another flash of the whip. Then another.

She sucked in a breath, and Joffrey turned toward her. She forced herself to offer him a smile.

The whipping seemed to last forever, the girl's loud pants and screams the only sound in the chamber, and with each one, Tommen jerked a little, where he stood.

And then the guard stopped. Margaery slumped a little in relief, as, she noticed, did Tommen.

"Well?" Joffrey demanded, voice shrill. "Go on. Can't you count? That was only thirty-seven."

The quivering girl on the floor let out a pained moan, at those words.

And then the spell was broken.

"For fuck's sake!" Tyrion Lannister snapped, storming into the throne room and glancing from the whore to Joffrey. Margaery nearly wilted in relief, at the sight of him. "What in the seven hells is going on here?"

Joffrey smirked at Tyrion. "I'm teaching my brother a little lesson," he informed the Hand of the King. "After all, Father is dead, and someone needs to take care of Tommen."

Tyrion squinted at the King, then at Tommen, seeming to notice him also standing in the middle of the room for the first time, the little boy shaking like a leaf; Margaery could see it even from here.

Then his eyes settled on the whimpering girl squatting in the middle of the throne room, and Tyrion's gaze hardened further.

"I can't imagine what sort of lesson would induce you to beat an innocent girl," he said, teeth clenched.

Joffrey eyed his uncle. "She was hardly innocent," he said. "She's nothing more than a rotting whore, painting her face and spreading her legs for anyone who will pay her." His grin turned wicked. "And you would know all about those, wouldn't you, uncle?"

Margaery watched as Tyrion's hand flexed. "The last time I checked, whoring was not against the law in King's Landing," he said calmly. "And you're starting to sound like that barefoot fanatic for suggesting as much."

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "But whoring for the enemy and then returning to our Keep to spy on us is," he said dismissively. "She got what she deserved, and you won't do it again, will you?" he asked, this last directed at the slave girl.

She shook her head miserably. "Of course not, Your Grace," she stuttered out, grimacing as she lifted her back and then slumped down once more.

Margaery wondered how unfortunately foolish she had to have been, to turn down one of the soldiers when they asked for her, for Margaery had no doubt that the girl had never left King's Landing in her life.

She bit down a sigh.

Tyrion did not. "Get out of here," he snapped at the whore, and the woman clawed to her feet, pulling what was left of her clothes a little more tightly around her and fleeing the room as quickly as she was able, in her condition.

Tommen's lower lib wobbled as he watched her go.

"Well, Tommen, did you learn something?" Joffrey asked gleefully, once the doors had closed behind the woman.

Tyrion glared at Joffrey. "I can't imagine what you were trying to teach your brother, save for how not to act as a King."

Margaery's was not the only surprised gasp in the room, at that. And she hated them, all of the rest of those people standing around excitedly watching a performance they thought would never affect them.

Joffrey's hands clenched into fists, and he jumped to his feet. "What did you just say, Uncle?" he demanded.

Tyrion didn't back down. "Tommen," he said, "Go back to your rooms. You're done learning, for today."

The boy nodded so hard Margaery almost expected his neck to snap, and then rushed out of the room, accompanied by his septa.

Tyrion turned hard eyes on Joffrey. "You are not in charge of the Prince's education in any case, Your Grace," Tyrion said. "I understood the Queen Margaery had been given control of that."

Joffrey waved a hand dismissively. "And the Queen understands her place, and that a King can give a future lord better education than she might."

Tyrion eyed Margaery, then said, "Does she?"

And like that, all eyes in the room were on Margaery. She wasn't expecting it, hadn't thought Tyrion could be so mad.

"I...My place is by my husband's side," she told Lord Tyrion, voice sounding shakier than she would have liked it to. "I belong to him, and thus everything I do and am is his," she said. "Besides," she smoothed down her skirt, a faux nervous gesture, "The King gave me the honor of overseeing Prince Tommen's education, but he would know more about some things than I."

"A wonder he did not take over Tommen's education completely," Tyrion muttered.

"Because I am the King," Joffrey snapped, sending Margaery an annoyed look. She was merely glad that he was not annoyed with her. "And I don't always have time for such things."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "Of course, Your Grace," he said, "But I suppose we could turn to more important matters, now? I have come to ask your written agreement that the soldiers be moved from Winterfell to Casterly Rock, to head off Stannis before he arrives."

Joffrey grinned. "Do it, do it," he said, excited like a little child, now.

Margaery remembered to breathe easy, the moment she saw it.

The rest of Joffrey's time in front of his subjects passed quickly after that, and soon enough, she found herself following Joffrey back to their chambers for the noon meal, a bout of nervousness still bubbling up inside of her, one she hoped Joffrey could not sense.

The Kingsguard shut the door behind them, once the servants had delivered their meal, and Margaery took her seat at the table, across from Joffrey.

Joffrey reached for his wine, not meeting her eyes. She was annoyed that she didn't know what that meant.

"My love..." Margaery began, remembering the angry look he had sent her when she dared to question him about giving Tommen such cruel responsibility.

Joffrey spun on her. Margaery barely withheld a flinch.

"Don't ever question me before the people again," Joffrey snapped at her, and Margaery swallowed, forced herself not to react and show weakness.

"Of course, my love. Forgive me, I have such a soft heart towards children," she said, and Joffrey relaxed instantly.

He reached out, hesitant, and Margaery reflected on how he hardly touched anyone of his own volition, save for perhaps during sex.

"Then perhaps we ought to make some of our own finally, eh?" he asked her, an impish grin on his features, and Margaery supposed she had been forgiven of her offense.

She got up from the table, Joffrey's eyes tracking her every move, came around to where her husband sat and reached down for the ties of his trousers, sinking to her knees. "My King," she said, a giggle in her voice, and Joffrey grinned back at her.


	203. MARGAERY

Margaery found herself going to Sansa's chambers without thinking about it. One moment, she was in her own, lonely and tired and reflecting on what Elinor had told her about the terrible conditions Sansa was being kept under, and the next she was just there, standing in the middle of Sansa's old rooms, hugging herself and breathing in deeply through her nose.

Gods, she was tired.

She was tired of her husband and his wicked theatrics; she was tired of worrying about whether she would ever see Sansa again.

She was so fucking tired that she could scream.

Margaery blinked.

Sansa's old chambers - the ones she had shared with Lord Tyrion since her marriage and which Margaery had often joined her in - were bare, now. All of the things in the little broom closet where they had resided had been moved to the Tower of the Hand. There was nothing left behind but dust, far too much of it for how long it had been, and moth balls, and a few scraps of fabric left behind, as well as the decor lining the walls.

She hated it. Nothing about this old room could remind her of Sansa, the way she needed to be reminded.

 _She looked like death_ , Elinor's voice whispered in her ear. _She was so pale, as if she'd never seen the sun, and when I handed the soup to her I thought she was going to be sick in front of me._

Margaery shuddered, sitting down on the bed which had been stripped of its Lannister quilts.

Of course, she had barely been able to drag such words out of her lady, so Margaery could only imagine how worse off Sansa must have been, what else Elinor wasn't telling her.

 _I told her to be patient, though,_ Elinor had said, and Margaery felt a desperate laugh bubbling up at the back of her throat.

Patient. As if there was anything that Margaery could do, from this end of things. Patient, as if Sansa could still be saved from Joffrey's wrath.

Sansa had been suffering away in the Black Cells for over a week now, and Margaery was no closer to getting her out now than she had been when Sansa and Oberyn were imprisoned together.

Her fists clenched at the thought of Oberyn. How dare that man. She had helped Sansa to escape, had kept her silence about it and done her best to ensure no one else knew of it, and he had betrayed Sansa's trust, had used her...

Margaery sighed, rubbing at her forehead and closing her eyes. Fuck. Even if there were some way to save Sansa in this moment, Margaery's head was not in the right place to achieve that.

She didn't even know where to begin.

"Oh, I didn't realize anyone else would be here," a subdued but familiar voice uttered, and Margaery blinked open her eyes, surprised at the sight of Prince Tommen, hands furling in the hem of his brown cloak, red rimmed eyes on the floor.

She was immediately aware that the last time she had seen him had been the day before, when Joffrey had called Tommen onto the court's floor and asked him what he should do about the whore.

How old was the boy, anyway, that he should have a wretch of a brother demanding such things of him?

"Prince Tommen," Margaery blinked in surprise at the sight of him. "What are you doing here?"

She hadn't had much contact with the boy, up close. It felt strange, to see him standing in Sansa's chambers, ones so intimately familiar to her.

Tommen stared at her listlessly, and then flushed. "Ser Pounce," he said, looking down at his feet. "I can't find him anywhere."

Panic infused his voice, and Margaery tried to remember back to a time when she had cared for an animal so much. Her favorite steed when she was younger, back in Highgarden, perhaps, but the beast had been just as stubborn as she, and she hadn't cared for another that she felt so close to, after that one died.

Tommen looked near tears.

"Have you checked the kitchens?" Margaery asked, folding her hands together in front of her. "Perhaps he went looking for some milk."

Tommen nodded miserably. "I did," he said, eyes lifting to hers before falling again.

Margaery swallowed. "Well," she said, reaching out her hand, "Why don't we try to find him together? Two eyes are better than one, after all."

He reached out hesitantly, placing his warm palm in hers, and Margaery let him lead her from the room, glad enough to have a distraction from her thoughts.

She was fortunate she had no further pressing engagements this evening.

They searched high and low for the damn cat, searched the kitchens once more, even Joffrey's chambers, though Margaery doubted the animal was suicidal enough to find itself there. Then the Maidenvault, where her ladies fawned over Tommen just as the kitchen girls did, then down to the servants' quarters.

Tommen stopped, at the entrance to the servants' quarters, and Margaery nearly dragged him before she realized that he was no longer moving.

She glanced back at the boy, raising an eyebrow. "Are you all right?" she asked, for he was still as a statue.

The boy let go of her hand, hugging himself. "This is where she lived," he whispered, rocking now.

Margaery's eyes furrowed in puzzlement.

"One of the serving girls," Tommen said. "Dryzel. Joffrey had her killed last year. He..." his lower lip wobbled. "He called her a...the bad name, and he had her killed."

Margaery sucked in a breath. "Your Grace..."

Tommen sniffed. "I..."

And Margaery realized that it would not paint a very pretty picture at all if one of the servants walked out of their rooms to see their Prince having a meltdown in the middle of their hall, the Queen standing by with no idea about how to comfort him.

She bit the inside of cheek. "Would you like to check if Ser Pounce is within?" she asked, uncomfortably, as she gestured to the first empty room she found.

He nodded, and they stepped inside.

The damn cat was sitting in the middle of the room, licking his paws and staring at them with Cheshire green eyes. Margaery could have sworn it was smiling.

"Ser Pounce!" Tommen cried, rushing forward and throwing his arms around the cat's neck. The creature yelped, scurrying away from him, but not too far.

Thank the gods for small mercies, Margaery thought, relieved that their earlier conversation was over.

She walked forward and knelt down beside Tommen and Ser Pounce. "How is he?" she asked, reaching out to pet the cat behind the ears, before pausing and glancing at Tommen.

The boy gave her a tremulous nod. Well, perhaps that conversation wasn't as finished as she had hoped.

"He likes being petted by girls," Tommen told her, tone incredibly serious. "At least, he liked it when Myrce petted him. Or Mother. Not Joffrey."

Margaery didn't bother to ask why. She'd had enough of horror stories, lately.

Instead, she reached out and ran her hand through the cat's fur, smiling when he purred and extended his neck for her.

It had the extended benefit of not forcing her to look at Tommen, while the little boy's eyes filled with tears once more and Margaery didn't know at all how to deal with it.

"She died," Tommen whispered, and she could hear the tears clogging in his throat.

Margaery's head did jerk up, then, because she may be Joffrey's wife but surely she could never be as cruel as he, and clearly Tommen needed to get these words out, even if she felt woefully ill equipped in comforting him.

"The servant?"

Tommen nodded. "Joffrey asked me whether I thought she should, or not. Said that we were both possibly going to be kings one day, and..." He bit his wobbling lower lip. "How she died, that was..."

"That wasn't your fault," Margaery felt obliged to say, even without knowing the details, the words spilling out of her before she could stop them.

Tommen froze, turned to glance up at her with wide green eyes.

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. She couldn't make this a habit, Margaery told herself. This was what she had done with Sansa; gotten attached, seen the vulnerable side of her and been unable to turn away from her.

Tommen was Joffrey's little brother. Margaery couldn't do the same with him. Cersei might not care about her friendship with Sansa, but she would damn well care if Margaery started exerting even more of her influence over Tommen. She was furious enough about Joffrey's letting Margaery take over the boy's education.

Margaery sighed, smoothing down her dress in a nervous habit. "What are you doing with your maesters today?" she asked.

She'd pushed for that, as annoyed as Cersei had been by it, the moment Lord Tywin was unable to keep seeing to his grandson's education.

She didn't know if she was going to birth the heir that everyone in Westeros seemed to want her to have now, rather than later, but that was not why she had asked Joffrey to let her take over Tommen's education, from afar.

Cersei hadn't quite figured out that Margaery was in charge of that, but she must have realized that most of Tommen's maesters were not Lannisters.

That was the extent of the influence that Margaery dared to have over the little boy. Anything more would get her stabbed in the back by his crazed mother.

But she was disturbed by what the maesters did tell her. Lord Tywin had started his education the moment he had the chance, and Margaery was no fool.

The boy barely had an education before that, passed over by his maesters as the second son just as he was by his mother. That in itself was disturbing, but Lord Tywin's handling of the situation was no better.

Lord Tywin had not been tutoring his grandson to be the Lord of Casterly Rock, as it was assumed he would one day be.

No, Tywin had been tutoring Tommen to be King.

Margaery had stiffened when she realized this, told the maesters to change a few aspects of his education.

She didn't know how she felt about the fact that Tywin had been essentially, less than subtly, grooming Tommen to be King.

However much a better king Tommen might make than his brother, he was not the king, and if he ever became king, then Margaery would not be the Queen.

Tommen swallowed. "We're learning about the Long Night," he said, and Margaery smiled.

"You and Ser Pounce?" she clarified.

Tommen nodded shyly, running his fingers through the cat's fur. Ser Pounce hissed, shifting in the boy's lap.

"Margaery."

Margaery stood abruptly to her feet, spinning around to where Loras stood in the doorway, eying them with an expression she couldn't identify.

She used to be able to read her brother so much better than she could now.

"Can you find your way back from here?" Margaery asked the little boy.

Tommen nodded.

Margaery gave Tommen a little smile. "I'm glad we found Ser Pounce," she told him, and the boy smiled shyly back at her as she followed Loras out into the hall.

"Gods, Margaery, I've only been looking for you for the better part of an hour," Loras muttered, as the door shut behind them.

Margaery rolled her eyes, not in the mood to be lectured by her brother at the moment. After all, it wasn't as if he was listening to her, either.

"What is it, Loras?"

Loras glanced around, and then took Margaery's hand, leading her into an abandoned corridor. He turned back to her, ran a hand through his hair.

"All right," he said. "I'll do it."

Margaery blinked at him, eyes widening. "What?"

He sighed. "I said I'll do it."

Margaery shook her head. "You..."

"When do you need it done?" Loras asked tiredly.

Margaery swallowed. "Loras, thank you," she whispered, pulling him into a hug.

Loras rolled his eyes, expression fond. "I take it things are still in development," he said.

Margaery nodded. "Well, yes, but..." she shook her head. "What changed your mind?"

He stared her down. "Do you want the truth or would you rather hear that you're right about me?"

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "You talked to Grandmother," she surmised, surprised that that had convinced Loras to do as she wished. She doubted her grandmother would find the logic in this decision.

Loras nodded. "I was...worried about you, Margaery. Acting rashly, that isn't like you."

Margaery's temper flared. "Isn't it?"

He sighed. "I don't want to fight, sister," he told her. "Just...let me know when it needs to be done. And, by the gods, talk to Grandmother, would you? Between the two of you, you're going to scheme all of Westeros into our hands and neither of you will have any idea what the other is doing."

Margaery sighed, and then nodded. "Right," she said tiredly. "I suppose I had better go and do that then." She paused, reaching out to touch her brother's arm. "Thank you, Loras."

He gave her a soft look. “Margaery, just...be careful. Whatever this is, please be careful.”

Margaery smiled, bending forward and kissing her brother on the forehead. “I always am,” she promised.

Loras snorted. “Oh, I’m sure.”


	204. TYRION

Finding the chambers of the Master of Whispers was not an easy thing. Tyrion had been there before, but he found it just as unsettling to approach those chambers now as he had then.

Fortunately, Varys did not invite him inside, merely held open the door and peered at him, before suggesting a walk around the Keep's many abandoned corridors.

Tyrion suspected that was merely a byproduct of Tywin's death, the lack of nobles cluttering those halls. No one wanted to remain in a King's Landing where Joffrey held power unchallenged.

They walked in silence, Tyrion strangely hesitant to break it, for he felt that there was something Varys wished to tell him, and he doubted they had the same thoughts in mind.

Fuck, but he hated these halls. He wondered if they were the very same ones Sansa had used to sneak out of the Keep when she and the Martells escaped together.

And now she was down in the cells, and Tyrion was thinking about doing the same damn thing over again. Surely the guards would find that predictable?

"Tyrion Lannister," Varys smiled at him, pushing away these errant thoughts and folding his hands together as they walked. "I realized I never gave you my congratulations on becoming Hand of the King. I always thought you were better at that job than court jester."

"Master of Coin," Tyrion corrected, but Varys merely rolled his eyes. "And you did, in fact."

Varys smiled. "I said you reminded me very much of your father."

Tyrion raised a brow. "Not meant to be a compliment, I take it?" he asked, words only partially in jest.

Varys didn't answer. "And what can I do for you, Hand of the King?" Varys asked, still looking far too amused.

Tyrion hesitated, turning in the middle of the hall so that he was standing in front of Varys. He cracked his knuckles, then his risks. Varys looked a bit startled, seemed to realize that whatever he was about to say had Tyrion far too nervous for it not to be risky.

He moved to lean against the far wall, watching Tyrion like a hawk.

"My wife," Tyrion said, finally. "As you know, she's found herself in a spot of trouble."

There was no one behind them; he'd checked, before he opened his fool mouth, and they were walking down a hall that did not curve for some time. Still, Tyrion felt anxious.

He supposed that was at the idea that, as much as Varys didn't strike him as the sort of person, he might very well turn Tyrion in for what he was about to say.

Varys merely nodded sagely. "Indeed, she has. I would say that trouble seems to follow that poor girl wherever she goes, but then, most young girls are foolish creatures, so I am told."

Tyrion grimaced, and went in for the kill. "Can you help her?"

Varys blinked at him.

Tyrion hated the silence that followed his request, found himself rambling in turn. "You and I both know that she didn't have a hand in killing my lord father, anymore than I did. And she doesn't deserve to die because of the Viper's games."

Varys looked amused. "We all die because of the games, Lord Tyrion," he pointed out. "Though some of us more tragically than others, I will grant. Her father went out in much the same manner."

"And when we lose the North because we've lost Sansa to the scaffold?" he demanded, gritting his teeth. Normally, he found Varys' circular words amusing. Now, they were anything but.

Varys shrugged. "That is the King's prerogative. I would advise against it, but as you learned the other day, when you are not Tywin Lannister, you merely sit at the table to advise the King, not to lead him."

Tyrion bit back the annoyed response that came immediately, at those words. "What do you want?"

Varys raised a brow. "A great many things," he said. "Stability within the realm. A king who cares about his people. A Hand who knows what he's doing, rather than trying to think of what his father might do."

Tyrion snorted, didn't point out how close to treason those words actually were. "You think I am acting that much like my father?"

Varys folded his hands, squinting. "I think you are afraid, Lord Hand," he said, voice quiet, but loud in the otherwise silent hall. "Afraid of losing anymore of your position than you already have, afraid of losing your life when Joffrey can just kill the girl he's been keeping captive for years in order to assuage the North."

Tyrion, suddenly uncomfortable, found it difficult to swallow. "Perhaps my father had the right ideas," he said, clearing his throat. He had hardly ever agreed with his father's ruthlessness while he lived, but it had kept the realm stable for years, where it seemed to be falling apart at the seams, now.

"And yet, he is dead and you are not," Varys said, eyes twinkling.

Tyrion eyed him. "Did you convince Lady Rosamund to speak for me?" he asked, brows furrowing. "I have been thinking about it since the trial, and can't think of another damned soul in King's Landing who would wish to see me live so badly."

Varys raised a brow. "And why would I want you to live?" he asked. "Perhaps the Tyrells sent the girl. We all know how they hate Prince Oberyn, and it was a perfect chance to get their revenge on him. Especially since the man confessed, and you did not."

Tyrion chewed hard on the inside of his lip. "What do you want from me?" he repeated.

Varys weighed him up and down. "Nothing," he said finally, and Tyrion jerked at the finality in that tone. Varys sighed. "Lord Tyrion, I sympathize with the girl's plight. Her situation has been...difficult, since the day her father foolishly agreed to bring her to King's Landing, and she is an innocent in all of this."

It was the most emotion Tyrion thought he had heard from the Master of Whispers, but it wasn't enough. He needed the Spider here, not a man capable of emotion. Tyrion felt a sinking feeling in his gut.

"But you won't help me save her from the scaffold," he surmised.

Varys shook his head. "There is nothing I can do for her, and much as I would like to, I cannot risk the stability of the realm for one woman."

"The stability of your own head atop your shoulders," Tyrion corrected, annoyance dipping into his tone. "Very well. Thank you for your time, Master of Whispers." He started toward the door.

"Lord Hand," Varys called at his back. Tyrion paused. "Do you know that your sister has been speaking to Ser Loras? Quite a bit, actually, and generally in the quiet of her own chambers."

Tyrion did turn around then, incredulous. "Do you honestly think my sister has abandoned her husband for that one? You're fucking dumber than I thought."

He kept walking.

Varys did not seem deterred by the insult. "The Ironborn abandoned their fight in the Islands," he said, and Tyrion froze. "They gave it up to Garlan Tyrell too easily, and disappeared into the night on their ships."

Tyrion turned back, jaw slack and eyes wide. "Why am I just now hearing of this?"

Varys' lips twitched. "You are Hand of the King, my lord, but we still have a King who can decide what and what not to tell his councilors. He received the missive two days hence, and has told no one on the Small Council, because his mother is scared out of her mind about it."

"I can...I can hardly blame her for that," Tyrion said, with a small sigh. "We have no idea where they are?"

"My little birds are good at climbing into small holes and finding information, Lord Hand," Varys said. "The Ironborn fleet was seen just North of Dragonstone."

Tyrion closed his eyes. "Shit."

Varys sounded amused. "Indeed. And the Queen Mother has been speaking to Ser Loras about leading an army there, to defend Dragonstone in case the Ironborn attack it."

Tyrion opened his eyes. "She's baiting him," he said, and thought perhaps his sister was not as dumb as she seemed. Of course Loras would not want Dragonstone, Stannis' stronghold, falling into the hands of their enemies.

Not if it meant he could claim it for his king.

But of course, Cersei was yet again failing to see the whole picture. If she sent Loras, who was a good swordsman, he could admit, to fight this battle, they were going to lose it. He was not Jaime, to be pushed through a battle on sheer passion alone.

He didn't have the experience. Cersei meant to send him to his death, and lose the chance to take Dragonstone in the process.

And, of course, their alliance with the Tyrells.

"Shit," Tyrion repeated, breathing heavily. "Do we even have our men there?"

Varys eyed him. "Your sister seems quite determined to ensure that Ser Loras lead the charge."

"My brother is the Lord of the Kingsguard," Tyrion snapped, though it was not Varys he was angry at, this time. "It should be he leading the charge."

Varys shrugged. "Your sister seems to think otherwise."

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose. "Fuck. That fucking..." he shook his head. "Thank you, for telling me, Varys. I suppose it's a comfort that someone within King's Landing was willing to do so, before the Ironborn simply took what they wanted."

Varys didn't nod. "I should think, Lord Tyrion, that this is a matter of the utmost importance. You may even need...allies, to handle this."

Tyrion raised a brow. "Other than you? I hardly think anyone within King's Landing would be willing to help me team up against Cersei now that she's set her mind to something, and you've already proven you won't help me with Sansa."

Varys eyed him, looking less than impressed. "I told you, I am not completely unsympathetic to the girl's situation. And so I will tell you this, since I understand that you are under some strain and have not yet put it together. There is someone in King's Landing whom you will find has a stake in both matters."

Tyrion's heart skipped a beat.

"Who?" he asked. Varys had been his last bet. He would have gone to Jaime, before he received that damned note from Jaime. Now, there was no one fucking left.

Jaime, who hadn't even seemed to notice the strain between them as they sat down for supper the night before, too caught up in his musings over their sister.

Varys licked his lips. "The young Queen. She seems determined not to allow her friend to go to the scaffold for this, even if it means all her ladies will, when they are found out to be little amateur spies. And she is notoriously protective of her brother. Perhaps if you spoke to her..."

Tyrion eyed him. "The Tyrell girl is just as opportunistic as the rest of her family," he pointed out. "Why is she risking her favor as Queen to help Sansa Stark?"

"As I said," Varys said, "they are friends, though the gods alone know why. I can't think of much that they even have in common, at the moment." Tyrion blinked. The man was laughing at him, he could just tell, despite the seriousness of his expression.

He wondered if Varys was always laughing at all of them.

"And why should she agree to work with me?" Tyrion asked. "She may care about her friend, but if Cersei is plotting to send her brother to his death, she is hardly going to trust a Lannister..."

Varys smiled. "You need only ask her, my lord," he told him. "At this point, what do you have to lose?"

Tyrion supposed there was some truth in that. He let out a long sigh, and Varys' eyes flashed with what was clearly amusement, now.

"If it would make you feel better, my lord," he suggested, "I could set up a meeting between the two of you. I, after all, am not a Lannister."

Tyrion rubbed his face. "No," he said finally. "No, I'll see to it myself." He had a feeling that would only scare her away.


	205. TYRION

Tyrion hesitated outside the door to the Queen's chambers. He had made his way all the way here, after deciding not to let Cersei know he knew about the Ironborn, and now he was hesitating.

He shook his head, laughing ruefully.

Varys had no reason to lie to him about Queen Margaery's loyalties, not when there was nothing he would get out of it. He had as much as admitted that he wanted to do everything he could to keep the peace, and the Lannisters would be better overlords to Dragonstone than the fucking Ironborn.

He had as much to lose to Cersei's stupidity as Tyrion did.

Still, Margaery may have worried for her brother, but Tyrion did not know if he could trust what Varys said when he claimed she cared for Sansa.

She was a Tyrell, and Tyrion knew not to trust them or their flowery words farther than he could throw them, even if he knew the importance of keeping them happy, as allies. And he didn't know her, the way he knew most of the people at court.

He thought he understood her, to some extent. Understood that her goal in life was to manipulate her husband into submission, and he wished her good luck with that. The gods knew she would need it, though if she did actually manage it, he would be fucking impressed.

But he did not know her beyond that, was not able to read her the way he could others at court. She kept herself closed off almost as expertly as some of the members of the Small Council, and it was infuriating, now that he was in need of her help.

And he was in need of her help. He may be Hand of the King, but sneaking Sansa out of the Black Cells, or forging evidence, whatever he was going to have to do save her, was going to be more work than just he could handle alone.

And, on top of that, dealing with his sister, keeping her from destroying their chances of winning this war, was not going to be easy.

He had just screwed up the courage to knock on the door when it opened, one of Margaery's many ladies stepping out and nearly running into him, her hands full of fabrics.

Tyrion swore, ducking out of the way just in time, and the girl let out a startled gasp, dropping her fabrics on the floor.

Well, the Queen's fabrics, no doubt.

"I'm sorry," Tyrion apologized, bending down to help her pick them up. "I shouldn't have been so in your way."

She flushed. She was a pretty little thing, with blond hair and almond eyes. Younger than Sansa, and Tyrion's heart clenched.

 _She seems determined not to allow her friend to go to the scaffold for this, even if it means all her ladies will, when they are found out to be little amateur spies_ , Varys had said.

He wondered how much danger the Queen's ladies were in, for Varys to have found out what they were doing. Wondered how much danger she was willing to place them in.

For Sansa.

"That was my fault," she said, picking up the last of them and taking the bundle Tyrion had collected. "I should have been looking where I was going."

Tyrion gave her a small smile. "Well, in your defense, I am quite too short to see over so many fabrics."

She flushed again. "I..."

Tyrion decided to save her the trouble. "Is the Queen within?" he asked.

Her nose wrinkled in obvious confusion. "The Queen Mother has not visited Queen Margaery in some time, my lord, but I could help you find-"

"Ah," he cleared his throat. "I meant the Queen Margaery. There is something I wish to discuss with her."

She blinked at him. "Oh. Well, yes, she is. She just sat down to read for a little while, before the King requests that she go riding with him once more, or whatever it is they are planning on."

Tyrion raised a brow at the cavalier tone, and then smiled. "Well then, I suppose I'll see myself in, if you think the Queen is able to take visitors, just now."

The girl nodded. "I could...announce you?"

Tyrion pursed his lips. She was just a child, far younger than Sansa. He didn't want to implicate any more people than he had to in treason.

And even if Margaery heeded his words about her brother, there was no reason she would not turn him over to the King, at his first treasonous suggestions about Sansa.

"I think I can take it from here," he told her, not unkindly. "You look to be in quite a hurry."

The girl nodded, then flushed. "I...Yes, I had better get going," she said, and suddenly he was alone once more, staring at the door of Margaery's chambers.

He took a deep breath, and stepped inside, knocking as he went, for the door was still mostly open.

The first thought that struck him, once he stepped into the Queen's chambers, were that they were perhaps three times the size of the ones he had been sharing with Sansa since they were wed, before he once more became Hand of the King.

The second was that the Queen looked surprised to see him, where she sat on a sofa in the middle of the room, dressed in her riding gear and holding a small tome. She hid the look of surprise behind a small, warm smile.

Well, it was meant to be warm, he thought.

The third was that, while the little girl with all of those fabrics was gone, the many ladies who often accompanied the Queen were distributed around the room, knitting or reading themselves. Of course. It would be inappropriate for the Queen to be alone, at any given time.

Still, it caused a problem, just now, in how to get rid of them without raising eyebrows.

"Queen Margaery," Tyrion greeted her when the Queen looked up from his knocking. "I was wondering if I might have a word with you."

Margaery blinked at him. "Lord Hand," she greeted, standing to her feet and setting the book aside. "Of course."

He bit the inside of his cheek. "Alone, if it wouldn't be too much trouble. What I have to say is of a...sensitive nature. For only the ears of those with the authority to hear it."

Margaery's eyebrow rose, but she nodded to her ladies, and one by one they filtered out o the room, leaving her alone with the dwarf. They didn't even seem shocked by the order, and Tyrion wondered how often the Queen managed that.

One of her ladies, however, a tall girl with a shock of auburn hair much to similar to Sansa's for Tyrion to be comfortable, paused in the doorway, glancing back between them.

Margaery sent her a dazzling smile that was far warmer than the one she had sent Tyrion. "It's fine," she said. "The Hand of the King won't harm me."

The lady gave Tyrion a rather dubious look, and then seemed to decide that Margaery was right, moving out of Tyrion's way and shutting the door behind her as Tyrion stepped inside.

Margaery gestured to the sofa across from the one she was occupying. "Is something amiss, my lord?" she asked, looking truly concerned.

Tyrion sighed. "I'm afraid so, Your Grace," he assured her, and, at her bemused expression. He...didn't know which treason he wished to mention first, and Tyrion bit back a sigh, decided to simply go for the worst one while he was at it, before she agreed to something and then changed her mind about working with him altogether. "I've been told that you are very close with Lady Sansa. I too care about her, and I come to you now in the hope that I might find an ally in helping her."

Margaery schooled her face into one of impassiveness. She was quite good at it, he noticed. "I see," she said finally. "And what sort of help would we be offering her, as...allies?"

Tyrion decided not to honey his words. If she was going to agree with him on this, they were going to be conduction treason. He might as well get it out there from the start. "Freedom."

Margaery's eyes widened. "My lord Hand," she began, but Tyrion lifted his hand, cutting her off.

"You know as well as I that my trial was a sham, from start to finish," Tyrion said softly. "And Lady Sansa does not deserve to die because some nobleman bribed or coerced a girl into speaking against her."

Margaery blinked at him, pursed her lips. "Lady Rosamund did not indicate to me that she was being forced to speak as she did at the trial," she pointed out. "On the contrary, I don't believe anyone knew what she was going to say, or they might not have allowed her to say it. Ah, your pardon, my lord."

Tyrion eyed her in amusement. "Neither of us believe that, Your Grace. I think that I have come to know people, Your Grace, rather well, and I saw the fear in her eyes as she exonerated me. And I think that you are a studier of people, as I am."

Margaery blinked at him, cocking her head. She didn't sound like she was disagreeing with him, only...like she was leading him on, to see where this would go. "You truly think she was forced to say what she did?" And, there. There was no question in her words, merely a parroted suggestion.

"I would put a wager on it," he confirmed. "But, as you said, there was no one at that trial who truly wanted me to be found innocent."

"And you think she will tell me who they are," Margaery surmised.

Tyrion nodded. "She is your lady."

"Was," Margaery corrected, and, at his incredulous look, "I don't take betrayal lightly, Lord Tyrion. I need to know that all of my ladies can be trusted, and if they cannot be trusted to ensure the safety of my friends, they cannot be trusted with my own." She paused. "I'm afraid I exiled her back to the Reach."

Tyrion blinked in surprise. "You truly count Sansa as one of your friends," he said. Perhaps he was too much of a cynic, these days, but he hadn't believed it, even when Varys told him as much. There was little reason to believe it. Margaery might care for the girl because she wanted something from her, but she was a Tyrell, through and through, and Tyrion had seen with his own eyes how adept she was at manipulation. But if she had sent one of her ladies into exile for possibly sending Sansa to her death...

No, it could mean nothing. Could merely mean that her family's plans for Sansa, whatever they were, had been disrupted by some silly girl who thought herself a hero, and Margaery had been infuriated by it. That didn't mean...

Margaery leaned forward, setting down her tea cup. "As clearly, do you," she pointed out. "And you're a Lannister, no less." She paused. "Lady Rosamund should not be back to Highgarden by now. No doubt she is traveling along the Rose road. I'll have a messenger send for her return, and we can interrogate her together, if it would make you feel better about this...arrangement."

Tyrion nodded gratefully, standing a little straighter. "Thank you, Your Grace."

And now came the other part, admitting to her that his sister might outright be planning to murder her brother. He wondered if their alliance could even survive that, of a sudden. He knew that it would not survive him keeping the knowledge a secret from her, not if Loras had already told her about his plans to lead the attack on Dragonstone, and even if he had not. What he was about to say would either cement their alliance or destroy it completely, and a part of him thrilled, at that, even as dread filled him.

"Now that is settled," he said, trying to keep his voice calm, "There is another matter. My sister is planning to kill your brother Loras. I would like your help in stopping her from doing so." He tensed, waiting. This part was the more dangerous. He needed her help in this matter as well, but he didn't have her care for Sansa to rely on, not here, and she had no reason to trust a Lannister in either matter now that she knew what Cersei planned for her brother.

Margaery's eyes jerked up to meet his. "I'm sorry?" she asked incredulously, and there was genuine surprise on her features. Perhaps she was not so difficult to read as he had imagined, Tyrion thought. Perhaps this would not be so difficult an alliance as he had imagined.

Tyrion grimaced. "As am I. The Ironborn fleet left your brother fighting paltry forces in the Iron Islands. They've turned their sights on Dragonstone, and my sister..."

"Wants Loras to go and fight them, and hopefully die in the process," Margaery finished, pursing her lips. She did not sound surprised, there. "I see." Her voice was shaky as she said the two words, and then she straightened, and when she spoke again, it was as clear as steel. "Has she approached him, yet?"

Tyrion shrugged. "I don't know, Your Grace. I only know that she has been speaking to him in private, and between the two of them, I can't think of a damn thing they have in common. Begging your pardon, Your Grace." He paused. "It would be in neither of our interests for what Cersei wants to come to pass, in this case."

Margaery went pale. "I see," she repeated. "I'll speak to my brother," she said, and Tyrion stood. "Thank you for pointing this out to me."

Tyrion nodded. "Well, I'd rather avoid a war with your grandmother at the helm of my enemies," he said wryly, but Margaery did not smile, and Tyrion realized what an idiot he had been to voice that, a moment later. Damn, but he was out of touch.

"Yes," she said, instead, and there was a thoughtful look in her eyes, now. "I rather imagine you would."

He froze at the thought now infusing her tone, because it reminded him rather too much of Cersei for his liking. "Your Grace..."

A price for a price. She would help him save Lady Sansa and in return, he would warn her of the threat to her brother. She was an intelligent girl, but here she was, already plotting, and he could only hope it was some way to keep her brother from Dragonstone, rather than what he suspected it was.

"I imagine you would not care for the rest of my family to know that House Lannister is plotting to kill one of our own," Margaery continued, voice almost an even drawl, now.

Tyrion opened his mouth, "Your Grace, I thought-" He cleared his throat, and fell silent.

He supposed he rather had walked into that one, giving her those words. Fuck.

"I will help you save Lady Sansa, which some would call treason," Margaery said, though now she didn't sound as certain, and he knew that to be a pretense, "And I will ensure that my House knows nothing of your plots against my brother-"

"My sister's plots against your brother," Tyrion corrected.

Margaery didn't bat an eye. "And in exchange, you will do something for me."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "Besides warning you about your brother. Well?"

She blinked at him. "Well?" she repeated, clearly having expected the need to put up a fight over this.

"What is your price, my lady?" He supposed saving her brother and their families' alliance was not going to be enough, and besides, he was interested in what she might demand.

She smiled thinly, still clearly suspicious. "You are Hand of the King." She paused. "That gives you power over the King's policies."

Tyrion hesitated. "Your Grace, I know that your father wanted the position, but you must understand that even if I were to step down now, he would never receive it." Cersei would make sure of that, just as she would reign hell upon them both if she ever knew they were having this conversation, thwarting her plans.

"I know," Margaery said, lifting her chin. "Which is why I did not ask for that. But there is something that is within your power to do for me."

Tyrion raised a brow. "I'm listening," he said, intrigued. He had not yet decided if he would grant her it. After all, they were even now, but he supposed there was no harm in listening to what she wanted. It might even prove useful, in the future.

Margaery wasn't smiling, anymore. "My husband, Long live the King, recently put into motion a law which I find...reprehensible, and damaging to his security on the throne," she said. "I understand that the Hand of the King can advise him to overturn such a law and he will listen without calling it treason. He can also draft the repeal of laws."

Meaning that she didn't want to be seen sticking her neck out and asking for such a thing, Tyrion thought, idly amused. He wondered how much research she had done into figuring out exactly what the Hand of the King could and could not do.

"Which law are we speaking of, here?" he asked, sitting down on the sofa across from her own.

Margaery's eyes were steady as she replied. "The one which punishes the act of being with another of the same sex with death," she said calmly, and Tyrion blinked at her.

Out of all of the things he had thought she would request, that had been at the bottom of the list. Had not even been on it, really.

Still, he supposed, it would not hurt to try and grant her request. After all, saving Loras Tyrell from a death by Cersei's machinations only for him to die by Joffrey's wouldn't save their alliance, either. And he was morbidly amused, by her wish to gain more out of this alliance than he would. She thought she had enough of an upperhand to make such demands of him, and Tyrion, damn him, wanted to see where she thought it would lead them.

"I can do that," he told her, biting his lip.

Margaery wilted a little. He had not realized how stiff she had been until now.

"Do we have an agreement, then?" he clarified.

Margaery nodded. "I will do what is in my power to help you free Lady Sansa," she said softly. "And keep your sister's secret."

Tyrion smiled, genuine. "Thank you," he murmured. "Thank you, Your Grace."


	206. TYRION

"The gardens, Your Grace?" Tyrion asked, glancing around as they walked down a familiar path. He knew that the Flowers had overtaken the King's gardens since their arrival here, that there were rumors it was done for Olenna Tyrell's health, to have her out in the fresh air as much as possible.

He just did not understand their fascination with sitting around outdoors and chatting over tea, all day. He would much rather sit indoors with a good bottle of Dornish red in his hands.

Margaery sent him a partially amused glance. "It is very populated," she agreed, gesturing to the ladies all taking the air with their gentleman companions, and Tyrion couldn't help but notice that most of both were Flowers of some description, "but there is something to be said for the lack of walls, whether they have ears or not. It keeps one from falling under any sort of condemnation."

Tyrion pondered that explanation, and then nodded. "I suppose one can never be too careful," he agreed, and wondered what else it was the Tyrells wished to discuss, besides this most recent treason, away from listening ears.

He supposed Sansa's proposed marriage to Willas Tyrell had only been the start of it. His father would have done well to keep a better eye on them, Tyrion thought, and then blinked at the thought. Almost chuckled, but caught himself in time.

Here he was, plotting some way to keep the Tyrells from committing anymore treasons against the Crown, while he walked with their flower Queen, plotting treason.

He supposed the gods must have found some cruel humor in that.

Margaery shrugged. "I have been thinking upon the matter we agreed to discuss, Lord Hand," she said formally, and he blinked at her, paused in the middle of the path.

"If I remember correctly, we did not agree to merely _discuss_ it, Your Grace," Tyrion said, through clenched teeth.

Margaery paused as well, eying him for a moment. Clearly, things were still tense on both ends of this alliance, but Tyrion was not going to apologize for this if she was not. She was a Tyrell, and he was a Lannister.

Perhaps their alliance was doomed from the start, but that couldn't stop him from trying, at any rate.

And then, Margaery reacted, her eyes flashing a little. Ah. He supposed she had only been speaking in code.

Tyrion was almost no longer used to anything but bluntness, having lived with the Lannisters dominating court for so long. There had been no subtleties in the Black Cells.

"Have you made headway in saving my brother from your sister?" she asked, then, and Tyrion resolved to go along with her, because he was pretending she had the upper hand in this situation, after all.

Ah, by fuck, of course she had the upper hand in this situation. He was only Hand of the King by the grace of the sister they were plotting against, after all, and Margaery must know that. That was the truth of why he had agreed to help her take down that law, along with helping her prevent the war Cersei seemed determined to start with her goodfamily.

Still, it was a nice illusion, Tyrion thought, before turning back to her question.

He swallowed. "I confronted Cersei about keeping vital information from me," he told her.

She hadn't been pleased, though he hadn't mentioned Ser Loras by name, only that he was angry Cersei had kept the siege of Dragonstone from him. It wouldn't do to completely compromise his one spy in Cersei's household.

"She...understands the seriousness of the situation now, I think," Tyrion continued, when Margaery merely waited in silence. "It won't happen again."

And gods, her fury had been something to witness. Cersei did not like being told by someone whom she had appointed that he stood above her, that any information which came from the King should go to his ears before it went to the Queen Mother's.

He had been quick to emphasize that, as well. The Queen Mother, not the Queen Regent.

Cersei had been grinding her teeth and reaching for a bottle when he left her. Tyrion could not say he didn't feel some amount of satisfaction, at that, even if he worried for how she would retaliate.

Margaery tossed her hair. He supposed that was an indication that she didn't care a wit about whether or not it happened again, and that told him everything he needed to know. This alliance would only last as long as it took to save her brother and free Sansa from the Black Cells, and not beyond that.

Tyrion supposed he shouldn't be surprised, for he hadn't thought to look beyond that, either, beyond a few mere inklings of ideas in keeping the Tyrells in line through invasion of their ranks.

"Have you spoken to your brother?" he asked into the silence.

Margaery nodded. "He is...quite stubborn. He..." she hesitated, and he could see her mind at work, weighing how much she needed to share to keep the faith between them, without over sharing more than she thought a potential future enemy needed to know. "Believes he is avenging the false King Renly, in this way."

Tyrion's lips quirked into a small smile. "I suppose he and my sister have that in common. Stubbornness in the face of all sense."

Margaery eyed him. She'd given away more than he thought she knew, there. Well, everyone within King's Landing and probably without it as well knew about Loras' feelings for Renly, save perhaps Joffrey, but she'd all but handed clarification of that to Tyrion.

If he were a crueler man, or the Tyrells less their friends as Cersei believed them to be, he might have done something with that fact. As it was, he had already made his promise to her about being rid of that law, and Tyrion had nothing to gain from it remaining in place.

Margaery started walking again, and so Tyrion did as well. This section of the gardens smelled of roses, and Tyrion glanced around, trying to avoid a conversation in order to think.

Gods, the vines around him reached above his head.

"Do you have a plan for sneaking Sansa out of the city?" she asked, abruptly.

Tyrion blinked back at her, realized that she had paused to bend down and sniff one of the roses. He wondered if she was consciously aware of how much the angle showed off her assets, and then inwardly scoffed. Of course she was aware. That was the point, after all, and he supposed that was a point in her direction.

Being friends with Sansa, she must know they didn't share a bed, or believe that Tyrion wasn't faithful enough to care, on that account.

Tyrion swallowed. The girl was very pretty, he could admit that, and might have even been to his interest were it not for the very simple fact that he had seen her around Joffrey. She was far too dangerous to hold affection for, in any capacity, and there was always the fear that he would be found out and beheaded for it.

And besides, his feelings for the women currently in his life were confusing enough, at the moment. There was no need to make things more so.

Shae might actually cut off his balls, if he considered it.

"I have a few ideas," Tyrion said, finally, half turning away from her. "It is the getting her somewhere else where she will be safe which concerns me. There are few places left in Westeros safe for a Stark."

Margaery straightened, plucking the rose and holding it up to her nose. She looked younger, like that, and he realized she was studying him as he was studying her. Attempting to figure out which he preferred.

Tyrion felt a bit sick, at the thought, though he supposed the woman married to Joffrey the Illborn had to be resourceful enough not to give up the first time.

"One of Sansa's guards has a bastard daughter in the city," the little Queen said, her tone almost musing. "She lives with her mother, a whore, and is only three summers old."

Tyrion eyed her, and then froze as the implication of her words sunk in.

This little queen was ruthless, he realized, in the sort of way he had not imagined her to be before, the way she simpered over Joffrey, but then, he supposed, it took a certain type of person to marry Joffrey Baratheon and not get herself killed.

This was the sort of idea Cersei might suggest, for all that she professed to love her children. Perhaps because of it.

"No," he said shortly. "Not that."

Margaery raised a brow. "If there were any other option, do you not think I would have suggested that first?" she demanded, taking his arm again and smiling at the strange looks they recieved from couples walking past. "Short of storming the place and alerting all of King's Landing to what we are doing before we even succeed at it, I have no other ideas. Unless you have one fully formed and ready to happen before Sansa's trial."

Tyrion hesitated. They were doing this for Sansa, he reminded himself, who was a child herself, innocent and sweet and not deserving to die anymore than a guard's daughter deserved to have her life threatened. "Are you certain there are no other...weaknesses we might exploit?"

Margaery paused, turning on him. "I don't like the thought of it either," she said, though she could have fooled him, Tyrion couldn't help but think. "But the other guards are there because they are brutal, and fighters who want for the money. Little more than mercenaries. If I bribe them, I cannot be sure that someone else will not bribe them with more gold than I. Or threaten them with torture that they do not wish to undergo. It is getting her out of the city which I am concerned with."

Tyrion sighed. He knew well enough how easily gold cloaks could turn on their masters for the promise of a few gold coins. Janos Slynt was a good example of that, and he would never forget it. He was Hand of the King once more, after all.

That didn't mean he had to like what the queen was suggesting.

"I see," Tyrion said, pursing his lips. "Perhaps I might have a solution, for that."

Margaery looked up at him, eyes wide and a little excited, but she was no longer actively flirting, and Tyrion would take what he could get.

"I am not Hand of the King for nothing," he told her. "And one of my many duties, is ensuring justice prevails throughout the realm."

Margaery smiled, and then drawled, "Yes, and I am quite sure you are doing the opposite, here."

"I'm not," Tyrion said calmly. "Some of the prisoners kept within the debtors' prisons of King's Landing are sent to Pentos to be sold as slaves," he told Margaery. "It isn't legal, here, but taking them there allows the ship owners to make a hefty profit, so long as they allow a hefty tax to the Crown once they return to King's Landing. A way of making money off those who will never be able to work their debts off."

Margaery raised a brow. He could tell she was thinking hard about his suggestion, trying to figure out what it meant. "What does that have to do with Sansa?" she asked finally.

Tyrion smiled. "It would be less conspicuous then a ship specially commissioned by those known to be fleeing from the Crown to a known location," he told her, a little bitterness seeping into his voice near the end, there. "And no one would recognize her, amongst those involved."

Margaery scoffed. "I still don't see how sending her off to become some slave is a kinder fate than the one she faces now."

And there was some of the emotion the little queen kept hidden. Tyrion was surprised by the onslaught of it, more than he licked to be.

"That is because she won't be becoming a slave," Tyrion told her. "I have a man, Bronn, whom I can have at the capitol easily enough. He's got the brute force of a slave driver, and the skill with a sword to protect her. But while we've established that it is possible to get her out of King's Landing, we have not yet decided what we would do with her once she is rescued."

Margaery's eyes lighted, at that.

"Not so long ago, my family would have gladly taken the Lady Sansa to Highgarden," Margaery told him, after a moment's hesitation, but she seemed to accept the truce. "Your father put a stop to such plans, but I believe that my grandmother would still be happy enough to host Sansa in Highgarden." She bit her lip. "Assuming, of course, that your marriage has yet to be consummated."

Tyrion hesitated. They both knew that was a joke, but he hated the thought that the Tyrells would be gaining even more from this arrangement. Would be secretly gaining the North, which such a plan, and Margaery must have clearly been able to see it on his face. But they both knew that he didn't have a better idea. Saving her now only to send her North would be as good as killing her, with the Boltons there and marrying 'Arya' to the Bolton boy, for they had no need of her.

"Your grandmother would be courting war with the Lannisters, if anyone learned where she was," he pointed out.

Margaery bit her lip. "Then we would have to ensure that no one found out where she was. That she was merely," her lips quirked, "lost amongst those sent to Pentos." A sigh, when Tyrion still seemed unconvinced. "Cersei has no intention of returning to Highgarden, I think. Ever, which would help in the matter."

Tyrion looked away, reminded of the Queen's own troubles. "My condolences, for your brother," he told her, because he had a terrible feeling Cersei was responsible for that, too, and he'd heard the woman crowing about how her husband was getting worse, to Jaime. Margaery nodded absently. "I hope that he recovers."

"Thank you," she worried her lower lip between her teeth. "I am the Queen of Westeros, and a Lannister's wife," she said primly. "That should stave off a full out war. And there are other Houses in the Reach where we might send Sansa, if anyone found out, and be assured of her safety."

"If it were found out that you were in any way involved in her escape," Tyrion began, but Margaery cut him off.

"I will take that chance," she said instantly. "Will you?"

Tyrion eyed her. "Sansa trusts you," he said finally, and knew it to be the truth. He didn't know what had so inspired that trust, but it was the only reason he was here, when he still had his doubts about what the Tyrells had been up to, of late.

Besides, he wanted a chance to speak to Lady Rosamund, and only Margaery was going to offer him that chance.

And...he would do this for Sansa, Tyrion realized, and hated the realization. He loved Jaime, and the children, and he would commit any number of atrocities for them, but Sansa was innocent and unprotected, where they were not.

He could not allow her to remain so, if there was anything that he, as her husband, could do to stop it.

"Yes," Margaery agreed, without hesitation, and that alone should have told Tyrion something, only he couldn't see what it was, just yet. "And I trust her. I know you have very little reason to trust me, my lord, but try to remember that out of the two of us, it is your family keeping her prisoner in the Black Cells at the moment, and mine offering to free her."

Tyrion winced. "Point taken, Your Grace."

"Lady Rosamund should be back in King's Landing within the fortnight," Margaery informed him. "I will confront her about who forced her to speak at the trial, and then come to you about it. We can decide how to go about the rescue from there."

Tyrion smiled, holding out his hand to her. "It's far more pleasurable to plot with you than my lady sister, I must say, Your Grace."

Margaery gave him a dimpled smile, and let him kiss her hand. "Having never known the alternative, I suppose I shall have to say the same, my lord."

Tyrion barked out a laugh. "Good day, Your Grace."

Margaery did not let go of his hand. "Wait a moment," she said, and he hesitated, turning back to her. "There is...something else you ought to know."

Tyrion raised a brow, surprised that she would offer up information unbidden. They weren't in this alliance because they were friends, after all, and she had made it more than clear that she preferred the upper hand, in this relationship.

"My ladies...the ones who got the information on the guards, ladies I would trust with my life as I did not Lady Rosamund..." still, she hesitated.

"Tell me, Your Grace," Tyrion asked hoarsely, a sinking feeling in his gut that he could not yet explain.

"They know how Cersei convinced Joffrey to name you Hand of the King, and it is something I think you must know in turn, if we are to continue this alliance and not break faith with one another." She took a deep breath. "She still believes your father died by your hands. She promised Joffrey...She promised him that she would help him kill you in a month's time, if he found anything about your work unsatisfactory. Joffrey could not pass up the chance, and named you Hand because of it."

Tyrion went cold. His body felt like it no longer belonged to himself, and he stared at the little queen without really seeing her. "You're certain?" he asked, and what a foolish question that was.

Of course she was certain. Even if she was lying in some attempt to turn him more against his family, Tyrion could believe that the conversation had happened. It made far too much sense, considering how easily Joffrey had caved to Tyrion's decision about Dorne, when he had been so ready to send another army.

He sighed when Margaery did not respond, merely looked away from him, and reached up, rubbing at the scar on his face from the Battle of Blackwater.

Fuck you, Cersei, he thought. Fuck her, and her fucking son.

"I see," he said finally.

"I'm sorry," Margaery managed. "I'm sure that must be difficult to hear."

Tyrion nodded absently. "I see you are not unfamiliar with your husband's particular...way of finding amusement," he said, and remembered how Joffrey had beaten her for a time, during their sexual encounters, before he went after Sansa.

Tyrion wondered how Margaery was keeping him from Sansa now, with Tyrion dead and Sansa helpless and locked in a cell. It was the logical conclusion to Joffrey's next action, in Tyrion's mind, much as he loathed the thought of it.

Margaery swallowed. "I know my husband, my lord," she said softly. "I merely thought that you should know the full extent of your circumstances, as well."

"Well," Tyrion said, clapping his hands together. "I suppose I had better not fuck up, eh?"

Margaery didn't smile. He didn't expect her to.

"I cannot offer you a place in Highgarden," she said instead. "My family loathes the Lannisters, and I do not know that you would be safe there. Or that your sister would not then turn the full weight of her anger on our borders. But..." she swallowed. "I fear for the state of both of our plans, if you are unable to even save yourself."

Tyrion sighed. He had known that before she even spoke of Cersei's threat against him. "I understand, Your Grace. You have nothing to fear, in that regard. I'm thankful for the warning, though."

She nodded, and then pulled fully away from him, drawing up her shoulders. She looked much younger, somehow. Tyrion wondered if this was the impression she wanted to give to those who didn't know of her schemes.

Margaery squinted at him. "Good day, Lord Hand."

He dipped his head. "Good day, Your Grace."


	207. SANSA

In her time down in the Black Cells, Sansa had received no other visitors save for Elinor, the maester Elinor sent to see to her afterward, and the girl who came to give her some food and take away her chamber pot each day.

Elinor had been a welcome reprieve, a chance to be away from this whole mess, but she had stayed for so little amount of time that Sansa had doubted she would see another friendly face before her trial.

Funeral. Whatever.

But today the door opened, and Sansa stiffened at the sight of it, wondered if today was finally the day she was going to find herself dragged off to face the King's Justice.

She blinked, never having realized how tall her lord husband was before this moment, when she knelt on the ground and he loomed above her.

"Guards," Tyrion said calmly, staring at her with an unreadable expression, "Leave us alone."

The door clanged shut behind them, and Sansa closed her eyes, opened them again.

Tyrion still stood before her, not a vision brought on by her lack of food lately, but real enough.

"Tyrion," Sansa breathed, scrambling to her feet, brushing down her ratty, dusty gown. "I..."

She was happy to see him, she realized. Genuinely happy to see him.

"Sansa," he murmured, and then she was kneeling once more, wrapping her arms around her husband's thin shoulders.

She didn't understand, until he gently pulled away, why he stood so stiff against her embrace. Didn't understand why he wasn't giving her some scant amount of contact, the way Elinor had at least tried to do, until he was away from her, and she was blushing.

It was the first time she had ever willingly touched him. Initiated it.

Sansa swallowed, glancing down at her hands. She didn't feel like standing, again.

"Are you..." he cleared his throat, not meeting Sansa's gaze. "Are you well?"

Sansa chewed on her lower lip, wondered if the fact that she was in a Black Cell did not answer that question for her. Then, she supposed that was rather ungenerous of her, since he was actually here to see her.

"I'm...there's nothing wrong with me," she whispered, not meeting her husband's eyes, and she heard her husband heave a great sigh as he sank down across the cell from her. He looked old, suddenly, and not in the way that had caused her to fear him, when they were first to be made man and wife.

Her torch was about to die out. Sansa could barely see his features in the darkness of her cage, but he did not look pleased, from what she could.

"Have you been eating?" he asked her bluntly. "Only...Shae has told me that can be a problem, for you, and you look rather thin."

Sansa flushed again. "Do I?" she asked, and hated the heat in her tone.

Her husband sighed. "I'm sorry, Sansa," he said softly. "That you have been stuck down here because of me."

Her head jerked up. "What?"

He shook his head. "Whoever it was who induced the lady to speak, they did so with the intention of setting me free," he said. "And I wanted to be free, but I would trade places with you..."

"Don't," Sansa interrupted him, and Tyrion fell silent.

The silence grew heavy and uncomfortable around them, until Sansa couldn't stand it any longer. "I'm sorry that I didn't tell you I was planning to run with Prince Oberyn," she said quietly. "You deserved to know, instead of being imprisoned for what he did while we ran away."

Tyrion stared at her for several long moments. "You think he did it?" he asked, and cleared his throat the way he did whenever he felt uncomfortable around her.

Sansa bit back a laugh. "Yes," she said. "He told me as much. I'm only sorry that you were dragged into all of this."

Tyrion's reaction was not what she had expected. There was anger, but his words revealed that it was not at her at all. "That was hardly your doing."

"Oberyn told me he planted your knife, af-after he stole it from the dinner he had in our quarters," Sansa whispered, horrified when she began sniffling.

Tyrion looked helpless, then, as if he didn't know whether he should approach her or to pull further away. "None of that was your fault, Sansa. You're not a killer."

Sansa sniffed. "I'm here for it, aren't I?"

Tyrion huffed out a laugh, then. "Did you kill him?" he asked her bluntly.

Sansa bit her lip. "I...No," she admitted, wiping at her nose with what was left of her right sleeve.

Tyrion eyed her, and then moved forward, handing her a handkerchief.

Sansa bust into tears at the sight of it.

Tyrion stared, helpless for another moment as he squatted beside her, before sitting in the dirty straw, wrapping an arm around her shoulder the way he hadn't before and holding out the handkerchief until she took it.

Sansa dabbed at her eyes through her sobs.

"I just...I just wish that you had trusted me, my lady," Tyrion said softly. "I know that I had no right to ask that of you, but I wish that you had, anyway."

Sansa swallowed. She wondered what it could have possibly done, had he known. She hadn't even told Margaery. "I'm sorry," she whispered, and Lord Tyrion's expression softened.

"Sansa..." he took a deep breath, gave her a pained smile. "I will get you out of this," he promised. "But I need you to trust me, and I need to know something of you, as well."

Sansa laughed incredulously. "How?" she asked, and Tyrion jerked a little, perhaps at the vehemence in her voice. "Are you able to convince Joffrey to let go of his wish to see me flayed alive, that wish he's had since he met me? Can you be rid of his bloodlust?"

Tyrion swallowed. "No," he admitted. "But I can convince him that keeping you alive and miserable is better than seeing you dead. I'm sorry that isn't much."

Sansa pulled away from him, eyes very wide, but her lord husband had clearly succeeded in getting her attention, in pulling her from the bout of self-loathing she had nearly fallen into, then.

"Don't forget, my lady, I was down here before you," Tyrion said, giving her a small smile. "And things will get better for you. Look at me."

She did.

"I am going to get you out of here, Sansa," Tyrion repeated to her, and Sansa swallowed hard.

"My lord-"

"Trust me," he told her, and she remembered the last time he had pleaded with her to do so, when she had refused to tell him of Prince Oberyn's plots. Remembered how he had asked for her trust, and she hadn't granted it.

And now she was sitting down here, in a cell.

Jeyne's parents hadn't trusted Robb, and now their daughter was dead.

"Prince Oberyn asked me to run away to Dorne with him months ago," she said softly. "He approached me and asked me how I felt about the Lannisters, and I told him at first that I thought such an idea too dangerous for all of us." She swallowed. "But then, I..." she bit her lip.

Tyrion let out a long sigh. "Sansa..."

"You don't understand," Sansa blurted out, meeting her wide eyes to his. "You are a Lannister, my lord, so you can't understand. I...I would have rather died in that cabin on the ship, by Ellaria's hand, than returned," she gestured around the cell, and Tyrion recoiled.

"Sansa..."

She didn't think he could find a word to say beyond that, and suddenly the words were vomiting their way out of Sansa's throat.

"Iwantedtokillhim!" she cried. "Joffrey, Tywin, the lot of them. I wanted to watch them burn and know that I would be the one to light the match. I would have been glad..." she sucked in a breath, panting hard. "I didn't kill your lord father, Tyrion," she said hoarsely, no longer crying so hard, now. "But I did want to leave this place, forever. I..."

"Sansa," Tyrion interrupted her, squeezing her hands until she was forced to look at him. "I promised I would get you out of here, just now. And I did not just mean King's Landing. But you need to trust me, you need to be strong for just a little while longer, and no matter what happens, you will not confess to my lord father's murder. Do you understand?"

Sansa licked her lips, sniffled. "I promise," she whispered. "But, please. Make it quick."

Tyrion nodded. "I will."

Sansa swallowed as her husband moved to the door once more, and tried to decide whether or not she believed him. She was more annoyed than anything that she couldn't say, and Sansa wondered if that told her more about herself or her husband.


	208. TYRION

He went to Prince Oberyn's cell, next. Might as well, as long as he was down here.

Looking at Sansa had made his heart clench in terror, that she would not survive down here long enough for him and the little queen to make it out of here. Hearing what she had to say only cemented the thought.

He had wanted to ask her about Queen Margaery, whether or not she thought the girl trustworthy, but sitting there, beside his little wife, Tyrion couldn't ask the question. Couldn't make anymore demands on her than that she trust him.

Which meant that he, in turn, was very much going to need to trust Margaery, whatever reservations he still had about her. She was Sansa's only hope.

But Oberyn...he looked pale, and feverish, at the same time. Tyrion distantly remembered that he had been ill, recovering from the beating he had received at the hands of Tyrell soldiers when they arrested him for Sansa's abduction.

Well, her willing abduction.

It could not have helped, being stuck down here.

Oberyn, however, still managed a grin at the sight of Tyrion standing in the doorway of his cell.

"Here to seek your revenge in the dark for my killing your father?" Oberyn asked, voice light. "And here I thought you would be thanking me."

Tyrion ignored him. "Guards, escort Prince Oberyn to a new cell," he said coldly. "It seems the walls of this one have ears."

Oberyn's head jerked up to meet his own, and Tyrion had the answer to the suspicion he'd had while in Sansa's cell. It had been fucking foolish of his nephew to lock Sansa and Oberyn up so close to one another, even if he did not have reason to suspect the integrity of the walls.

The guards strode forward, gripping Oberyn by the arms and dragging him to his feet. He gave them each a roguish grin in turn, but Tyrion ignored the interaction, holding the torch in his hand a little higher and leading the way down the darkened corridor.

Tyrion gestured to the first random, unused cell, and watched with some small amount of satisfaction as Oberyn was practically tossed inside.

Sansa had been shaking, as Tyrion held her in his arms. Shaking and sobbing, and this man had admitted to killing his father, had caused all of this to happen to her in the first place.

The guards glanced at Tyrion, who nodded to them, and wondered if either one of them was the guard with this child Margaery Tyrell wished to exploit. He flinched.

Tyrion sighed as the guards shut the door behind them, leaning against the wall as the door slammed. He pinched the bridge of his nose, glanced up over his hand at Oberyn, who was watching him avidly.

"I don't like secrets within a House, Prince Oberyn," Tyrion said calmly, when he was certain he had the other man's attention. "I don't like knowing that my sister has my brother turned against me because of the talent of her tongue, and I don't like finding out months later that my little wife was enticed away to Dorne by one of its princes the way Prince Rhaegar stole away her aunt."

Oberyn glared. "This was nothing like that. If I hadn't suspected that the girl's life here was a breath away from ending at any moment-"

"And do you think that Lyanna Stark would have enjoyed a life as Robert Whoremonger Baratheon's wife?" Tyrion shot back. "That strong willed girl? But it was the natural order of things, and when the natural order is upset, it leads to war."

Oberyn was silent, glaring back at him mutinously. "I was trying to help her," he said finally. "And she wanted it badly enough."

"Why in the seven hells did you take so long, then?" Tyrion asked, annoyance filling his voice.

Oberyn gaped at him for a moment, before sighing. "I was waiting," he said calmly. "For a signal from my lord brother, on when to kill Lord Tywin. The Martells work in tandem, Lord Lannister, not against one another."

Tyrion ground his teeth. "Prince Doran would never be so foolish. Surely he realizes that a kingdom united under my father was a safer one than a kingdom united under Joffrey."

Something flashed in Oberyn's eyes, giving him his answer, and his heart sank a little.

"I think I can piece together how it happened," Tyrion said, sinking down onto the putrid floor of the cell across from Prince Oberyn. At least this cell had been a little cleaner than Tyrion's own had been.

Oberyn eyed him warily, but waited.

"You remained here for months, idling away on the Small Council, providing ideas that were more and more foolhardy, but which my lord father gave ridiculous interest to because he wanted to figure out what you were planning. And all the while, you were slowly poisoning him, wanting to screw him over because you knew what had happened to Elia was his fault." He paused. "But then he ordered that you remain in King's Landing with a hint toward indefinitely, and you panicked. Killed him with one of my knives, and fucked off to Dorne with my wife, in order to start the war you Dornish have been clamoring for since the Lannisters took King's Landing."

Oberyn looked amused. "You seem to have put some thought into this."

"I just don't understand one thing," Tyrion said amiably, rubbing at his eyes. "Why the fuck you confessed. The trial doesn't need to prove your guilt now, only Lady Sansa's."

Oberyn shrugged, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the wall. "I know I shall recieve a fair trial, in the end. My confession means little if they can find no evidence to prove that I or Lady Sansa did as I claim," His eyes opened. "And look at the lengths they went to prove your guilt."

"Mace Tyrell is going to be one of your judges," Tyrion said dryly. "I'd hardly call that a fair trial on any account."

Oberyn did not flinch. "Mace Tyrell had no great ties to Tywin Lannister," he said dismissively.

Tyrion snorted. "I was referring to the ties he has to you. I understand my sister's husband is rather sickly, at the moment. That can't be helping you."

Oberyn squinted at him. "Say what you came to say, Lord Tyrion."

Tyrion sighed. "Sansa tells me that you spent so much time with her because you were always planning on sneaking her out of the city almost from the moment Joffrey's wedding ended. But you chose an awfully strange time to do it. Some would say the worst time. Almost as if...you wanted the party to be found and dragged back here, with much ado about it."

Oberyn raised a brow. "Why would you say it was bad timing? I would think waiting until Lord Tywin was discovered as dead would be far worse timing."

Tyrion leaned forward. "Perhaps because you were planning to kill Lord Tywin, and wanted reasonable doubt about the fact that you were doing so. But I would think that your fleeing at the same time as my father died would only reassert this doubt, even if your remaining might help assuage any guilt about you."

Oberyn shrugged. "Perhaps?" he asked. "Or perhaps I left then because I knew that Lord Tywin would have dragged me back at any other time, and only returned with Ellaria and Sansa because a Tyrell warship twice the size of our own vessel and twice the weaponry as a merchant vessel found us."

Tyrion nodded. "Or, you had nothing to do with Lord Tywin's death, for it came out at about the same time as Sansa's disappearance with you, and whatever you stayed behind to do in King's Landing had nothing to do with killing my lord father."

Oberyn looked amused as he leaned forward, meeting the dwarf's eyes. "Then what would it have had to do with?" he asked. "You seem to think that I would not have endangered Lady Sansa. What did I want, then?"

Tyrion glanced around this cell, which had been his home not so long ago. He hated it in here. The dank, dark walls, constantly dripping with some substance he had not been able to identify but which stank, the food that came twice a day if he was fortunate.

"Just the war. For King's Landing to burn. I don't know," he said finally. "And I know you aren't going to tell me. But, by the gods, I am not going to let you drag my wife down with you. She has suffered enough."

Oberyn's grin faded. "Yes," he agreed. "That we can agree upon. I wished to take her from this life, not to bring further misery to her. But it seems that I have failed at both."

Tyrion snorted. "If you had gotten the war you wanted and which I am having a hard time stopping, she would have been in danger even in Dorne. Joffrey does not like to give up his pets."

Oberyn eyed him, one eyebrow raised. "But she would have been alive to feel it, not numb as she is in King's Landing."

"Does she sound fucking numb to you, on the other side of your cell?" Tyrion burst out.

Oberyn flinched at the raised voice. One of the guards knocked tentatively on the door.

"We're fucking fine in here!" Tyrion snapped.

The knocking stopped.

"You care about her," Oberyn breathed.

"Damn right I do," Tyrion said, then closed his eyes, breathed in and out deeply. "What are you planning now, then, with this confession?"

"I knew that I would be confined to one of these cells, the moment I confessed," Oberyn said. "I rather hoped to call for a trial by combat, but that little tart seemed determined to implicate Lady Sansa, as well."

"Yes, that was interesting," Tyrion muttered.

Oberyn gave him a look. "You have a good many flowers within your court, Lord Lannister," he said.

"That would be my sister, Lady Lannister, Head of our House now," Tyrion corrected.

Oberyn looked less than impressed. "Stole the Rock from you, did she?" he asked, amused. "I did hear about that. Though my understanding was that Dorne was the only kingdom in this wretched Westeros where a woman might inherit before a man."

Tyrion shrugged. "There were...mitigating circumstances. Well?"

Oberyn sighed. "Sansa will get a trial by combat," he said. "Cersei won't want to admit the scant amount of evidence against her, and neither will the Flowers, if they were behind that little tart speaking up. And when she gets it, I would fight the Mountain and rid the world of the last beast who killed my sister and her children. But I underestimated your sister's ability to blind herself with her hatred," Oberyn said lightly. "I hardly thought she would go to such lengths to see you blamed for it."

Tyrion smirked self-deprecatingly. "Most do." And then he paused, looked Oberyn over delicately. "You wish to convince Sansa to ask for a trial by combat that Cersei will approve."

Oberyn bent his head forward. "I am. I would sooner leave my fate in my own hands, and Sansa's in hers, than in that of Cersei Lannister's."

"You could simply confess that Sansa had nothing to do with it," Tyrion told him coldly.

Oberyn raised a brow. "I do care about the girl, Lord Lannister," he said, voice soft. "But they will not give a man who has already confessed a trial by combat, I'm afraid."

Tyrion straightened. "Then I am afraid I have nothing more to discuss with you, Prince Oberyn," he said calmly. "That girl is innocent of the charges against her, and I am not going to leave her life in the hands of the Dornishman who dragged her into this whole thing," he said, gesturing around at the cell before walking to the door.

He had almost knocked for the guards to let him out when Prince Oberyn spoke again.

"You said that you do not like secrets within your House."

Tyrion half-turned, grinding his teeth together. "I don't suppose many do."

Oberyn gave him a long look, and then that Cheshire smile of his. "Then allow me to tell you one, as a sign of good faith and the knowledge that I will fight for Sansa's life as if she were my own."

Tyrion tapped his hand against his thigh, impatiently.

"A Flower came down to the cells to visit Sansa, the other day," Oberyn informed him, and Tyrion stiffened, turning fully to face him now. "Bringing a message of hope and endurance from the Queen."

"Yes," Tyrion said slowly, wondering why Margaery had not mentioned this. But then, he supposed, she was not obligated to tell him everything about her relationship with Sansa. "The Queen and Lady Sansa are dear friends."

Oberyn snorted. "They are more than that, I think. When I overheard their conversation drift to speaking of the Queen, there was a level of...intimacy in their tone that I did not expect. Tell me, Lord Tyrion, has Lady Sansa shared your bed since your marriage?"

Tyrion stared at him. "Guards," he called, voice a little shaky, "We're done here."

Oberyn smirked. "You're not letting me back to my real cell?"

"I don't think so," Tyrion said coolly, as the door opened.

He was relieved that he was able to keep from reacting to Oberyn's baiting words until the door to the cell had closed behind him. He didn't even bother to think that it might be cruel, to leave Sansa without any of the companionship the man might have given her before.

But he would also be leaving her without Prince Oberyn whispering in her ear, trying to convince her to ask for a trial by combat.

And, apparently, he wasn't the only one whispering in her ear, these days.

_They are more than that._

"Fuck, I'm an idiot," Tyrion muttered, chuckling to himself.

The guards exchanged nervous glances, and Tyrion waved them off. "There is no need to tell the King or the Queen Mother that I was down here," he told them. "I am Hand of the King."

Another exchange of glances, this one different, and Tyrion groaned, reaching into his pockets and tossing a bag of coins at the guards.

He made his way to the stairs leading back up to the Keep, whistling a soft tune as he went.


	209. TYRION

"I have just come from the dungeons, where I spoke to Oberyn Martell," Tyrion announced as he stepped into the Small Council chambers, stepping around his brother as he did so.

Joffrey, where he sat at the head of the table beside his little wife, rolled his eyes, and gestured for Tyrion to be seated. "Well then, since you've interrupted far less interesting matters, tell us what the traitor had to say."

Tyrion glanced around the Small Council table. He was sure he would have Lord Varys on his side here, and perhaps the Grandmaester, even if he was too loyal to Cersei for his own good. But Cersei did not want this fight to happen, either. She may have summoned the Mountain to ensure that Oberyn was evenly matched, but she wasn't foolish.

They would have far better standing with the people if they killed a lady after proving all of the wrongs she had done in a court of the King's justice, rather than fighting by the gods'.

But it was Joffrey whom he needed to convince, and Tyrion was not sure he was capable of convincing the vile, violent little boy that a trial by combat was not what they wanted.

Any excuse to see bloodshed, after all, was an excuse that Joffrey would jump on with all too much enthusiasm.

Tyrion pulled out a chair, sat down with exaggerated slowness. He felt the eyes of everyone in the room on him, including Lancel Lannister, where he stood guarding in the back of the room. Good.

"He means to fight in a trial by combat for Lady Sansa," Tyrion said. "He confessed as much to me, in the cells."

Joffrey snorted. "He must have found her cunt glorious if he's willing to kill one of his betters for it," he muttered, and Margaery glared at him, where she sat beside him.

Joffrey didn't seem to notice.

Tyrion eyed Margaery in a new light now, after what Oberyn had revealed to him in the cell. He supposed he should have figured it out before now. Her willingness to commit treason on Sansa's behalf, to cover up a conspiracy against her own brother.

Her asking for a law that killed those found to be in homosexual relationships to be repealed. He could see now that had more to do with just her brother.

"Of course, it is impossible," Tyrion continued, "As I explained to him. A prisoner who has already given a confession cannot then fight in another prisoner's trial by combat."

"Is there a law against it?"

All eyes flew to the end of the table, where Cersei raised an imperious brow, hands folded delicately in front of her on the table.

"I'm sorry?" Tyrion managed, after staring at her perfectly placid expression for several moments.

"Is there a law against Prince Oberyn fighting in a trial by combat for another prisoner?" she repeated, lips quirking into what was almost a smirk.

Damn her. Joffrey perked up.

"It has never been done before," Tyrion said slowly, "because the gods don't acknowledge a convicted criminal as one worthy of fighting for the justice of another."

Cersei rolled her eyes. "So says tradition. But if there is no law against it, then I say that we let Prince Oberyn fight. The people need theatrics, and I prefer the kind that do not take place within a civilized trial. Besides, there are none else who would speak for Lady Sansa."

"I know you want her gone and this whole thing swept under the rug, sister, but Sansa has not even requested a trial by combat," Tyrion reminded her, coldness sweeping into his voice.

He knew why Cersei was pushing for this. It was the same thing Prince Oberyn wanted so badly that he was willing to confess to murder and drag an innocent girl down with him.

Gregor Clegane was on his way back from the North, a slew of broken bodies behind him, if the rumors were to be believed.

Tyrion believed them.

A cough from the end of the table startled them. The Grandmaester cleared his throat. "If the Lady Sansa asks for a trial by combat, technically, by law, she can appoint anyone she wishes as her champion," he informed them. "She is a member of the royal family only distantly, and by marriage, at that."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "And it is a moot point, because Sansa has not asked for one."

Joffrey grinned. "We ought to make her ask for one. Convince her it is in best interest, and then make her fight it herself, the little bitch. See her ripped apart by the gods' justice."

Tyrion shuddered. He almost thought Margaery did the same, and his eyes narrowed.

Cersei's eyes gleamed, ignoring her son altogether. "If you had taken the time to explain her situation to her, I am sure she would have agreed to this. She cannot think that she would win in any other form of trial."

Tyrion slammed his fist down on the table. Everyone but Margaery Tyrell jumped. "And she would not win this one! You would see to that, Sister, so what does it matter, either way?"

Cersei's smile fell. "I take no joy in either option, Brother," she told him. "Here is a girl whom we brought into our home, forgave for her brother and father's treasons, and married into our family despite the treachery of her House. And still, she turned around and killed our father, who only looked out for her..." she trailed off, glanced at Joffrey. Tyrion thought her eyes grew rather wide, and then she was glaring at Tyrion.

Well. So she suspected, too.

Took her long enough, Tyrion thought idly.

"Lady Sansa needs to be put to trial for her culpability in our father's death, for she did not confess to the crime at the time Prince Oberyn did," Cersei said shortly. "And I do not believe we have the evidence on either side to decide her involvement, beyond her absconding to Dorne with Prince Oberyn. Let the gods decide her fate, whether she is innocent or guilty."

"You mean the Mountain," Tyrion ground out.

"Lord Tyrion!" the Grandmaester cried, clearly scandalized by the insinuation.

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "I see that you are as determined in this as Prince Oberyn is, Sister," he told her. "I suppose I shall just have to find yet another way to appease Prince Doran."

Cersei's eyes narrowed to slits, no doubt remembering the warning she had sent him after Jaime's betrayal.

Tyrion forced himself to smile, though it was rather thin.

The Small Council meeting wrapped up quickly after that. Tyrion managed to be the first one out the door, pushing past Joffrey and his wife with no small amount of amusement, when Margaery sent him a scathing look.

She was certainly good at playing the part, he reflected.

And then he was alone with a hesitant Lancel Lannister, who had neglected to follow after his cousin or his king.

"Lancel," Tyrion said, smirking. "Why don't we go to my chambers? I'm sure your father has sent another letter for you."

Lancel bit his lip, sighing but not looking surprised, before following Tyrion out of the Small Council chambers and back to his chambers.

"What is my dear sister up to today?" Tyrion asked pleasantly as Lancel sank rather shakily into the seat in front of his shiny new desk. Tyrion reached for the goblet of Dornish red Prince Oberyn had given him some time ago, hesitated as he glanced at it suspiciously, fully cognizant of the fact that Oberyn Martell was currently in the dungeons for killing his father, and then poured Lancel the first cup.

Lancel took a rather generous gulp of the stuff immediately. Tyrion did not have the patience to last much longer.

"She...she is going to find out about this," he told Tyrion. "I barely managed to keep off her scent the last time, but this time I shall not be as fortunate. She is already suspicious of you, and she asked me about my father after you insisted I stay behind before."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "You let me worry about my sister. Now. Answer the question."

Lancel worried his lower lip. "She called me to her chambers today."

Tyrion bit back a sigh. "And?"

The young man shifted uncomfortably under the scrutiny, and Tyrion was reminded of how difficult of a spy he really was, back when Tyrion had essentially blackmailed him into telling Tyrion everything about his beloved sister.

By the gods, was Cersei actually fucking him and Jaime at the same time...?

"Lancel," he snapped, and Lancel glanced up, green eyes rather wide.

"She wants me to keep an eye on Ser Loras Tyrell, now that we are both in the Kingsguard."

Tyrion raised a brow. "Her goodbrother?" That boded ill, with Cersei's most recent plans for him, but he didn't let that show on his face, just in case Cersei had figured out about his meetings with Lancel. But he didn’t understand. He knew about her secret meetings with Loras, attempting to manipulate him into leading the charge on Dragonstone, but this sounded...different. "What in the seven hells is she wasting her time on that one for? I know for a fact that she isn't interested in any blond boys who aren't relatives, and he doesn't...share the female interest, anyway."

Lancel shifted again, and Tyrion's eyes narrowed, and then the boy was blurting out, "She believes that the Queen is very...close with her brother. It has been noted that he is often seen as her guard and that she will be obstinate enough to refuse all others, and that, more often than not, he is the sole member of the Kingsguard guarding her during the nights."

Tyrion stared. And then he chuckled, the sound echoing in his opulent chambers until Lancel flinched at the sound of it. "It appears my sister does have a sense of humor."

Fuck, but his sister was reaching too far, this time. Did she have no sense of self-preservation? Without the Tyrells, they were losing this war. With the Tyrells, they were barely keeping a handle on it.

Lancel hardly looked amused, and Tyrion's expression flattened. "With that sort of accusation, Good Queen Marg, as the smallfolk have taken to calling her, could easily lose her head, much less her throne." Especially with the lack of an heir, thus far, and not for lack of trying, if what he'd heard was the case. "Does my sister have any proof of it?"

If she did, it would mean a messy business of erasing such proof before Cersei could use it against the girl, take it to the bloody High Septon and demand a trial for it.

The High Septon might eventually be bought off by Tyrell bribes, but Joffrey would not be, and no doubt Cersei knew that.

Lancel swallowed thickly. "I thought you hated the Tyrells," he posed hesitantly, and Tyrion rolled his eyes.

"I find them to be an irritating group of power mongers, but they are also the foremost ally the Crown has, as well as the wealthiest, and I don't see why I am explaining this to you. You're not here to think, merely to tell me what my sister is thinking. What else, Lancel?"

"There was an...incident, recently," Lancel said carefully. "A boy, a whore from Littlefinger's establishment, sent to the Keep in the dead of night. After less than an hour, Ser Loras was seen escorting him onto a ship out to Pentos."

Tyrion was silent. He could easily explain that away, after all. Everyone knew of Ser Loras'...proclivities, in the same way that they knew of Tyrion's. Just because Ser Loras had called on a whore did not implicate his sister, save perhaps in Cersei's shallow mind.

"There's more," Tyrion said, sighing. "Isn't there."

Lancel took a deep breath. "Queen Margaery submitted to an examination, before her marriage, and it was found that her maidenhead was broken." He took a deep breath. "At the time, it was ruled to be because of her extensive love for riding, but Cersei..." he bit his lip again.

Tyrion leaned across the table. "Let me explain something very clearly to you, Lancel, so that there is no confusion amongst us." Lancel paled further. "My sister will very likely kill you for telling me any of this, if she finds out. But you should fear far more what I will do to you if you seek to double cross me."

Lancel gulped. "Then there is something else you should know, Hand of the King." A pause. "Cersei doesn't plan on taking this information to the High Septon."

Tyrion's forehead wrinkled. "Why the fuck not?"

Lancel chewed nervously on his lower lip, took another sip of the wine that Tyrion had offered him. It was a wonder he wasn't chugging the stuff, like the rest of the Lannisters seemed to do when they came within the vicinity of alcohol.

"She's found another source she thinks will deal with the situation better," he explained and Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Fuck," he groaned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays! And...that's about as festive as this story is getting, haha.  
> In the interest of holiday spirit, I was wondering if you guys could give me the names of some of your favorite GoT or asoiaf fics on this site. Looking for some new stuff to read, any pairing, really.


	210. TYRION

"Are you plotting to have the Queen arrested for adultery?" Tyrion asked her bluntly, as the door to Cersei's chambers shut behind them.

He had asked to speak with her in her chambers, made it seem like it was about the Ironborn again, just to get her in a good mood, considering how smug she had been about knowing it while Tyrion did not, even if that meant withholding important information from the man she had named Hand of the Fucking King.

Then he had attacked her about her plans to set up the Queen, because as much as he didn't wish to compromise his little spy in order to keep a better handle on his sister, he couldn't let her continue with this plan.

Not when it was Margaery helping him save Sansa, and the Tyrell alliance.

But Cersei didn't seem to understand the importance of any of it. He wondered if perhaps he should tell her servants to lay off the fucking wine. It seemed to be going directly to her head.

Cersei lifted a brow, setting down the scroll in her hands. Gods, now he was going to have to take a look at that, just to make sure it wasn't yet another plot he didn't know about.

"And if I am?" she asked. "She is the King's wife, and must know such scrutiny. I...have reason to believe that it is the truth, and if it is, I don't want my son's name dragged through the mud."

Tyrion chuckled. "As if his name could be any more besmirched," he muttered, and Cersei glared at him. "And you're not doing this because of that. You're doing this because you hate the girl."

She lifted her chin. "I have reason to believe-" she repeated, but Tyrion cut her off.

"What reason?" he demanded.

Cersei eyed him. "I don't think I should say."

Tyrion snorted. "Right. Because you don't have anything to say. I warn you, Cersei, drop this."

"I don't know why the hell you are so against it," Cersei said archly, lifting her chin. "Unless you're fucking her."

Tyrion bit back a groan, suddenly understanding why their father had always been so disappointed in all of them for so long after they became adults.

"Because it would be a fucking stupid idea, Cersei," Tyrion snapped at her, and she glared at him. "And it would plunge King's Landing into chaos. Surely you see that."

"To want to get my son out from under the clutches of that little bitch?" she demanded.

Tyrion smirked. "To have a trial for the Queen's honor placed in the hands of fanatics. To give that much power to that odd High Sparrow fellow," he told her. "Or do you think that adultery is somehow better than incest, than kingslaying?"

Cersei flinched as if he'd struck her. He wondered if she'd truly thought he hadn't known. "He would not be after me," she said, but the words sounded uncertain, now. "I am going to kill Lancel, for speaking of these things to you."

Tyrion snorted. "And once he had demonstrated that his power extends over the Queen of Westeros herself, proven that no one is above him, who do you think would be next on his list?"

Cersei glared. "I won't have that fucking whore polluting my son's mind anymore than she already has," she gritted out. "She has pushed me to this."

"Oh?" Tyrion questioned. "Did the sight of her fucking her pillow biter of a brother while she was married to your son so affect you? Has she told you of all of her conquests, the ones so disrespecting our king? Did she whisper in her husband's ear right in front of you what she wished of the Crown?"

"No," Cersei hissed. "No, she did none of those things. But she is a manipulative little thing, and I hate seeing her corrupting my son. That fucking little harlot stole my son," she hissed, face flaming. "She stole him from me with her first sultry, slutty looks in Joffrey's direction. And I was relegated to nothing more than the housewife of an impotent cripple, fucked over by everyone here as she sat by my son's right hand and whispered into his ear, until I came back and was nothing more than a piece of furniture in my own son's eyes!"

Tyrion's expression softened. "Cersei, he is still your son."

"Are you going to tell the King of my plotting?" Cersei asked finally, her voice coolly detached in a way that Tyrion knew her too well to think was true. "I will deny it. I will deny every charge you put to me-"

"No," he said, and Cersei's head jerked around to face his once more.

"No?" she echoed. Then snorted. "It is not as if you've ever been averse in the past to trying to take everything from me."

Tyrion shook his head. Was she so far up her own ass that she didn't recognize the score? She had taken the fucking Rock from his vulnerable wife, had forced it from him without even his knowledge until after it had happened.

And it was time to even the score, to take the one thing besides her son's esteem from her that Cersei cared for most dearly in the world. He could pretend that this was still about his alliance with the little queen, but in truth, Tyrion had found the solution to another problem.

"No," Tyrion said calmly. "You're going to do something else for me, instead, sweet sister."

Cersei's eyes narrowed as he told her exactly what he would require for his silence toward Joffrey, the price he demanded of her, and then his sister set her lips into a firm, white line.

"No," she stammered out, and he supposed he had underestimated her, that she had figured it out.

He raised a brow, echoing her earlier word. "No?"

She shook her head. "No," she repeated, and a fearful tremor bled into her voice. "I won't do it. You won't make me do that. I refuse. You're not Father. You can't do this to me."

Tyrion smiled thinly, clasping his hands before him once more. "Then let us go and find the King, shall we? As you say, he quite loves his little wife. I am sure he will be very interested to hear of the treasonous plots you've made against her, and how little proof you actually have about any of it."

Cersei glared, taking a step to stop his advance toward the door. Tyrion paused, watched the way her lips screwed up, eyes flaming, before she spoke.

"When you were just a babe, just days after you murdered our mother with your entrance into this world, Father took you out to the sea by Casterly Rock," Cersei said suddenly, or so it sounded, in the silence of the room, every word pointed, sharp.

Tyrion looked away, down at his shoes, the floor, the walls filled with depictions of the Rains of Castamere behind her head.

"And held you out above the waters," Cersei continued, merciless, and everything in Tyrion wanted to wrap his arms around her throat and strangle her into silence. He couldn't move. "He thought no one had seen him, but Jaime was inconsolable with our mother's death, and it was easy enough to get away from the nannies." She sniffed. "I watched as he almost threw you into the depths, and I knew then. I knew, no matter what the nannies claimed when I voiced it, no matter how Uncle Kevan slapped me when I suggested that you ought to be killed for killing our mother, no matter what Jaime said later, blinded by the way you've always played with his mind. I knew what you were."

Her teeth grit, Cersei's lips twisted into a sneer the likes of which Tyrion had never seen from her. He couldn't speak, couldn't even breathe, and could only stare at her as she continued her merciless vitriol.

"You are nothing more than the ugly, stunted vermin who stole my mother from me, stole my father as well, for all that he changed after her death. The little monster that hid in the stunted body of a Lannister heir and demanded everything from me. My love when you were still a fucking child, too stupid to realize what you were, my place in the inheritance, my daughter when you shipped her off to Dorne! And I knew then, the moment I watched Father turn around with you still in his arms and return to the Rock, that I would always hate you for the monster that you are."

Silence, and yet, despite Tyrion's earlier wishes for it, he thought the oppressive silence thickly filling the room would now only make him sick. Tyrion cleared his throat, blinked rapidly. He knew his sister; knew how she lashed out with her words when she was desperate, cornered.

It didn't help, knowing that, not today.

Still, Tyrion's voice was remarkably calm when he spoke again. "Does that mean that you will agree to my terms, sweet sister?"

Cersei's eyes flashed. "I hate you. And I will never forgive you for the many times you have plotted to steal away the members of my family, one by one."

Tyrion tasted bile in his throat. "I know you won't," he said, voice gentle, and he thrilled a little in the way Cersei glared at him for those words, "And I know you will always hate your little monster of a brother. But you will do this thing I ask of you, for my silence, or you will not be able to stop me from going to the King about this."

Cersei gritted her teeth. "I will make you regret this," she hissed out. "That happiness you feel, that you once promised to take from me and leave as ash in my mouth? I will return it to you tenfold," she snapped at him, and Tyrion smiled thinly.

"I look forward to seeing you try, sister," he told her, words almost gentle.


	211. CERSEI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple of people asked for warnings last time we had a chapter like this, so here we go:  
> Lannicest, extremely dubious consent, nonconsensual voyeurism, and all from Cersei's POV. There. I think I covered everything.

"Someone needs to lead the charge against the Ironborn laying siege even now to Dragonstone," Cersei said, as she looked across the desk in her chambers at her twin brother. Jaime stared back at her mutinously. "The King would see that you did so."

Jaime was incredulous. "You're sending me away," he said, disbelief coloring his tone, two high marks of red appearing on his cheeks.

Cersei raised a brow. "No. I told you. You are the one who told us about this predicament. Someone carrying the Lannister name needs to be leading the-"

"And what, Kevan Fucking Lannister suddenly doesn't carry our name, or am I missing something?" Jaime demanded, rounding on her.

Cersei swallowed hard. "The King has demanded it," she repeated. "And Uncle Kevan is busy with the Freys and Mormonts, at the moment."

Jaime rubbed at the back of his neck, a moment later slamming that same hand down onto the desk so hard the pens and papers across it clattered in all directions.

"The King?" he demanded. "Fuck you, Cersei. We both know Joffrey doesn't think I'm capable of leading a circus, much less an army, with this," he waved his golden hand in front of her face.

Cersei picked up her quill, once more. "Nevertheless, he has commanded it. You are the Lord Commander of his Kingsguard, and thus you must go."

"I thought you wanted me back," Jaime told her, tone almost pleading, for all that his face was set in stone, eyes staring at some spot off to the far wall, and Cersei wanted to slap him, wanted to reach out and grab his chin and force him to look at her.

What the fuck did he think she wanted? If it weren't for the Imp swearing her to secrecy, if it weren't for that fucking whore Margaery Tyrell, she would never send Jaime from her presence again.

"Jaime..."

That was it. She saw it in his eyes when she lifted her own to meet his for the first time during this conversation, the moment her brother snapped.

Her breath caught in her throat.

Jaime started to round the desk, growled low in his throat before shoving the desk aside with his good hand. The inkwells and books on it tumbled to the ground, a loud thud i the room, and then Jaime was in front of her.

He grabbed by the throat with his good hand and threw her so hard against the wall Cersei cringed, felt the pain deep in her bones and knew he might have bruised her tailbone, one of her ribs.

"Jaime..." she whispered, barely able to get the word out as she clawed at his throat, but she had to try, because she damn well didn't want Tyrion to..."

Jaime yanked his cock free of his trousers with the golden hand, grimacing at the difficulty of untying them before simply pushing his trousers down around his thighs. He adjusted his grip, and suddenly the golden hand was replacing the real one around Cersei's throat, and now she couldn't breathe.

He stroked his cock a couple of times, and Cersei found herself watching, not reaching out to take control as she always did.

And then Jaime was pushing inside of her, half hard and grunting more with anger than with pleasure.

Cersei closed her eyes, felt tears gathering behind them. "Jaime, please," she whispered, but her brother ignored her, fucking into her with all the vehemence that she had never felt form him.

He bent his head, breathed against her neck, and Cersei pretended that Tyrion was not hiding behind the curtain, a voyeur to this. She could enjoy this, she thought, if he just wasn't here.

But if Tyrion wasn't here, this wouldn't be happening at all, because she wouldn't be sending Jaime away.

He breathed against her neck, and she was expecting him to kiss it, as he so enjoyed doing.

He didn't.

"You cunt," he breathed against her skin, the words worshipful and furious at the same time. He pushed inside her, and Cersei moaned as her muscles stretched around him.

Cersei did reach out then, tangling one hand in his hair, the other reaching between them to grasp at his balls. She had never been one to passively sit through a fucking, after all, and he would know something was wrong, if she suddenly did now.

And, a darker thought hit her, let Tyrion watch this. Let him watch his precious, innocent Jaime take her apart like the wicked lion she knew her twin to be, and then judge her, for corrupting their sweet, sweet brother.

She was the only one who knew Jaime as he really was, Cersei thought, letting out a wanton moan as Jaime's thrusts grew faster. Tyrion had this image in his mind of who his brother was, but he didn't know Jaime at all, because he would much rather see Cersei as a villain in their love story.

Jaime was hers, she knew, as she pet his hair. He was hers, and Tyrion would never have that, would never know that his siblings were soul mates, even if he could take Jaime away from her, now.

Her brother wouldn't leave her forever. He had defied Father to remain in the Kingsguard at her side, and he would defy Tyrion, the Iron Islanders, the fucking gods themselves, if it meant returning to her.

Tyrion could never have that, and so he didn't know Jaime at all, really.

Cersei threw back her head and moaned again, sucking in desperate breaths as her brother reached around to grab at her arse and squeeze, the grip harder, crueler than normally.

This was how she had wanted things, when she was first married to Robert. They had slowed things down, gotten more relaxed, after the children were born, but Cersei had pushed Jaime into this sort of roughness the moment she realized she didn't belong to Robert Baratheon at all.

She had liked it, then. She could like it now, if only her other brother wasn't here, ruining everything as he always did.

"You fucking cunt," Jaime snapped again, pushing into her so hard that time that her back slammed against the wall with a sickening crunch. Cersei lifted her thighs, wrapped her legs a little tighter around her brother's waist in an effort to keep from falling. "You fucking, miserable cunt."

Cersei stuttered out a breath, ran her hands through Jaime's too short hair and hung on tightly as his cock thrust into her, again and again, fueled by passion and anger that was real, that was fucking real, finally.

Brienne of Tarth hadn't stolen him from her, after all. It had only taken the very real threat of being separated from her for him to see that.

"Seven," Jaime groaned, reaching out and tearing at her gown so hard she thought her own skin might have come off with the fabric, "You merciless cunt."

"Jaime," she whispered, bending down to kiss him, flinching as his harsh lips bore into her own, taking what he wanted in the ungentle way he would never have dared, a month ago.

"You fucking cunt," he repeated the words like a prayer when they pulled apart, and Cersei groaned, dug her nails into his Kingsguard's cloak, into the armor beneath as if she could break it herself, with such nails.

Relished the feel of him, fucking in and out of her at a brutal pace, slamming her again and again into the wall until she knew she would have bruises she would never have been able to explain to Robert, when they were still married and she had hid so many others of her liaisons with her twin.

She wondered if Tyrion was hard, where he stood watching them, and ashamed of his hardness. Wondered if he was horrified, instead, and didn't know which thought made her cunt wetter.

Her brother didn't deserve to see this thing between them, Cersei realized. Didn't deserve to see Jaime at his best.

"Jaime," she said when he grunted and was done, when he had collapsed against her where he still held her trapped against the wall, panting heavily but no longer cursing her name.

Her twin pulled away from her, eyes cold. "Fine," he snapped. "Fine. I'll fucking go to Dragonstone, if that's what you want."

She closed her eyes, breathed out slowly through her nose. "Thank you."

"But I want Brienne of Tarth pulled from the Iron Islands to go with me."

Cersei’s eyes snapped open, her mouth going slack. "What?"

Her brother gave her a smile that was far too familiar, but which she had never seen on Jaime’s face before, as he repeated his demand. She’d seen that look often enough on Tyrion’s face, seen it in her son’s, though not usually directed at her. Seen it in Robert’s.

The look made her recoil, for she had never seen her twin brother to act out of nothing but sheer revenge, like this.

"She's not doing much difference there, without me. The damn Tyrells think she's some big jape, and they've won the battle, there. Well, by default."

Cersei swallowed hard, jaw going as stiff and cold as she felt Jaime's seed going inside of her still.

"Fine," she snapped, and then watched him turn and stride from the room without another word.

She waited for a moment, watched the door slam loudly behind him as he kicked it with his boot, and heard his boots stomping down the hall.

And then, her voice trembling more than she liked, "Did that satisfy you, you hateful creature?"

The Imp stepped into Cersei's room from where he had been standing in the adjacent office, a mostly empty wine glass still in hand and a sad look on his face as he stared at the door Jaime had just left out of, before turning to face Cersei, looking up at her with mismatched eyes rather wide.

Gods, she could kill him in this moment with her bare fucking hands. What right did he have to...

"I could have done without seeing the two of you..." he cleared his throat and looked away, ever the prude for all of his whoring. "Yes," he said finally.

Cersei sniffed. "I want proof that you will not bring my plots against the little whore before Joffrey," she told him.

Tyrion nodded. "I've had your false witnesses executed," he said quietly, and Cersei pretended to be surprised at the words, at the lack of a soft heart everyone else seemed to think her youngest brother possessed. "Joffrey will not hear of it from me, so long as you do not make an effort to find any others."

Cersei nodded, reached up to fix her gown back into place when she realized why the half man was still blushing. "Good."

Tyrion cleared his throat, and there was something in his expression that Cersei did not want to acknowledge, did not want to see at all. "Cersei-" he began, but she cut him off before he could speak.

"I will never forgive you for this," Cersei snapped, as she turned from the doorway to glare at him one more time.

Tyrion took another long swig of his wine. For a moment, she thought he was tempted to make a jape, but then his features were serious once more. "I can hardly claim surprise," he said, instead of reacting as she'd wished him to. "You've yet to forgive me for being born."

Cersei stopped, glared at him again, for that was hardly the response she'd wanted. Seeing him torn apart after she flayed him with the knowledge of what their father had almost done to him as a babe had not been nearly so satisfying as baiting Jaime in the knowledge that Tyrion was watching.

And she hated Tyrion all the more for it. She hoped he’d gotten his fill.

'Why did you want me to send him away?' she almost asked, but could not bring herself to, just as she had been unable to since the Imp suggested it.

She thought it had something to do with her plans to send Ser Loras in Jaime’s stead, but she couldn't figure that out. Couldn't decide if Tyrion was allied against her with the fucking Flowers now, or thought he was keeping the peace.

Or something else entirely, and simply wanted to send Jaime away to be cruel, as Father had wanted when he sent Cersei to Highgarden. When he married her to Robert after promising her a Targaryen.

Instead, she turned on her heel and stormed from the room, seething as she thought of the ways she would make that fucking Imp pay for this.


	212. TYRION

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I did not set out to write a Lannister family drama inside of a Sansaery fic, but here we are, somehow 400,000 words in, doing just that.

An incessant pounding on the door had Tyrion waking from the troubled sleep he had fallen into after spending far too long in his evening trying to figure out how to deal with his bitch sister. It only compounded matters that Lancel was nowhere to be found, when Tyrion needed insight into his sister's mind the most.

He wiped at his face, shook his head a little. "Coming," he muttered when the knocking did not cease, moving toward the door with a groan.

He was in no mood to deal with Cersei and her mercurial attitude since his price for keeping quiet about her plans for Queen Margaery had been revealed. For all that she was furious about it; she also wasn't leaving him alone, which at least let him know that she didn't have a plan of revenge.

A small comfort, that.

He opened the door, blinked blearily up at Jaime as his brother nearly fell into the room from leaning so hard on the door.

"Jaime," he murmured, and Jaime moved inside without a word, pushing past him and standing in the middle of the room with his back to Tyrion for several long moments.

Tyrion froze where he stood, wondered how it was possible that Jaime could have found out his involvement in Jaime's banishing, but he doubted Cersei would have shared even that, when it would have meant letting Jaime know their brother had outsmarted her, that he had been there when they... He doubted the two of them had much spoken since her pronouncement.

Jaime was leaving in two days, but he had spent most of the time since Cersei's command to leave for Dragonstone locked away in the White Tower, doing gods knew what.

"Are you...drunk?" Tyrion asked incredulously, sniffing the air around his brother's breath and gagging. "Fuck. Did you drink the whole wine cellar?"

Jaime didn't respond. He swiped a hand across his face, and had yet to turn around.

He stumbled over to the lavish dining table in the corner of the room, glad that he had sent Pod away to do some digging into what the ladies of the castle had to say about the Grandmaester these days. And that the boy had recently replenished his wine supply.

After all, the cure to a good hangover was always more alcohol, even if Jaime was a far sight from hung over, just yet.

"Some wine?" Tyrion asked, already reaching for a bottle, and Jaime finally turned around. Tyrion winced. "You look like shit."

Jaime laughed humorlessly, moving to sit down across from him. He took the wine bottle from Tyrion's hands and reached to uncork it, grimaced, and did rid of the cork with his teeth, spitting it across the room.

He poured some for Tyrion and some for himself in the empty glasses he found. Tyrion was surprised he bothered, rather than just downing the bottle.

Tyrion had only seen his brother drunk once in their lives. Jaime was perhaps the only Lannister in the family who didn't enjoy his wine, who thought more of getting into a good fight than relieving his feelings with drink.

The night before Cersei's wedding to Robert Baratheon, they had drank the night away, though Tyrion was too young and Jaime no fun at all. His brother had been in a solemn mood to begin with, and the drink had not helped at all, though their Uncle Kevan had said nothing of it when he found them later on, drunk on Dornish Red and Jaime puking his guts onto the shiny floors of the Keep.

That had been because Tywin was separating Jaime and Cersei by a force far more powerful than leagues. Marriage.

This time, Tyrion was doing the separating, though he knew that Jaime could come back once the war was won.

He didn't...understand why his brother was taking this so hard. Being separated from Cersei for a few months. He had endured years of captivity under the Stark boy, had endured the time Father had sent Jaime to fight and Cersei to marry Willas without much complaint.

And yet, here he was, drunker than Tyrion had ever seen him, and judging by how he had reacted when Cersei made her demand, this was different.

Tyrion wondered if it would have been kinder to give Jaime the command himself. But then, he wasn't sure that he knew his brother at all, these days. Wasn't certain that Jaime wouldn't have gone to Cersei anyway, would have forced her to send him away to keep her secret, as Tyrion had done.

Tyrion sighed. Jaime squinted up at him.

"Gods," Jaime muttered, disgust in his tone, "how did you drink this piss at your wedding?"

Tyrion raised a brow. "I'll have you know that Dornish red is the finest wine in Westeros, and that particular vintage-"

"Tastes like you got it from a barmaid in Flea Bottom," Jaime muttered, pushing his glass away and leaning back in his chair. He rubbed at his eyes, groaning. "Tyrion..."

Tyrion cleared his throat. "It's not even light out, Jaime," he said. "What..." Fuck, but he knew why Jaime was here, and he didn't want to keep lying, even if it felt like Jaime had been lying to him for such a long time.

He remembered the way Jaime shoved their sister against the wall, called her a cunt and fucked her more brutally than Tyrion had ever done with his whores. Remembered the way he came without much of a thought to whether Cersei had done so.

Wondered if marrying Jaime would have been better or worse for Cersei than marrying Robert.

It was a legitimate question, he thought. In the days of old, incest may have been frowned upon, but the Targaryens were allowed it because they were the monarchs. If that had been House Lannister instead, would either of his siblings have been happier, or would they have fallen on each other's weapons long before now? Jaime, cowed into submission in all the ways that mattered by their sister, until he was only her reflection, the way they saw each other anyway. And Cersei, pulled under by Jaime's temper.

He shook himself. He'd rather avoid thinking such thoughts about his siblings ever again, thank you very much.

Jaime didn't appear to need much convincing to open up about what was bothering him, anyway. Tyrion was relieved.

"She's sending me to fucking Dragonstone," Jaime gritted out, slamming his golden fist down onto the table. Tyrion started a little, where he sat across the table, more than awake now, and Jaime's anger seemed to subside when he noticed. "Like I'm her godsdamned Hound."

Tyrion poured his brother a rather liberal amount of wine, tried not to let the sorrow he felt show on his face.

He didn't regret what he had done; Cersei needed to be stopped from her plotting against the Tyrell girl, and he wanted Jaime out from under her poisonous influence. He would do it again, if given the choice, in a heartbeat.

But he did regret that Jaime had to suffer for it. Did regret that Jaime needed to believe it was Cersei who was sending him away, when Tyrion knew, didn't approve, but knew of the way they felt for one another.

Jaime took a sip of the wine, having a better handle on it now, and reached up with his good hand, scrubbing at his face. "I just...We just found each other again, and I thought that I knew what she wanted from me," he whispered. "I thought that now...Fuck, but I'm an idiot."

Tyrion eyed him. "Jaime..."

"I've only ever done everything she's asked of me," Jaime said, staring down at the table in lieu of Tyrion.

"I know," Tyrion said quietly, but his brother wasn't done.

"I joined the Kingsguard for her. Because she wanted me to be close even when she married Prince Rhaegar, even when it went against the wishes of our fucking father." He snorted. "I've only ever been faithful to her. I gave her children, so that she didn't have to bear the children of that fuck Robert. I pushed that Stark boy off a fucking tower for her, for those fucking children." He wiped at his mouth, took another gulp of wine, then another. Tyrion winced. "What the fuck else does she want from me?"

Tyrion shook his head, biting down hard on his tongue. There was an annoying part of him that wanted to reassure Jaime that there was nothing else that Cersei wanted from him, that Tyrion had been the one to insist he be sent away.

But then he thought of his brother, fucking his sister like some whore in pure anger, and thought of the cruelty of throwing a child out of a window, crippling him for the rest of his short life, for Cersei. And thought of Lancel, still sharing their sister’s bed.

He had once thought that Cersei had poisoned Jaime’s mind when she dragged him into their bed as children. That she was the monster constantly hanging over his head.

He didn’t know what to think of either of them, now. Not after seeing them together as he had, and that frightened him, but it also hardened his resolve to separate them the way it was rumored their mother had tried to do when they were children.

He thought of the fact that his mother was long dead now, and wondered if that was a coincidence, wondered if the fates truly conspired the way Cersei thought they did to keep his brother and sister together.

But it didn’t matter. Tyrion hardly believed in the gods, but he would stand up to them, too, if that was what it took to keep from reliving the sight of his brother turning into a monster.

"She is the Queen Regent, Jaime," he said gently, though he knew that the delivery did not soften the blow. "Her children's safety must come first, and securing Dragonstone will be a step in that direction."

Jaime's eyes shot up to his, and anger flared in them for a moment. "You almost sound like you fucking agree with her."

Tyrion sighed. "Jaime, you are the best member of the Kingsguard we have left," he said bluntly, because it was true. He knew why his sister had gotten rid of Ser Barristan, but it had been a foolish move to leave the king with so few good protectors. "And we're going to need a good leader to save Dragonstone from the Iron Islanders. We don't have a fleet, at the moment, not like the Tyrells do, and I’ll be damned if we let them hold one more thing over our heads. We only have soldiers, and so we have to make do with the best we have."

Jaime snorted. "'Save Dragonstone,'" he repeated. "Take it from Stannis and make sure it doesn't fall into a different enemy’s hand. Is there even an army there, keeping it for Stannis?"

Tyrion shrugged, because news of Stannis Baratheon was few and far between, on the best of day, and always biased, at that. Either he and his paltry army were wasting away in the snow of the North, or they were raising the entirety of the North and the wildlings to fight for them. But Stannis at least seemed to have forgotten about Dragonstone, for the time being, and that was what Tyrion was counting on. "A skeleton one. That isn't the battle we're concerned about you winning."

"With what great strength, Brother?" Jaime asked, holding up his golden hand. "This? A left hand I can barely lift a sword with? Cersei said..." He paused. “She said this was Joffrey’s command, but Joffrey hardly thinks I can wipe my own...” he trailed off then, paused as he considered Tyrion. “We,” he said finally, voice flat.

Tyrion swallowed. "Jaime..."

Jaime stumbled to his feet, shoving his chair out. "You planned this with her?" he asked.

Tyrion hesitated. "I knew about Dragonstone," he lied, "And I knew this was a possibility."

"A poss..." Jaime shook his head to clear it, took a step back. He looked even more betrayed, if it were possible, and godsdamnit, this was what Tyrion had been hoping to avoid. "Do you know what? Fuck you both. Fuck you both."

"Jaime," Tyrion tried, getting to his feet, but Jaime swayed along in front of him, ignoring him. But he had to try, had to get through to the brother he had once known and loved somehow, the man he had not seen in so very long that he was beginning to fear that man was still inside his brother at all. "Jaime, be reasonable. Cersei would not have thought of this if she thought you would be separated for long, anyway. You'll be back here soon enough..."

"I come to you about everything," Jaime snapped, turning around to face him. "Everything with her, and always you tell me that she is the one who..." he shook his head, a look of disgust filling his features. "And now you're siding with her?"

Tyrion shook his head, reaching out to touch his brother, and then letting his hand fall at the look on Jaime’s face. "Jaime, this isn't like that. I know that you feel as if she's abandoning you, but for fuck's sake-"

Jaime's good hand shot out, grabbing Tyrion by the throat of his tunic and pulling him closer. Tyrion couldn't help but think of how he had done the same with Cersei, had grabbed her and held her up against the wall while he fucked her, not knowing that Tyrion was in the room, was watching the horrid scene...

"Don't," Jaime gritted out, and Tyrion swallowed, falling silent.

Jaime stared at him for a long moment, and then let him go, looking faintly sick and no longer quite as drunk. In fact, he looked frightfully sober.

"I'm going to win Dragonstone," Jaime said calmly. "For House Lannister, not for her."

Tyrion nodded, taking a shaky breath. "I know," he said, because he had known that all along.

Had intended on it.

Just...not like this, please.

Jaime eyed him. "I should go," he said. "I leave in two days, and I want the men who go with me to be of my own choosing, not Cersei's."

Tyrion nodded. "I hope..." he paused, and so did Jaime, staring at him expectantly. Tyrion scratched at the scar from Blackwater. "I hope I see you again, before you go."

Jaime gave him one shallow nod, before turning on his heel and walking to the door.

"What is it that you want, Jaime?" Tyrion asked gently, just as his brother opened it. Because the question had been gnawing away at him, since he heard Jaime list off everything Cersei had demanded of him, and since he truly did not understand, in this moment.

Did not understand why this hurt so much, for either of them, and needed his big brother to have that answer, in this moment.

Jaime stopped where his hand rested on the doorframe. And then he lifted his head up, and kept walking, the door slamming quietly shut behind him.

Tyrion winced, and took another sip of his wine as he heard his brother's feet stomp down the hall.


	213. MARGAERY

Margaery rang her hands, staring down at them idly. She hated that this was a tell for her, now. Hated that she had spent so many years schooling her emotions, only for one man to come along and cause such a reaction in her each time she was truly nervous.

Hated it enough that each time she felt it happen, Margaery had to grit her teeth to keep from screaming.

There was a part of her that envied her husband, a part of her that envied his ability to be so angry without repercussion, as the world bowed at his feet, even if they all secretly hated him.

Sansa had once told her that if she had been the queen, she would wish to be loved by everyone. Her mother had imparted upon her the reasoning behind caring for the smallfolk, in case one was ever in need from them.

But Margaery had learned from her husband that it was just as well to be feared by all, even if it wasn't what she wanted, and a part of her clung to that anger, now.

"My lady?" Alla asked quietly, and she was staring down at Margaery's shaking hands, but did not reach out to her, where she sat on the sofa beside her. "Are you going to be all right? If...If you want Elinor and I to take her to Lady Olenna instead, we could manage that, I'm certain."

Which was exactly what Margaery did not want, not at all. Her grandmother was not faring well in the capitol, hated the air clogging in her lungs here as much as she hated all of the people, and Margaery did not want to put another burden on her that Margaery was perfectly capable of performing herself.

And...she didn't want her grandmother to think her inept, after all of the work Olenna had put into her granddaughter. She knew about the alliance with Tyrion; disapproved of getting into bed with a Lannister for any reason beyond stealing their power to the throne, but understood the advantage of having the North under their control, as Margaery phrased it when she suggested the whole thing.

She would have gone through with it anyway, Margaery thought, even if her grandmother had disapproved, but it was good to have the woman on her side, even if just barely.

Now, she needed to prove that her plan was a good one and that started with figuring out who had gotten to Lady Rosamund and told her to speak out against Sansa, and why they had done so.

Margaery cleared her throat, swallowed hard. "I...don't know," she admitted. She turned to face the other girl, where she sat beside Margaery on the divan as they waited. "But...No. I can handle this myself."

The girl was waiting here, with her, because Margaery couldn't stand the thought of being alone, just now. Couldn't stand the thought of Sansa, alone in the Black Cells, while Margaery was still here, guilty of treasons worse than any Sansa had done, but not imprisoned at all.

She sucked in a breath, closing her eyes.

Margaery jerked a moment later, when Alla reached out and took one of her hands in both of the girl's own. She was smiling, hesitantly, but shining as bright as Alla always did, and Margaery felt another flash of guilt, that she had brought any of her ladies to this wretched place.

Alla, especially. She was so fucking young, and Margaery had dragged her here on her father's promise of serving the Queen of Westeros.

"You need to gather yourself, Your Grace," Alla told her, wise beyond her years. "When she comes, you need to be ready to face her, not like...this."

And Margaery blurted out the first thought she had at Alla's words, because she knew the girl was right, knew that she needed to be unflinching from the beginning, if she wanted a straight answer.

Rosamund had always been a quiet, sweet girl, a cousin whose presence Margaery had always taken for granted because of that sweetness, which was worlds away from the sweetness in Sansa. She loved animals, and gowns, and didn't have any more thought towards men than Margaery herself had. She was incapable of conflict, hated the thought of hurting anyone around her, and in retrospect, Margaery should never have brought her to the capitol, either. Should have been expecting something just like this to happen to her.

Margaery should have chosen her ladies more carefully, and she was never going to make the same mistake again. Out of all of her ladies, she knew she could trust the ones she had left, but even so, she had somehow wound up only taking counsel from Alla and Elinor, and she had yet to see a reason to change that, of late.

But Rosamund's inability to face conflict, as devastating as it had been for Sansa, was the sort of character trait which Margaery could use to her advantage, just now.

"Alla, why are you so good to me?" Margaery blurted.

Alla bit her lip, appeared to give the question serious consideration. "Because....you were my best friend before you were my queen, Your Grace," she said softly. "And Rosamund, she came into your service only when you married King Renly."

"The false King Renly," Margaery reprimanded her, though there was no heat behind her words, no passion.

Renly would always be her brother's king, and so he would always be Margaery's, as well.

There were times when she wondered what sort of a life she might be living now, were Renly still alive. The Tyrells would never have come to the aid of the Lannisters at the Battle of Blackwater, and King's Landing would have fallen to Stannis, but Renly had the better army, back then.

He might just have prevailed, and Margaery might now find herself the wife of a beloved King of Westeros.

But more likely, Renly would have died just as brutal a death on the battlefield, only not killed by a shadow or Lady Brienne, but by his own brother, and Margaery would have been the queen of nothing at all.

She wondered if that would have been preferable, and then thought of all that she had gained, since becoming queen. Saw a flash of red hair, as Sansa leaned into her to kiss her-

Alla just smiled. "She didn't know you as we did," she continued, "because she never tried to, but she should have loved you anyway."

Margaery's throat closed. "Alla..."

Alla shook her head. "I know that some of the things you do are against the laws of the Crown we now have pledged to serve," she said softly.

Margaery's throat clogged. "Alla, I was foolish to ever ask you to do something that went against the King's laws, and I shan't do it again, I can promise you that."

Alla shrugged, lips pursed in a way that signified she was not done. "And I know I am young and in many ways still a naive girl, but I also know that I pledged my service to you, before the Crown and before my family. So yes, what Lady Rosamund did was wrong, no matter who convinced her to speak out, no matter what her intentions. She should have gone to you, first, because only a blind person in our ladies would not have seen the way you and Lady Sansa are around each other."

Far from reassuring, the words had Margaery stiffening. _Only a blind person_ , and she had been foolish enough to send Rosamund away, to a place where Margaery could not keep an eye on her and she could speak to anyone of what she knew. Knowing that the girl would bow to the first stern voice she heard, knowing that she had already done so.

If the girl breathed a word about Margaery and Sansa's relationship, she could have brought down Margaery, Sansa, Margaery's entire family. With just one word, and Margaery had let her go in disgrace, with reason to want revenge, rather than trying to help her, to ask who it was who had forced her to speak.

Margaery closed her eyes. That had been a mistake, she knew. A mistake she made in the heat of her anger, and now everyone she loved might just pay for it.

And Rosamund could not fail to know why she was being brought back. She had everything to lose, if the one who had threatened her had demanded her secrecy, as they no doubt had, and nothing to gain from telling Margaery that person's identity.

She had been such a damn fool.

"I...right," Margaery said, teeth clicking. "Alla, whatever I say when Rosamund walks through that door, whatever she says, you are to repeat it to no one, do you understand?" she squeezed Alla's hand tightly. She wasn't sure if it was a warning or reassurance, and if so, for which one of them.

Alla grimaced, but did not pull away. "I swear it, my lady," she whispered, without hesitation, meeting Margaery's eyes. "On the Seven."

Margaery took a deep breath and dropped the other girl's hand. Alla pulled back, rubbing them together.

"I'm sorry," Margaery apologized, looking at the ugly red marks on the girl's hand, marks Margaery had caused. "I shouldn't have done that."

Alla shook her head. "No," she agreed, "but I'll be fine."

And then there was a knock on the door, the pattern Margaery had told Elinor to give, once she had smuggled Rosamund back into the palace.

Summoning the girl had not been difficult. The caravan Rosamund travelled with had not even gotten to the Reach yet, and everyone within knew of her shame in being dismissed from the Queen's service.

Rosamund had been accompanied back to the capitol by guards, told to wear blue, nondescript cloaks in order to keep her identity a secret, after the lies Margaery had spread about her.

Much as she had loathed the girl, in sending her away, she had not planned to hand her over to the sparrows' fanatical group as a harlot. The gods knew what they did with those unfortunate enough to be caught in King's Landing, after all.

And Elinor had snuck Rosamund back into the Keep, making sure no one saw the girl's face as she led her to the Maidenvault, per Margaery's instructions.

Margaery's heart fluttered a little, at the sound of that knock at the door. Alla glanced at her, trepidation clear in her features, and Margaery nodded to the girl anyway.

Her lady got up, answered the door, and blinked at the sight of Elinor and a cloaked Rosamund standing on the other side, inviting them in quickly and shutting the door behind them.

Rosamund stood in the middle of the room, hands clasped in front of her and eyes downcast and Margaery felt a renewal of the anger she'd felt when she sent the girl away in the first place.

Margaery swallowed it down, because there was no time for that now. If she scared her too much, perhaps she wouldn't speak at all, and Margaery wanted answers as much as Lord Tyrion.

Margaery told herself that it was merely because whoever had bid Rosamund to speak could still be a threat to Sansa, but she was beginning to think that wasn't the case for either of them.

Rosamund looked worse for the wear, since the last Margaery had seen her. Her hair was askew beneath the cloak, eyes red rimmed with large, black circles beneath them, and she was thinner, despite it having not been very long since Sansa's imprisonment and the last time Margaery had seen the girl.

Margaery was struck with the image she had of the last lady she had lost, Lady Reanna, the girl's throat slit by Cersei when the woman left for Highgarden.

But Reanna had died in faithful service to Margaery, whereas Rosamund was still here, and the comparison vanished as soon as it had come.

Whoever had enticed Rosamund to speak had at least let her live, and that would tell Margaery something of the person's identity if only she could think properly about what had happened rather than spending all her thoughts on hating Rosamund for Sansa's predicament.

There were few at court, after all, kind enough to leave loose ends.

"Elinor," she said, "You may go. Lady Alla has things quite in hand with my tea, just now."

Elinor's head jerked up, and she eyed Margaery for a moment, gaze speculative, and for a moment Margaery thought she was going to protest, before she nodded, dipping into a curtsey. "Yes, Your Grace."

She turned and walked out, shutting the door behind her. It would have been annoying if she had protested, would have given the idea of defiance to Rosamund where Margaery did not want it in her mind at all.

They stood in silence. Alla walked hesitantly over to where the tea kettle steamed on the table between where Margaery sat and Rosamund stood.

"Would you care for some-?"

"She wouldn't," Margaery interrupted, before Alla could finish the offer of tea to the dismissed lady.

Rosamund opened her mouth, and then closed it. Instead of speaking, she hung her head, dipping into a curtsey, eyes no longer on Margaery at all.

Margaery could feel the fear dripping off of her in waves, and Margaery reflected that she had never wanted her ladies to fear her, once upon a time, just as she had never wanted the smallfolk to do so.

"Do sit down," Margaery said coolly. "We have much to speak about, and I don't suppose you'll be able to manage it all upright, after such a long journey."

Rosamund raised her head, swallowing hard. "Yes, Your Grace." She sat.

Margaery folded her hands in her lap, such that Rosamund would not be able to see them shaking. "Now," she said, "Why did you speak at Tyrion's trial? The truth this time, if you don’t mind."


	214. TYRION

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...You guys still out there? Could really use some encouragement for this story today.

"Queen Margaery," Tyrion called out, and watched as the little queen's shoulders stiffened where she stood in the middle of the corridor before she turned around and gave him a barely there smile, motioning for her ladies to go on ahead of her.

He would freely admit that he had followed her here, from the throne room, out of sheer desperation. She had not been at their rendezvous point in the gardens when she was supposed to be today, and while Tyrion could easily chalk that up to Joffrey needing his wife as the thin walls of the Keep had proven he so often did, Tyrion had felt a sinking feeling in his gut ever since.

Something was wrong, and he couldn’t get a handle on why. Everything was going exactly as they needed it to, and yet that feeling in his gut only grew tenser at the sight of Margaery’s wide eyes, when she turned to him in the corridor.

As if she had been hoping not to see him at all.

He wouldn't have resorted to asking to speak with her in front of witnesses at all if he hadn't had the feeling she was avoiding him. Lady Rosamund, he had learned from Shae, a sneer on the woman's lips, had returned to King's Landing last night, under cover of a cloak and in the dark.

She was here, and Margaery should have reported what she learned from the girl at the first opportunity she had, as she had promised to do.

Beside his sister, Ser Loras paused, giving Margaery a worried look, before walking to the end of the hall and keeping the both of them in his sights.

Tyrion smiled bitterly, thinking of what Cersei had been planning to accuse an overprotective brother of doing with his sister.

He was surprised the boy was willing to let Margaery out of his sight at all, in a less than public place, but then, he supposed, it was likely Margaery had induced her brother to be happy to remain in King's Landing in order to help with their plan.

Though he couldn't imagine Loras as a threat to young girls.

"Lord Tyrion," Margaery said, in her musical voice, plastering on the same smile he often saw her giving Joffrey when the boy was prattling on about inane things like dragons in the Small Council meetings. She stepped to the side of the corridor, where Tyrion supposed they would be relatively undisturbed, in the shadows. "Forgive me; I didn't realize you were there."

He didn’t believe her sharp smile for an instant.

Tyrion nodded. "I was wondering if I might have a word with Your Grace," he told her. "We haven't had the opportunity to speak recently about the topic we both have found...such common ground upon."

And now that he knew about her and Sansa, about her interest in helping the other girl, he supposed he could see it. He had known her family was ambitious, but did not think her grandmother would approve of such a thing.

Of course, the Tyrells had already committed treason for the love one of their members had for King Renly. Tyrion supposed this was par for the course, with them.

He told himself there was nothing to be concerned about, not with that knowledge about the two of them.

Margaery quirked a brow. "I see," she said, though she looked bemused. She glanced over her shoulder at her brother, and Tyrion watched as Loras put a hand on the hilt of his weapon. "Lord Tyrion..." she bit her lip, and Tyrion eyed her.

He took in her stiff posture, the pursing of her lips, the way she wouldn't meet his eyes. He had always been so good at reading people, and he didn't like what he was reading, now.

"I am afraid that the plans we made together are no longer possible,” Margaery said finally, the words all coming out in a rush. “I wish that I bore better news for you, after all this time."

Tyrion squinted at her, brought up short. Yes, he had sensed bad news, but pulling out of their alliance altogether? Like this? "I thought your grandmother saw the advantage to such a situation," he told her slowly, but Margaery merely shrugged one thin, bare shoulder. “If you need me to speak with her...”

"I'm sorry, Lord Tyrion," she told him, though she didn't particularly sound sorry. He wondered if she had ever graced Sansa with such lack of emotion. Wondered if this was the true Margaery, beneath the facade she presented everyone with. "But it will no longer...I can no longer help you in this matter."

Tyrion rubbed at his nose. "I see," he said, even if he didn't. Especially after the revelation Oberyn had given him. "May I ask why not?"

Margaery chewed on the inside of her cheek. He wondered if she was doing it on purpose. "That I can't say. I really am sorry for it," she settled on, and started to turn away from him.

"There are other ways we might help her," he said gently, glancing around to ensure they were not overheard. "Give me time to think of something else, if that won't work for you."

Down the hall, Loras' stance got a bit stiffer, as if he sensed the desperation Tyrion was feeling and felt the need to come back over to where they were.

Tyrion was aware that his voice sounded vaguely pleading, that he shouldn't be showing such vulnerability toward the second and smarter incarnation of his sister, but he couldn't help it. Sansa was in trouble, and thus far, Margaery Tyrell was the only person willing to help him do something about it.

He couldn't lose her as an ally, now. Not when Sansa's trial was rapidly approaching and he had no one else.

Margaery pursed her lips, glanced over Tyrion's shoulder, then back at him, worried her lower lip between her teeth. "As I said, Lord Tyrion," she said, sounding prim now rather than sympathetic, "My hands are tied in this matter."

Damn her, she sounded just like Varys, there.

“Then I think I deserve at least an explanation,” Tyrion ground out. And then, trying his last card, “Or, at the very least, Lady Sansa does.”

Margaery stiffened, glancing over her shoulder at those words before speaking again. "Sansa's fate is now in the hands of the gods," Margaery continued, and something he was annoyed he couldn't read flickered in her eyes. "She shall have all my prayers, in the days to come."

Tyrion eyed her. Couldn't believe she would just turn her back on Sansa, after all this. "Your Grace, if I could just speak to the Lady Rosamund myself, even if you are unwilling to continue this alliance, I could-"

Margaery spun away from him. "If you'll excuse me, Lord Tyrion, I was just on my way to the Sept to do that very thing. The Mother has always been merciful to me, and I hope that my intercession will bring mercy to Sansa in turn." She turned back then, pausing and licking her lips. “I do suggest you do the same, my lord Tyrion.”

"Queen Margaery!" he called after her, but she hurried down the hall, ignoring him completely as she took her brother's arm and allowed him to guide her around the corridor at a fast pace.

Tyrion stared after her as crimson skirts flew around the end of the corridor in surprise. He supposed he shouldn't have been. For all that Margaery Tyrell seemed to truly care about Sansa, he was somewhat certain of that beneath the facade she hid under, she was still a Tyrell.

And their family came first, as it was for his own, however much they all hated one another. The old Queen of Thorns must have changed her mind about harboring Sansa when they learned who was threatening the girl, and forbidden Margaery from helping Sansa.

Strange, when the Lannister army was spread thin enough that the old crone might win a battle against them, if she struck now.

He sighed. It seemed he had lost his only ally in helping Margaery.

And then a thought hit him, and Tyrion's eyes flew open once more. He could almost still smell the rosewater the Tyrell girl had been wearing.

He had approached Margaery just days before he learned from Lancel about Cersei's plotting against the little queen, about her plan to have Margaery accused of fucking everyone from her brother to the court bard.

And Margaery had agreed to the plan to rescue Sansa, had let him think her an ally, in need of protection if they were to work together, but genuine in her motives the way the rest of her family never was. Had sent her lady down to give Sansa encouragement in the Black Cells, knowing that Tyrion might visit Sansa himself and hear of the way they had spoken of the Queen, likely planned for the girl to push Sansa into mentioning that very thing. Had agreed to treason with him, to become the better part of their alliance lest he feel he could do this thing without her.

Mace Tyrell, scratch that, Olenna Tyrell, would never sacrifice the position they had finally gained in Westeros for a girl slated for death, even if she did control the North. They knew well enough their own position.

And now that Tyrion had removed Cersei as a threat to Queen Margaery, had slaughtered her witnesses and blackmailed her into submission, never once mentioning Margaery herself in the matter, the girl was suddenly unable to help him. Unable to help Sansa, where she had been so very keen, before.

He allowed a slow, humorless smile to spread across his face. The girl was good; he would certainly give her that.

He was going to make her pay for that.

But first, he needed to find another way to save Sansa, one that the Tyrells didn’t know about, damn them, lest they rat him out as well as abandon him like this.


	215. TYRION/SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This update is two chapters shoved together because they're happening exactly simultaneously and because you guys deserve it. (More about that at the end). The second chapter is marked by a line break, where we switch from Tyrion's POV to Sansa's.

"Can you defeat the Mountain in trial by combat in Sansa's defense?" Tyrion asked as soon as the guards shut the door behind him and the Viper.

Tyrion shuddered, and tried to pretend he did not. Being down here, in these cells, after so long imprisoned in them was something he was never going to get used to, he supposed.

He had given it as much thought as he could afford to, with the upcoming trial tomorrow. And he knew that short of running away with Sansa himself, there was nothing he could do to ensure her safety once she was out of King’s Landing, if she even made it that far.

The Tyrells had been offering the bribes; after all, the ship that would pretend to be a slave ship, the destination Sansa would arrive in, when it was all over.

And Tyrion was not a man without resources, but he was also without many friends, at the moment.

Save perhaps one.

"I thought you believed I was plotting against her and you couldn't trust me with her life," Oberyn pointed out, raising a brow at Tyrion's reaction to the closed door. "And now you are here asking me to fight for her, to leave her fate in the hands of the gods."

"I don't have the luxury to care what you were planning with Sansa now," Tyrion said hurriedly. "But I doubt it involved killing an innocent girl. Tell me the truth," he said desperately. "Can you do this? Can you defeat the Mountain in single combat? I can...The King will demand my presence at the trial, as he has already demanded Sansa’s, but my sister is terribly invested in this now, and no one will notice if Sansa is snuck away quickly after you win. You’ll have one her by legitimate measures at least, this time."

He had to know. Because Margaery Tyrell wasn't going to help him sneak Sansa out of the city anymore, and Tyrion didn't have time to come up with a better plan, not when everything had depended so heavily upon the Tyrells in the last one.

He had left only one option, and Tyrion did not know how he felt about that at all, but he knew that, by the Stranger, he was going to have to see it through, this time.

Oberyn glanced up, met his eyes. "Yes."

Tyrion believed him, in that moment. Believed the rage and the justice in the other man's eyes, and pretended that this had nothing to do with the fact that Oberyn was his only choice, just now.

Tyrion licked his lips, rubbed his hands together. "Cersei will cry her rage the moment the deed is done," he said. "We will need a getaway plan for you the moment the fight is over."

"And do you have one?" Oberyn asked, sounding amused. “I’m afraid our ship was...destroyed. Courtesy of the King.”

Tyrion squinted at him. He hadn’t known that. He wondered what had become of the Dornish merchants who had helped them. "I can get one," he promised. "And it will be more failsafe than the merchant vessel you took, though probably less comfortable."

But of course, the little queen would know of it. Would she turn against that escape idea now, knowing the details of it, as she had turned against Tyrion? He could replace her brother with Bronn easily enough, given the days between now and the trial by combat to bring the man to King's Landing, send the ship to Dorne rather than Highgarden, an easy enough feat to bribe the guards, but if the girl spoke a word of it, they were all doomed.

Still, he was desperate. He needed help wherever he could get it.

Varys would provide that, however much he claimed he wished to wash his hands of the whole ordeal. While Tyrion still hadn't worked out quite what allied the Dornish and the little eunuch, he knew that something did, and while Varys cared far less for Sansa than the Dornish, he would work with Tyrion this time if it meant saving Prince Oberyn.

That was a morbid thought, but a true one, Tyrion knew.

And, perhaps, Tyrion could ask the man what the fuck he'd meant, by telling Tyrion to go to Queen Margaery when she had been less than helpful.

"Perhaps you will come to Sunspear with your lady wife," Oberyn said, giving him a roguish smile. "My brother Doran would be most pleased to meet the rightful heir to Casterly Rock...especially if he brought his lovely wife, the Lady of Winterfell."

Ah, of course. Tyrion had still not discovered what it was the Dornish wanted with Sansa, beyond the obvious key to the North that she represented, but the Red Viper was tireless in his pursuit of her, Tyrion would give him that.

"A trip to Dorne might be pleasant, now that I reflect on it." Tyrion paused. "Of course, the last one didn't turn out too well for you."

Oberyn's jaw ticked. "I did find it rather strange," he said, a touch of amusement in his tone, "how quickly that trip soured. Some might say a little too quickly, given the timeline."

Tyrion glared at him. "Sansa is my lady wife," he reminded him. "Whatever your plans for her, however innocent you may present them, I will not see her harmed again."

Oberyn dipped his head in acknowledgement. "Stranger still," he went on, as if Tyrion had not spoken, "How quickly the Tyrells managed to outfit their ships and send them to Dorne. Why, I do believe such a journey would have taken...at least as long as our own from King's Landing."

Tyrion stared at him for a moment in bemusement, and then thought of the way Queen Margaery had given up any and all pretense of helping him get Sansa out of King's Landing, and felt his blood boil. He may not think much of the Tyrells, but Sansa was besotted with that one, and now her betrayal felt all the worse.

He wondered if Margaery had planned it that way. All of this, to get under Sansa's skin in order to...what? Convince Tyrion to keep his sister from plotting against her?

It made no sense, unless the rumors that filled Cersei's head were true, and he did not think the girl stupid enough to try that.

"Did you have...any indication that they knew of your plans to escape?" Tyrion asked idly.

Oberyn shrugged, though his eyes were dark. "My brother's letters to me were strangely silent in the weeks leading up to our departure," he said. "And my brother never leaves me without a word."

Tyrion raised a brow. "You think they were intercepting your letters?" he asked.

Oberyn gave him a long look. "Plan on a lengthy visit. You and Doran have may matters of mutual interest to discuss. Music, trade, history, wine, the dwarf's penny...the laws of inheritance and succession.” He glanced up, meeting Tyrion’s eyes with cold intent. “No doubt an uncle's counsel would be of benefit to Queen Myrcella in the trying times ahead."

"Queen Myrcella," Tyrion echoed, cocking his head. "I might be mistaken, but I do believe we have a slight impediment to that route."

Queen Myrcella? He wondered at the temptation stirring in him, with Sansa tucked under his cloak. If she declared for Myrcella over Joffrey, would the North follow? What the Red Viper was hinting at was treason, and Myrcella’s claim was hardly valid while Joffrey yet lived. Could Tyrion truly take up arms against Joffrey, against his own family? Cersei would spit blood. It might be worth it for that alone.

Oberyn gave him an unimpressed glance. "I don't think that will be an impediment that Dorne shall have to suffer."

"You threatened Myrcella's life to me, not so long ago," Tyrion pointed out. "Offered her as a bargaining chip against the Mountain. And now you see her as a queen?"

Oberyn's jaw ticked again. "We in Dorne do not hurt little girls," he said vehemently, "but this is a game of thrones, and you in King's Landing would certainly believe such a threat."

Tyrion sucked in a breath, let it out slowly. "What weapons do you need to fight the Mountain?" he asked finally. "I can get them for you."

Oberyn smiled.

* * *

 

The door to Sansa's prison flew open, and Sansa flinched toward the back of it, lifting her hands above her head as light shone into the dank quarters, and then she blinked in surprise at the figure standing in the doorway.

"Margaery!" Sansa cried, finding her feet despite her legs' shaking, and rushing forward to throw her arms about the other woman's shoulders. "Oh, Margaery, I thought I'd never see you again. How, how did you even get down here?"

Elinor had said she couldn't come to visit Sansa herself because of the danger of someone recognizing her. And yet here she was, standing before Sansa, and she looked like a saving angel, here to take Sansa far away from this wretched place, and Sansa felt as if she remembered to breathe after a long time without air at the sight of Margaery before her.

But, on second thought, Sansa didn't want to know. She wanted only to be near the other girl, to breathe her in and to know that she was there.

She found herself peppering the other woman in kisses, unable to hold back, and felt Margaery's arms envelope her. For the first time since Lady Rosamund had spoken against her in the throne room, Sansa felt safe.

Safe, in Margaery's arms, and Sansa nuzzled the other girl's neck and tried not to think too hard about why that was.

It took her a few moments to realize that Margaery was not reciprocating her kisses, not after the first one.

Sansa pulled back, staring up at Margaery in concern as she saw the look in the other woman's eyes. "What is it? Marg?"

Margaery shook her head, looked up and met Sansa's eyes, her own full of worry. And Sansa tried to convince herself that it was just worry over Sansa's state, that Margaery hadn't realized the full extent of Sansa's conditions down here until just now.

But Sansa knew that Elinor would have dutifully reported all of that to her queen, because that was what she had come down here to do, and Margaery had sent a maester to see her, so she must have known the extent of it.

No, the worry in Margaery's features meant something else entirely, and Sansa swallowed hard at the sight.

She needed to trust Margaery, Sansa remembered. Margaery knew how to play the game better than she did, and Sansa was going to need that brand of ruthlessness if she was going to make it out of this alive.

Oh, gods, she wasn't going to make it out of this alive, and Margaery was indeed here to say goodbye-

"Sansa, breathe," Margaery whispered, and Sansa sucked in a breath, then another, eyes watery and breaths shaky.

Margaery cooed reassuringly at the sound, cupped Sansa's cheek in her palm and pulled the girl close again. "That's it," the other girl whispered. "Good girl. Deep breaths. I'm right here."

They knelt on the floor of the dinghy cell, and all Sansa could think about was the fact that Margaery was here, and oh gods, she was going to ruin her dress, sitting on the disgusting floor of Sansa's cell-

"Sansa, I need you to listen to me very carefully," Margaery said softly, taking Sansa's face carefully in her hands and pulling back. "Are you listening?"

Sansa sucked in a breath. "Yes, of course, I...Margaery, how did you get down here?"

Margaery bit her lip. "I...convinced the King to allow me to speak with you," she said, no longer meeting Sansa's eyes.

"But..." Sansa's eyes widened, her heartbeat quickening. "Margaery, you know that's too dangerous. If he figures out-"

"He allowed it, because there is something we need to discuss that interests him," Margaery said, and Sansa glanced at the door, suddenly expecting guards to come rushing in to arrest the both of them.

Gods, had Cersei figured out what was between them....?

"What is it?" Sansa asked hoarsely, because suddenly Margaery was not just here as her friend and confidante, she was here as the Queen, for Joffrey to have approved of this meeting. "I don't understand. What could Joffrey..."

"He's agreed to what I am about to lay out for you. But you have to trust me. Can you do that?"

Sansa licked her lips. "He's agreed...to what, exactly?"

Margaery bit her lip, looked indecisive for a moment, as if the very last thing she wanted to do now was tell Sansa why she was here, what it was that Joffrey had agreed to.

"You must testify against Prince Oberyn," Margaery said finally. "You must tell the Court that you had no part in Lord Tywin's death, but that you know Prince Oberyn did it, have evidence of that."

Sansa shook her head. "But...he already confessed," she said, brows wrinkling in confusion. They were down here waiting for her trial, not his, after all. "What would be the point?"

"The Crown is not convinced that this wasn't simply to fight the Mountain in your trial by combat," Margaery said, unflinchingly. "Is not convinced that others will not think so. He confessed, but the Crown is not winning the war with the Dornish."

Sansa blinked at her. "I...What has that got to do with anything?" she asked, instead of admitting that he had also confessed to her in private, that she knew it to be true, what he'd said.

Margaery shook her head, lips pressing together in obvious frustration. "Joffrey has agreed not to charge you for keeping premeditated murder a secret if you tell him of how Prince Oberyn managed the murder. He wants you to," she hesitated, "confess that Prince Oberyn did this against the direct orders of his brother, Doran, and that you saw some proof of this. That he kidnapped you against those orders, as well. Joffrey will grant you mercy, and will have a reason to pull out of the war with Dorne without looking a fool."

Sansa pulled away from her, chest heaving. They'd told her to say that Oberyn had kidnapped her the first time, would no one find it suspicious if she suddenly admitted it was against Prince Doran's orders now? "Margaery, I don't even know, I can't-"

"Sansa," Margaery's voice was an impatient hiss. "If you do not do this, then they will condemn you to death alongside him, do you understand me? You will die, and for something that you did not do, had no part in whatsoever. Oberyn has confessed to the crime of murdering Tywin. You just need to..." she shrugged, a shadow crossing her features. "Claim that he is guilty of one more sin."

Sansa sucked in another heaving breath, eyes wide. "Margaery..."

"They will kill you," Margaery repeated, voice softer, slower, but no less insistent. "Cersei will kill anyone who was involved in the death of her father, whether there was love lost between them or not. Tyrion may think you are safe because you are their link to the North, but they...may have managed a way around that, according to my grandmother."

Sansa blinked at her in surprise. She knew that the one thing which had kept her relatively safe here in King's Landing was her link to Winterfell, and yet...If what Margaery said was true, she did not have even that anymore.

Sansa suddenly didn't want to know what it was that had Margaery so sure of that. She shuddered, hugging her knees.

"You must appeal to Joffrey."

Sansa laughed, aware that she might be somewhat hysterical. "Appeal to Joffrey? Like my father did? Margaery, Joffrey killed my father and called it mercy. Weren't you listening, when I told you that?"

Margaery flinched. "I can guarantee, this time, that no harm will come to you if you do this, Sansa. But I can also guarantee that you will die if you do not."

Sansa sent her a scathing look. "I thought that I could guarantee the same when my father was imprisoned, Margaery. None of us can predict Joffrey's madness."

"But at least now you would have half of a chance!" Margaery cried, clearly frustrated with her. "Please, Sansa," she said finally, calming herself, "Do this for me. Please."

"Lady Rosamund is your lady," Sansa said then, blinking up at Margaery as this occured to her. "Why would she have spoken out against me?"

Margaery bit her lip. "Sansa-"

"Tell me, Marg. The truth, this time. Don't you think I deserve that much, before I lose my head?"

Margaery flinched again, glancing away.

"You told me that I should think of leaving King's Landing, after Lord Tywin's death," Sansa said cautiously then, because she'd had ample time down in these cells to figure that out. "Told me to annul my marriage to Lord Tyrion, before. I thought...I thought it was because you knew that Cersei was returning, but it wasn't, was it? You were planning on framing Oberyn for Lord Tywin's murder, and you knew that I might be implicated in it."

Margaery reached for Sansa's hands, but the other girl pulled away. Margaery sighed. "We aren't framing Oberyn, Sansa. I had no idea what Lady Rosamund was going to say until she spoke to my husband a mere hour before the trial, and by then there was nothing I could do to stop her. And he confessed, anyway. He did poison Lord Tywin."

She knew that, Sansa reminded herself. Oberyn had confessed as much to the court, and then, in secret, to her.

Sansa sucked in a breath. "And you thought to send me away, so I could not be implicated?" she asked incredulously.

"I thought to send you away so that you could not be punished," Margaery admitted. "I didn't know that Lady Rosamund was going to implicate you. I didn't even know that Prince Oberyn was guilty, but you were there, and you had lied about running away with Prince Oberyn unwillingly, and I knew that Joffrey would not let that stand, even if you did give him the war that he wanted. But when Rosamund spoke against you, I..."

She hesitated. Sansa sucked in her breath.

Margaery glanced up, meeting Sansa's eyes with a fierce intensity that suddenly reminded Sansa that this was the woman who survived as King Joffrey's beloved bride. "I would do anything for you, Sansa."

Sansa stared at her, struck silent by the words, even though she hardly knew what they meant, what they were implying. She wanted to ask if Lady Rosamund was still alive, suddenly, but the question clogged in her throat.

"You haven't asked me if I helped to kill him," Sansa said finally, voice hollow. "You'd do all this, and you haven't even asked me-"

Margaery kissed her. "I know you didn't," she whispered, pulling back and forcing Sansa to meet her eyes, rubbing her thumb against Sansa's cheek. "You were with me that whole night, remember, before you left?"

"But...the poison-" Sansa murmured helplessly.

"And besides, I know you, Sansa Stark," Margaery murmured sweetly. "And you aren't a murderer."

Sansa felt a sudden annoyance rush through her, at those words. Annoyance that Margaery would say such a thing, and then turn around and ask her to kill.

"But now you wish for me to lie about Prince Oberyn," Sansa said then, swallowing hard. "To somehow prove that I am not guilty and that he is? He deserves a trial, a real one, and this would be as much as killing him. He lives so far only because I have not yet had mine."

"You are _not_ guilty, my little bird, and he _is_ ," Margaery said, gripping Sansa's hands tightly in her own. "You need only prove it. Whatever plans you did have with him are meaningless, now, and they do not implicate you in Lord Tywin's murder."

"How do you know that he is guilty?" Sansa demanded then. "Why are you so certain?"

Margaery would not meet her eyes, once more. "He is well-known as a poisoner, Sansa. That is why they call him the Red Viper. And Lord Tywin was clearly poisoned. Who else had the motive?"

"Everyone in King's Landing hated the Old Lion," Sansa pointed out. "Even my lord husband had motive, his own son. No, you must have some reason to know that it was him..."

"My brother is dying, Sansa," Margaery interrupted then, her voice quiet and very cold in a way that had Sansa flinching. "He was well, for just a few days, and now he is fading again, and fading fast. He is dying of a clinging, painful, and slow poison the Tyrell maesters say comes only from Dorne, and..." she bit her lip. "My family is convinced that whoever poisoned him could have gotten that poison from only one source."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "I..." She was struck between the need to offer her condolences when she saw the rare panicked pain on Margaery's face, and the need to defend Prince Oberyn, for surely he would never have done that. "Cersei..."

"He may not have the one who provided Cersei...or whomever," but her sad smile was wry, "with the poison to kill my brother," Margaery interrupted, "Or he may have; I suppose we will never know, but Oberyn killed my brother long ago, Sansa, when he crippled my Willas in a tournament and left him a shadow of his former self, and now Willas is dying because of it." She glanced up at Sansa. "I love you, Sansa Stark, and I would do anything for you, but I would do anything for my family, as well. This is the only way I can think to do both."

Sansa swallowed hard. "Tell me...Tell me the truth. I need to know. Did you...did you do this because you didn't want me to leave, when Oberyn took me? Did you...learn of his plan to take me away, and this was how you stopped him? By..." Gods, she couldn't even say the words. "By killing Tywin yourself..."

Margaery reared back, hurt filling her face. “Of course not. Sansa, you know I would never do anything to keep you from safety. This place is poison. I...I would never want you to stay here, if you could leave and it was in my power to help you go."

Sansa sighed, pressing her forehead against Margaery's. "I know," she whispered. "I'm sorry, it's just this place..."

Margaery cooed, running her fingers through Sansa's hair. "It's going to be all right, Sansa," she whispered hoarsely, and Sansa felt her press a damp kiss into Sansa's hair, just at the crown. "You can do this. Just one last thing and you never have to look at these walls again. I wish that I could shoulder this burden for you, but you have to do this. And I will be there when it's done, no matter what." She pulled back; thumb caressing at Sansa's chin.

Sansa swallowed thickly, a fear rising up in her that she realized was her last defense. Oberyn's last defense.

"What if he's innocent?" she whispered. She knew that he wasn't, knew that he confessed...

But she had confessed to Tyrion. Confessed how very much she had wished to see Lord Tywin die, herself. Could she condemn another man to death for the same thing, when he had merely been brave enough to kill the man where Sansa had not?

Margaery shook her head. "You can't afford to think like that, Sansa," she reprimanded gently. "I...we cannot afford to think like that, because I can’t lose you.” The words hung in the air, and Sansa’s next breath caught in her throat. “Him or you, there is no grey area here." She swallowed. "You made a decision not long ago in the throne room that saved your life but started a war. Remember that decision. Remember why you made it. Please.”

Sansa bit her lip. "Margaery..."

"Sansa," and then Margaery was kissing her, hard and soft at the same time, vehement and pleading, and Sansa leaned into the kiss, couldn't remember the last time she'd felt such passion, such adoration in her time in the Cells.

She felt tears pooling in her eyes.

Margaery pulled away then, eyes soft and doe-eyed. "Sansa," she whispered, and then there was a knock at the door.

Margaery sighed, pressing their foreheads together. "I can't save you," she whispered. "I really can't. But you have to come back to me. Promise that you will, and whatever happens next, whatever the outcome is, we can pick up the pieces. Together."

"I..." Sansa licked her lips. "Margaery..."

The door swung open, and Margaery jerked away from Sansa, standing to her feet and giving Sansa a long look.

The guards didn't appear to notice the tension in the room, as they held their torches and waited for the Queen to emerge.

Margaery's eyes grew no less intense, as she stood in the middle of the cell and waited, and Sansa found herself sucking in a soft breath.

"I promise," she whispered, because she realized that was what Margaery was waiting for.

Margaery let out a slow breath, relieved, and then turned and walked out of the cell, as Sansa was no longer free to do.

Sansa swallowed, lowered her head into her knees, and started to cry. For once, she was relieved that Oberyn could no longer hear her through the hole in the wall.

She thought she would have even less of an idea of what to do, then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow! Thank you so much for all of the kind words last chapter, I loved reading every one of them and was honestly blown away by how many of you had such kind things to say about this fic, especially those of you who've been following this story from the beginning. I kind of hate it when authors start holding their fics hostage for reviews or begging for them, and I hope my note didn't seem like that, but if it did, thank you all for putting up with me yesterday.
> 
> Holidays back with the family are just kind of stressful, is all. Mostly though, as some of you know, I never intended for this fic to turn into what it did. I've been writing this story for a year and a half now and that just sort of hit me the other day. When I started out, this was pretty much just going to be an angsty/cute little short about Sansaery if Joffrey hadn't died and they'd gotten a chance to be together, but you guys definitely inspired me to continue it pretty early on, and writing this fic has turned out to be a lot of fun for me, and a way to de-stress in school. But it's also turned into a monster of a fic, longer than any original fiction I've ever written before, and without a near end in sight, which can get a little overwhelming when I sit here planning it out.
> 
> I'm estimating the series is going to be about 800k now, which is a ridiculous length, I know, so thank you all for hanging onto the story and I promise I'll do my best to continue it as long as I know there is still an interest in this story.
> 
> Phew, okay, back to the ridiculous cliffhanger, don't mind me.


	216. SANSA

The next time the guards brought food, it was all green. Sansa wondered if she had Margaery to thank for that, how Margaery would even have known, have convinced the guards. She supposed the answer to that second question was easier than the first. She was the Queen, after all, capable of making deals with the King which no one else would be able to have any confidence of him upholding.

She managed to eat it all without issue. When she looked down at it, the greens that were bitter and leafy rather than containing any flesh, Sansa didn't even feel ill.

It was a...strange feeling, and there was a rush of guilt which ran through Sansa with it, that the food she being almost pleasant to eat.

She wondered how Margaery had known, once more. She had never tried to explain why she hated to eat meats and red foods to Margaery, and didn't think the other woman had ever asked her, or paid enough attention to figure that out for herself.

Gods, Sansa wasn't even sure herself, until she looked down on them just now, what it was about fleshy looking food that so repulsed her where greens did not. She supposed it made a sick sort of sense, and yet.

And yet, she didn't want it to make sense at all. Wanted it to just go away, that Margaery and Shae could stop worrying, and she didn't have to worry so about the flat lines of her body not being flat enough to atone for all that she had done.

For what, she never knew, but they never were flat enough.

Sansa bit into her tongue, taking her next bite, and swallowed a little hard, chasing down blood with greens. She closed her eyes, because she was trying very hard not to think of what the Queen had asked her to do, had warned her that she would have to make a decision on it by tomorrow, because tomorrow was when the trial would be, and that would be her last chance.

 _Tomorrow_ , when Sansa could barely even think, the decision so muddled in her mind that she wanted to scream or be sick, and yet, she could have neither of those, for no words would force their way passed her parched lips, in the moment, and she certainly couldn’t make such a decision in a _day_.

What Margaery had asked her to do...Sansa wasn't certain that she would be able to do it, for all the promises she had made the other woman.

The very thought of it, of betraying Oberyn that way even if he had betrayed her confidences and seen her locked away in this horrible dungeon, awaiting death, was almost unthinkable.

She had thought he was a good man.

She did know that she didn't want to die. She had known that when Ellaria slit her throat, for all that living meant coming back to the Lannisters; for all that she hadn't fought against the other woman when Ellaria tried it. She may have told Tyrion different, because she did hate the Lannisters, but in her heart, Sansa knew the truth. She would give anything to stay alive, and she didn't know what was wrong with her, that she could think such things.

But Sansa had watched her father die, had learned of her mother's and brother's deaths, and each time was like another blow to the cowardice that she felt. She couldn't die. She couldn't go out, as they had. Couldn't face the Stranger alone, not yet.

And she also knew that she could not afford to disappoint Margaery again, not when it would be the last thing that Sansa did.

She still didn't understand their relationship in its entirety, not since she had walked out of Margaery's chambers, with its strange back and forth, but Sansa understood that. Margaery was the only person left alive, if Arya was not still breathing, which Sansa doubted, whom she had not completely fucked up with, and she couldn't afford to lose that on the scaffold, as well.

And Sansa knew, deep down, that was the reason she was considering this so easily, where she would have balked at the suggestion had anyone else, Tyrion or Cersei, given it to her.

_I love you, Sansa Stark, and I would do anything for you._

Sansa sucked in a ragged breath, then another, because, much as her relationship with Margaery was confusing, she knew those words to be true. Had known them for some time, even if she hadn't realized it then, from the moment Margaery tossed Sansa into her closet in order to hide her from Joffrey, when he came to Margaery's chambers. She hadn't known what the feeling was then, but she'd known that somehow, Margaery was able to appease Joffrey in her own bed in order to keep him from noticing that the door to her closet was not quite closed.

Sansa reminded herself to breathe as she set the greens aside. Closed her eyes hard and sucked in another breath that was almost too difficult to drag through her lungs.

She could do this. After all, she had done this to the Martells before, Sansa thought, and instantly felt ashamed at the comparison.

Still.

Was it really so different, to betray Ellaria by saying she had not gone with them willingly when the Martells took her from King's Landing, and to say that Prince Oberyn had plotted against Tywin on his own?

Except that it was. She had known that Ellaria would not die, that the goal had been a chance to go to war with Dorne. And she knew that, if she did testify against Prince Oberyn, there was every likelihood that he would. Cersei had been happy enough to see her own brother killed, and with the thought that a Martell had killed her father...

Cersei. Cersei, who had likely poisoned her own husband but would never be placed upon the accused's stand for it. Who had gotten that poison from Dorne, and very likely from the one person she'd had contact with from Dorne in recent months.

A stray thought hit Sansa, then. That if Cersei ever did have to worry about being blamed by the Tyrells for Willas Tyrell's murder, she was just now setting things into place to be rid of the one person who might be able to implicate her, if what Margaery believed was true.

And that alone made Sansa realize that it was true, that it had to be true, and perhaps Oberyn was never the man she had thought he was. That Oberyn really had offered that poison to Cersei, really was capable of killing Tywin Lannister.

She swallowed, sucked in another breath, and realized she was crying.

She wished to the gods that she had never agreed to Oberyn's haphazard suggestion that she follow him to Dorne, because that was where this had all started, wasn't it? Her, unhappy in her captivity here, willing to follow anyone offering to get her away from this place.

There would be no escape to Dorne. There would only be Prince Oberyn, killed by Lannisters as so many others had been, and she too, if she were very foolish this time, not protected by her claim to the North when she had killed the second most powerful man in Westeros.

The Lannisters had an army now, in the Tyrells. If they wanted the North that badly, they could have it without her. And she was still Tyrion's lawful wife. They would have it through him even if she did die without an heir, though it would be a trickier claim.

When Sansa fell into a troubled sleep that night, spent of tears and eyelids thick, or, she assumed it was night, she dreamt of Margaery. Dreamt of that horrible night when Joffrey called Sansa to his chambers. And Margaery’s pretty lips, while Sansa stood mute, unable to speak a word despite remember that she had at least said something then, while Margaery suggested a beating which would at least distract Joffrey from the murderous lust in his eyes as he looked at Sansa.

Sansa didn’t feel the pain of the lash, though, because the world around her fell away, melted into snow.

Sansa blinked, and she was standing in the courtyard in Winterfell, a place she had known so well as a child, a place where she had watched her brothers and even her sister roughhouse, their father and mother watching from the parapets, but when Sansa glanced up at them, their faces were blurred.

She screamed for her father, but he couldn’t hear her, Sansa somehow knew instinctively. And even though she stood in the middle of the courtyard, she remained unseen by those milling about around her.

And then there was no one around her, and Sansa watched one of the walls surrounding the courtyard burn, going up in furling smoke that clogged at her lungs as she stumbled back from it, desperately seeking cover.

Sansa screamed out for someone, anyone, to come running, to notice the damage being done to her _home_ , but no one did. She could only watch in horror as the wall came down in flames, as no one bothered to stop it and the snow beneath her feet began to melt.

And there was Joffrey, standing just out of reach of the flames, proud and tall as he never quite was in life, grinning at her with that same murderous lust in his eyes.

Sansa shivered where she stood in the middle of Winterfell's courtyard, suddenly cold when she knew the flames around her should be making her too hot, in the heavy Stark robes she was wearing. She stumbled out of the courtyard and into the snow outside Winterfell, ran a few steps before a log alit with fire landed in her path, and Sansa screamed again, but no sound would emerge from her throat.

She was going to die, Sansa realized with a dull clarity, burning just outside of her own home. There was some irony in that, if only she weren’t dying and could appreciate it.

She was going to die here, and she had _never even told Margaery that she lo_ -

A hand reached out toward her, and Sansa grasped it before she even glanced at the long, porcelain fingers, the motion instinctive.

Sansa was standing in a garden in what she assumed was Highgarden, or what her mind's eye had conjured of Highgarden every time Margaery told her of it.

It was beautiful, lush greens and warm yellows and pinks, and Sansa saw Margaery's smiling face as the other girl tugged her with that porcelain hand toward the double gates leading into the castle.

She tried to speak, tried to tell Margaery the words she desperately needed to say, what she had wasted so many days and nights not saying to her, but the words were shoved deep down Sansa's throat, unable and unwilling to come forth no matter how Sansa tried to speak them, and she mutely followed after the other girl, the smiling face which Sansa missed so.

And she knew that she had missed her chance to say them, a lifetime ago in another dream, where she was wasting away in a Black Cell instead of running through the corridors of Highgarden. Wasted a chance, and now, despite Margaery running in front of her, just out of reach, Sansa couldn't say them.

Sansa glanced down at herself, saw that she was wearing the green and gold gown she had worn to the tourney, the one that Margaery had commissioned for her and then nearly ruined beforehand.

And when Sansa gasped awake, still stuck in a cold, Black Cell in King's Landing, Sansa found that she was screaming here, too, as she had been in Winterfell, but, as there, no sound came out of her throat.

_I love you, Sansa Stark, and I would do anything for you._

Sansa hugged her knees, and fell into a troubled sleep once more. This time, she dreamed of Dorne, but she did not remember the dream at all, when she woke.


	217. SANSA

The guards standing at her door huffed impatiently, and Sansa stood unsteadily to her feet, flinched as they grabbed her arms and dragged her out into the hall. She was silent as thick chains were wound around her hands and left to hang from them, was silent as the chains rattled with every small movement that she made.

Prince Oberyn was already out in the hall of the cells, standing tall despite the rags and filth covering him, looking very much the prince. Sansa wondered what she looked like, wearing the same dress she had been wearing when they'd thrown her down here days ago, straw sticking out of her hair and vomit still on her lips, covered in her own filth, her hair a tangled mess of knots.

She must look a fearsome thing indeed, although Margaery had not seemed at all affected by it, when she came down here to see Sansa. Had not even seemed to even notice it.

Sansa swallowed, remembering why she had come to see her, and found that she could not even meet Prince Oberyn's eyes. She hadn't seen him since Tyrion had separated them the day he came to speak with her, but Sansa couldn't even bring herself to resent her husband for that, now.

Which was all very well, she thought, for Oberyn wasn't really looking at her, either. He was glaring at the guards, demanding that they tell him whether or not he had been granted a trial by combat and if Ellaria Sand was safe.

The guards pointedly ignored him, until the moment he asked where they were being taken.

Then they snorted, glancing at each other and then at Sansa, and that was all the confirmation she needed, that Margaery's visit to her cell hadn't been merely a dream, that it was real and she was really about to do this.

Oberyn looked annoyed at the lack of an answer, but surmised the answer from their looks all the same. "Our trial?" he asked.

One of the guards, a pock faced man holding Sansa too roughly by the arm, nodded. "Come along, my lord," he said mockingly.

"It's Ser, actually," Oberyn corrected mildly, a cold smile on his face, and Sansa turned away, blinking rapidly.

She couldn't do this. She couldn't, and her legs weren't moving in the moment, she was about to be dragged along by the guards if she didn't move, and Oberyn was going to die-

It had been different, with her father. She hadn't known that she was going to kill him with her words.

And then the guards were pushing them along, heedless of the panic bubbling up inside of Sansa, and Oberyn turned abruptly to Sansa, as if noticing her for the first time. She knew that he hadn't though, could see that in his eyes as clearly as she could see the shock in them at the sight of her.

A fearsome thing indeed. She had spent the night throwing up whatever of the food Margaery had sent her that she had managed to get down. Evidently, the color had not helped the oppressive feeling of guilt settling over her.

"Sansa," Oberyn said, softly, though he must have known that the guards could hear, "You must ask for a trial by combat. I will defend you, and-"

"Quiet, you!" one of the guards snapped, slamming his metal glove into the back of Oberyn's head, and Oberyn grunted, half-turning as if to attack the man.

Another of the guards pulled out his sword from its sheath, and Oberyn lifted his hands, glancing sideways at Sansa. She wondered if he would have done so at all, were she not here. If he would have fought valiantly and gotten himself half killed before his audience with the king.

She shivered. He shouldn't let that deter him, she thought. Not when she was about to do this horrible thing.

What did it matter, in the end? Either he could get himself killed by a bunch of guards now, or Sansa could kill him in a moment.

A selfish part of her wished that he would simply fight back now. He might even defeat the guards, and then-

And then what? Then he would be right where he had been when he kidnapped her from King's Landing, a fugitive whom Joffrey would be more than happy to kill, this time. Perhaps he would not even need Sansa's testimony against the man.

Despite its emptiness, Sansa's stomach churned at the thought. She couldn't do this. She had thought she would have the strength, with Margaery's revelation about her brother, but now that Sansa was here, standing in front of Oberyn...she couldn't do this. She couldn't lead him to his death like this.

She opened her mouth-

And closed it, when no sound came out. Tried to force something past her lips, some warning, and then the guards were pushing them forward again, and Sansa wondered if she truly was a coward.

It didn't matter, in the end. They made it to the throne room before Sansa could make up her mind about what, by the gods, she was going to do.

The great doors to the throne room swung open as they approached, and Sansa shivered, hated the sympathetic look that Prince Oberyn sent her at the motion, as if he sought to reassure her and didn't know how.

He was going to die by the words she was to utter now; he had no business trying still to be kind to her.

She swallowed, but there was no saliva in her throat, and Sansa nearly choked as the first set of ravenous, curious eyes turned upon her.

Gods, there were so many people in the throne room, waiting to watch this trial. Margaery had not warned her that there would be so many people here.

She took a step forward, and then another, dilligently not looking at any of them, staring only forward, at the accused's stand where she knew she would be sent in some moments. Or perhaps they would send her to witness stand, have her speak out against Oberyn immediately.

That seemed like the soft of swift action Joffrey preferred, if he was truly agreeing to the arrangement Margaery had made.

Sansa eyed that, ominous and looming in the throne room, and then her eyes flitted to Margaery, where she sat at Joffrey's right hand.

Margaery's face was carved in stone, this far away, but something in her expression seemed to gentle as she felt Sansa's eyes upon her.

Gods, Sansa needed that. Needed that as she felt the eyes of all of the lords of King's Landing upon her, as she saw Cersei's shrew-like glare turn towards her, the woman's eyes unforgiving as they glanced over Sansa's filthy form.

Did she know why they were really here? Sansa wondered, or had Margaery kept such cards close to her chest?

And then it didn't matter anymore, because she was standing before the King and his queen, Oberyn standing abreast with her, their guards behind them.

The King clapped his hands together, once, eyes never leaving Sansa's face. Margaery's weren't either, but it was an entirely different experience, Sansa couldn't help but think.

"We are here today to allow the King and the gods to decide the fates of two accused murderers," the Grandmaester puffed out, standing beside the thrones, and Sansa blinked at him, swallowed hard. And then he hesitated when Joffrey loudly cleared his throat, as Sansa's heart began to beat faster. "Ah, first, to hear words from Lady Stark which she believes will prove her innocence."

On his throne, Joffrey leaned forward, smirking but managing to look surprised at the same time, and she wondered at that, how he was able to convincingly portray emotions he shouldn't be able to feel.

The surprise on Lord Tyrion's face, however, was clearly genuine. Whatever the King and his wife had plotted together, clearly it had not included Lord Tyrion, and that had a spark of worry running through Sansa, because surely the Hand of the King would know about plans to legitimately pull out of Dorne.

Margaery hadn't managed to get Joffrey to agree to this arrangement, Sansa's fearful thoughts told her. She was about to condemn an innocent man to an almost certain death for nothing.

She wondered how long they had been down in the Black Cells together, and Oberyn injured before that, and he would be fighting _the Mountain_.

She wondered why Tyrion had thought they were gathered, then. Wondered if the man had thought this was to be her trial.

Sansa swallowed, remembering her husband's promise that he would get her out of here. Promise that if she was patient with him, he would find a way to save her.

He hadn't found a way. Today was the day of the trial, and he had to have known that, and yet he had said nothing at all to Sansa, and he had to know that she wouldn't _accept her death_ if that was what he demanded of her-

But no. Margaery had told her this was the only way, and like a fool, Sansa had listened. She had no other choice, now. Whatever it was Tyrion had been planning no longer mattered.

The guards led Sansa up to the accused's stand, and Sansa swallowed hard as they undid the chains around her hands only to wrap them around the metal ring in the box.

Her hands were shaking. The guards moved back, apparently no longer deeming her a threat, as if she had ever been one to anyone before this.

Well, she was about to be one to Oberyn. And she had been one to him before, when she accused him of kidnapping her so that Joffrey could have that damn war with Dorne that he had wanted so badly, and now wanted nothing more than to distance himself from.

Sansa swallowed hard, realized that the whole of the court was gathered, waiting for her to speak.

She suddenly couldn't remember her lines.

All she could do was stare up at Margaery, where she sat by Joffrey's side, eyes boring into Sansa, trying to warn her.

"Lady Sansa," the Grandmaester said, then, "Do you swear by the gods and the King that what you are about to say is the truth?"

Sansa swallowed again, cleared her throat. "I-Yes, my lord," she whispered, still looking at Margaery, now.

The Grandmaester heaved a great sigh. "Lady Sansa, I hope you did not ask for this audience in order to waste the King's time," he reprimanded her, and Sansa felt hot tears clogging at the back of her throat, the desperate need to apologize.

She bit her lip. "I..."

"Yes?" he asked, leaning forward impatiently where he sat now, just as Joffrey and half the court were.

Sansa glanced back at Oberyn, where he stood in his chains, eyes somber as he looked at Sansa. There was no surprise in those brown depths, as if he knew already what she was here to do from the start. As if he already suspected what she was about to say, unlike Tyrion.

And then Oberyn nodded to her, the movement gentle but certain enough and Sansa's eyes widened.

Sansa faced forward again, before closing her own.

"Lady Sansa, is what Lady Rosamund accused you of the truth?" Grandmaester Pycelle asked, staring down his nose at her.

Sansa fidgeted in the stand. "I..."

"Well?" the Grandmaester demanded, moving closer, and Sansa flinched back at his presence. "Speak up, girl."

"It is, to an extent. I..." She swallowed hard, glanced at Margaery, who gave her an encouraging, though tight, smile and a nod, and wondered if she truly would not be able to do this.

She had done it once before, and she had loved her father far more than she did Prince Oberyn, but she would know exactly what she was doing, now.

Sansa had not made the decision about what she would do until this moment, she realized abruptly. She had told Margaery she would speak these words, but she hadn't really meant it, at the time.

But the thought of her father clinched the decision for her, as it had the last time, she thought wryly. She had not so agonized over the daming words she had used against him, however unwitting, and she could not afford to care for another man in this world over her own life.

Margaery had taught her that, Margaery who had come down to her cells and kissed her after throwing Sansa out of her rooms, who had promised that whatever happened, she would be there to pick up the pieces.

Sansa swallowed hard. Because she knew Prince Oberyn had done it, and she didn't want to be dragged down with him, not after he had kidnapped her, knowing the danger it would put her in. Knowing that the trip might end with Ellaria's knife through her throat. She knew that he was guilty, because, unlike her father, he had confessed as much and meant it wholeheartedly, and Sansa...

Sansa had _never told Margaery that she loved her_.

"Lady Sansa, you have nothing to fear here, so long as you speak the truth," Joffrey told her, and Sansa bit back a hysterical laugh.

"Prince Oberyn...approached me," Sansa said carefully, not daring to look back again and meet the man's eyes. In the audience, she heard a strangled gasp, and wondered if it belonged to Ellaria, or someone else. Gods, she shouldn't have agreed to this. She was a terrible liar. "As the Lady Rosamund has said, after eating in my lord husband's chambers with us. He...several times, spoke to me in private and insulted Your Grace, as well as many of the Lannisters, including...Lord Tywin."

She could feel Tyrion's eyes burning into her, and she didn't dare look in his direction.

And, to her surprise, she didn't feel the burn of Prince Oberyn's eyes on her at all.

She was going to live, Sansa thought. She was paying for her life, just now, but at what price?

_I love you, Sansa Stark, and I would do anything for you._

Joffrey's eyes widened, though Sansa thought he looked more amused than horrified, as anyone else might rightly be, at such information. "Is that so?”

Sansa swallowed, glanced at Margaery, who gave her another nod. It seemed that she was confident enough in Joffrey's willingness to agree to her terms, today, and that was what Sansa needed, because even if Joffrey went back on his word, she was going to die either way.

"One of the...many things he intimated to me was to ask me to come away to Dorne with him, to leave my husband and disobey my king. He spoke often of his hatred for the Lannisters as well, for he blames them for the death of his sister, and especially Lord Tywin."

Joffrey nodded, stroking his wife's thigh. "Yes, his anger over his sister's death is legendary."

Out of the corner of her eye, because somewhere in Sansa's speech, Oberyn had moved forward, despite his guards, Sansa saw Prince Oberyn stiffen in a clear indiction of that anger.

"I told him..." Sansa licked her lips, felt her vision starting to blacken. "I told him that it was not appropriate for him, an unmarried man, to speak to me in such a way, that I wished for him to leave me alone, but he would not. He...kept approaching me, when I was alone and knew that I could not appeal to anyone for help, and..." The tears came naturally then, for she knew that hiding them would do her no favors, "He told me of his plans...to...kill Lord Tywin, made vague threats towards all of the rest of House Lannister, even..."

No, she couldn't finish that sentence. Couldn't paint Oberyn as the monster she needed to, in order to survive this.

There were gasps throughout the room, and Sansa, her voice wobbling, forced herself to continue in spite of them, Prince Oberyn's presence behind her burning through her accusingly.

Gods, they were believing this? She was a terrible liar, and everyone knew as much, and yet they were eating up her words. How? Had the war with Dorne really taken such a turn, in her absence?

"And yet," Joffrey said finally, "You did not come forward with these threats. Allowed my lord grandfather and Hand to be killed because of your silences. Were kidnapped because of them."

That was a lie Sansa could easily tell, she thought then, and she found herself absurdly grateful to Joffrey for giving her the chance.

"I was afraid," she blurted, "So afraid. I knew that I should confide in someone, but I was terrified that he would poison me as well, or worse, kidnap me and drag me away to Dorne as he intended, force me to...be with him, in that sense of the word." She shuddered. "I...I did not think that he would follow through on his threats to Lord Tywin, Your Grace. I swear, else I would have tried harder to speak of it."

The words were spilling out of her lips now, horrendous lies that had her shaking and unable at all to think about the fact that Oberyn Martell was standing just behind her. If she did, she knew she would break.

Sansa kept staring into Margaery's eyes as she continued her confession, as she had since the beginning of it, and she knew this was the only thing keeping her from cracking. Thinking of how Margaery would play this game. Of what Margaery had done, when she stood in this very spot and accused Ser Osmund of attempting to rape her.

But then, of course, she had been telling the truth, where Sansa was making this up as she went along, and so Margaery had a very distinct advantage. Sansa sighed.

"And he did kidnap you," Joffrey said, expression darkening. "He and his whore stole you away from my lord uncle."

Sansa nodded. "Yes," she whispered, and Joffrey nodded, the action almost sage for all that Sansa had never thought to attribute such a word to this particular boy. "Yes, to my terrible shame, they did." She swallowed.

Joffrey let out a theatrical sigh. "Is that all you have to confess to us, Lady Sansa?" he asked her, and Sansa remembered what Margaery had told her to say.

"I...No," she whispered, remembering the rest of what Margaery had told her to do. "I know the full extent of the conspiracy," she said, and that had several more gasps. She wondered if this was how Margaery felt, playing queen. "Prince Doran wrote once to Prince Oberyn, and when I..." she flushed, "When I was alone in his chambers one evening, I found a letter that the Prince had written, warning him not to do this thing and not to associate with me, a traitor's daughter, any longer. But the Prince-"

"Hold a moment," Joffrey interrupted, smirking now. "Are you saying that he fucked you? That he committed adultery with a married woman?"

Sansa swallowed hard, paling as she realized the implications of her words. _I was alone in his chambers one evening_. "I..."

"Lady Sansa," the Grandmaester admonished her again, "If we cannot believe that you are telling the truth, then I am afraid this testimony cannot go on."

Tyrion interrupted, then, getting to his feet and glaring first at Joffrey, and then at Sansa. Sansa wilted a little, under that gaze.

She had known her lies would not be believable. Had known that her husband would be able to see through them, and now here she was, and she was going to die anyway, dishonoring her family name with such lies.

"This is ridiculous," Tyrion snapped. "What in the seven hells did you do to her?"

Joffrey raised a brow. "What did I do to her? I believe the question was what Prince Oberyn may or may not have done to her, Uncle." His lips pulled into a smirk. "Aren't you paying attention?"

Sansa could almost see the steam coming off of her husband, at those words. Because he hadn't been, she realized. He hadn't known this was going to happen, and he was the Hand of the King.

Gods, she couldn’t do this. She couldn’t speak against Oberyn like this, couldn’t make an accusation like that against him. She should never have agreed to this in the first place, should have taken her chances with the trial by combat Oberyn so eagerly wanted, and now she was condemning the man to far more than she’d ever meant to. Gods, she couldn’t _breathe_ -

And then the blur at the corner of her eyes was stepping forward, and Sansa found her mind going back to Tyrion's trial, when he had done the very same, and a horrifying thought hit her only once Prince Oberyn had begun to speak.

"I never touched her," he gritted out, the words low and angry in the throne room, and yet everyone heard them, Sansa could see.

One of the guards moved forward to bring Oberyn in line, but Joffrey raised a hand, motioned for Oberyn to continue, and the guards stood down.

But Oberyn wasn’t looking at Joffrey, or the Grandmaester, or Tyrion. His eyes never left Sansa’s, sweeping over her with an expression she couldn’t place at all, meeting Sansa’s own when he spoke his next words.

And Sansa...didn’t know why, by the gods, he was doing it at all.

"I was saving her," Oberyn went on, "For when we returned to Dorne, and I would wed her lawfully. After all, everyone in King's Landing knows that her husband hasn't touched her, for all his protestations to having deflowered the Lady of Winterfell." Shocked gasps rang through the chamber, and if Sansa's feet were not frozen to the stand she was in, her eyes wide, she might have rolled them at the theatrics.

And then Oberyn widened his stance, narrowing his eyes, and his back was to Sansa now, but she could see the tension in his shoulders. "My brother sent me here to do our part, as one of the Seven Kingdoms. But I came to King's Landing to seek revenge. For my sister, her children, against those who killed her. Your grandfather gave the order. And I brought justice to my sister's death."

"Oberyn!" Ellaria's shrill voice called from the crowd, but Joffrey was sitting upright now, face white. He almost looked disappointed.

"Then you admit to the things the Lady Sansa has accused you of?" he asked, voice in that particular monotone which disguised his boredom with his kingly duties.

Sansa wondered why he was bored. Surely the prospect of taunting and humiliating Sansa over being fucked by a man who was not her husband was not as exciting as watching a man die.

She slumped against the witness stand as her knees went weak again.

Oberyn lifted his chin. "Lady Sansa is an innocent in this matter," he said calmly, which was not exactly an affirmation, Sansa thought nervously. "Whom I used for my own ends. She hardly knows the truth of what happened."

And then she wanted to berate herself, because this man was going to die, and she was thinking on him as coldly as she always imagined Cersei did. And while she was thinking such horrible things, Oberyn was _saving_ her still.

"Whatever information that little rose thought she had," Oberyn spat out, "she was wrong in it, as far as Lady Sansa was concerned. The girl was hardly useful in my plans to bring down that old man, and less so in my plans to take the North."

And Sansa knew those words were pretend, that Oberyn was talking himself - or Sansa, really - out of a hole, and yet.

She was being foolish, Sansa thought, reaching up to rub at her eyes with her chained hands.

Cersei leaned forward a little in her chair. Sansa hadn't realized until that moment how remarkably silent she was being.

"Do you have proof of this, Lady Sansa?" Joffrey asked coolly, bringing the trial back on track, back to where Margaery had said he wanted it, and perhaps he wasn’t useless after all. Sansa opened her eyes. "Something to attest to your innocence in the murder plot itself. The letter, perhaps?"

Sansa swallowed, glanced desperately at Margaery. Margaery dipped her head, once. Sansa would have thought that was too obvious a ploy, until she realized that no one was looking at Margaery, for once.

They were all looking at Sansa.

"I...I know where it is in the Prince's belongings, Your Grace," she whispered, ducking her head, and wondered how the Crown was going to manufacture that piece of evidence. Decided she didn't want to know, anyway. This was what they had wanted from her, this was what Margaery made her promise to give, what Margaery said was her only way of surviving, and she had given it to them. "The ones that were returned with him from the ship we took to Dorne."

She could wash her hands of this, now, Sansa Lannister. Sansa breathed out slowly through her nose.

Joffrey smirked.

Sansa closed her eyes, and waited. She had done what she needed to, said what she needed to, sold Prince Oberyn so that she could live; for all that she had barely managed the lie without his own help.

She could only hope it was enough. For all that Sansa loved the songs, she had never been very good at telling tales herself, and she worried that her lies would no longer be believable if Joffrey asked her to continue.

She wasn't even sure if they were believable now, for all that she had worked so diligently at them since Margaery had left her.

"Still, my grandfather is dead, anyway," Joffrey spat out, turning accusing eyes on Oberyn before his attention went back to Sansa. Margaery reached out, taking her husband's hand in her own. "I thank you, Lady Sansa. For your bravery, in admitting to these things. It takes a brave woman indeed to commit conspiracy and then ask for the King's mercy-"

"Your Grace," Cersei started, perhaps remembering how this had gone with Sansa's father after all, Sansa thought idly.

"-But I am a merciful king."

Sansa dipped her head, shaking. She wondered if this was a trick, if Joffrey had lied to Margaery after all and had only wanted her to confess, as he had done with her father. "Yes, Your Grace."

"And I am not going to see you dead for something you were beguiled and forced into by a roguish prince who threatened to have his way with you, after kidnapping you," Joffrey continued. "Because of that mercy."

Sansa wilted. "Thank you, Your Grace," she breathed out, and wondered how much of a coward she was.

Sansa Stark was dead. Sansa Lannister, whoever that was, had been born in those dark cells, and Sansa wished more than anything that she could kill that girl, as well.

She reached up; touching the line of lifted skin along her throat, and wondered when it had become so imperative to her, that she live.

Looked up and met Margaery's relieved gaze, and knew the answer to that question even as she forced the possibility of it from her mind.

"But," Joffrey continued, "In spite of that mercy, your cowardice and silence still allowed a good man to go to his death."

Beside her, Oberyn snorted, and that caught Joffrey's attention.

"Do you have something to say, you traitor?"

Sansa swallowed hard, half-turning, and looking at a spot away from Oberyn, less she be forced to meet his eyes.

"I do," Oberyn said, and Sansa closed hers. He was going to expose her for the liar she was, despite what he had just said, was going to-

"I confessed to Tywin's murder, and attested to Sansa's innocence, but this letter she speaks of, I deny it.”

Joffrey raised a brow. "Is your mind beginning to fail away from the hot desert sun?" he demanded. "You just said-"

"I just said," Oberyn interrupted calmly, "That Sansa was hardly as useful to me as I had thought she would be. And the Lady Rosamund was wrong in her accusations, stupid girl."

Joffrey stared dumbly at Oberyn. "Are you saying that Lady Sansa is a liar?" he asked, sounding far too gleeful for a man wishing to pull out of the war with Dorne and use this opportunity as a chance to do so.

Oberyn pursed his lips. "I am saying that she is a child," he said calmly, and Sansa couldn't deny that the words stung. Whether because they meant he thought she didn't know what she was doing, or she didn't want to die, she didn't know, but she heard them, nonetheless.

Joffrey waited, tapping his fingers impatiently against the arms of his throne. "And?"

"As is my right, I demand a trial by combat," Oberyn said, his voice almost light with amusement, and Sansa's eyes boggled as she was sure Joffrey's had, when she glanced at him.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat. Of course, every man could demand a trial by combat if he did not think he would receive a fair trial otherwise, and it was the law that he ought to have it.

But Oberyn was demanding that trial because he would not admit to the charges Sansa had brought against him; he had made that clear enough, just now. He was demanding a trial against her words, the words Margaery had given her.

She swallowed hard. Of course she would not be expected to fight him. She was a lady, and would choose a champion to defend her words - her _lies_ \- but surely, she swallowed, how had the Crown not thought of this outcome?

Joffrey looked furious for a moment, but then he glanced at his mother, at the smug expression on her face.

Perhaps they had. Of course they had. Cersei had not called Ser Gregor Clegane from Casterly Rock for nothing.

"Very well," Joffrey said, sneering, "After all, that is your right. As King, I dictate that trial will take place in three days, with a champion of Lady Sansa's choosing to fight your own," he said, and Sansa paled.

They weren't going to let her choose her champion at all. Ser Gregor was going to fight Prince Oberyn, and all of this was out of Sansa's hands, now that she had dutifully played her part.

She wasn't quite as certain that Dorne was going to take all of this without a fight as Margaery and Joffrey seemed to be, but it no longer mattered, because she no longer mattered, in this little drama.

Then, Joffrey turned to the guards. "Release Lady Sansa."

Sansa expected herself to wilt in relief. Her shoulders stayed stiff, though, and she found she couldn't look at Prince Oberyn at all.

If she had, looked at him, she might have seen the pity in his eyes where she thought there to be anger.

She did look up at Tyrion's, however, and saw the anger there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Closes eyes and waits for the rioting to start*


	218. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the angst continues to ramp up.

Sansa saw Margaery get up off her seat the moment the verdict was passed, and she fled, because she couldn't stand the thought of facing Margaery, just yet. Not when it had been Margaery who had convinced her that this was the only way she could save herself.

Instead, Sansa fled out the doors, and didn't think about the courtiers all trying to gather around her, scandalized by her confession. She didn't think about the guards at the entrance of every corridor, no doubt told to make sure she went straight to Joffrey to speak with him about said confession.

After all, if they were going to manufacture such evidence against Oberyn, they would need to make sure she knew what it looked like.

Sansa sighed, rubbing at her forehead. Some of her greasy hair fell down in front of her eyes, and she swallowed at the sight of it.

She would give anything, Sansa thought, for a nice, warm bath. She didn't know where Shae was, didn't even remember seeing her in the crowd, but Sansa managed to sneak past the guards and the courtiers and make it back to the chambers she shared with her husband, anyhow.

It took some time. She hadn't remembered how long it took to reach their chambers, and Sansa hadn't been walking in some time.

She was no longer wearing the chains the guards had put on her when they took her to make her confession, but still, Sansa felt the weight of her body far too often during the long trip to the chambers.

Her legs were shaking by the time she got to the door, and Sansa barely managed to push it open. Gods, she was weak. And hungry, but Sansa couldn't think about that, because she would only be sick again.

Sansa pushed open the door, and then stared.

She supposed she should have realized this. That her husband was wearing the chain he once wore as Hand of the King, and the Hand of the King did not sleep in chambers sectioned off just before the servants'.

Still, that had not occurred to Sansa at all, and as she stared at the empty room where she had spent all of her married life - ha! - Sansa felt like wilting all over again.

Lord Tywin was dead. Sansa was about to sleep in the chambers of a dead man. She shivered, and grasped the door handle, took a long, steadying breath.

Sansa stepped into the room, uncaring who it belonged to as she moved to the chamber pot in the back of it, where it always was.

It wasn't there anymore. As Sansa glanced around, she realized that the bed had been stripped of the Lannister colors that adorned it, the decor on the wall brought down. Even the chairs were gone.

Sansa stared, no longer feeling quite as queasy in her confusion.

And then Shae was standing at the door, frowning at her, and Sansa remembered it.

"I thought I would find you here," Shae said, voice soft, as if she were afraid that if she spoke any louder, Sansa would break into a thousand pieces. Perhaps she would. Shae held out a hand. "Come."

Sansa shook her head, took a hesitant step back. "I need," she huffed. "I think I am going to be sick."

Shae nodded. "This room is no longer used by anyone. Come, I can take you to my rooms in the servants' quarters before we go to your new chambers. Do you think you can last until then?"

Sansa blinked at the other woman. She knew that Shae knew about her issue, whatever it was, knew and didn't judge her for it, tried to help her with it. But clearly Shae did not know what was wrong with her, anymore than Margaery did, even if she knew more of it than Margaery.

She also had never thought about Shae's chambers. Of course, she knew that the servants had chambers within the Keep, some of them, the ones who were deemed important to their masters. The rest stayed in the city, but Sansa could not imagine Tyrion allowing Shae to remain in the city, when Cersei so clearly loathed her.

She supposed she had never thought about Shae's chambers because the other woman was a servant, and Sansa flushed, thinking about the chambers she had called her own for the past week.

She had been such an arrogant young girl, Sansa thought, and the sickness in her belly felt a little less terrible, at the thought.

"I can last," Sansa rasped out, because of course she could. And then a thought occurred to her. "Where is...Lord Tyrion staying instead?"

Her mind's eye conjured one of the Black Cells she had most recently been staying in, and she flinched a little.

She knew where her husband was staying, Sansa thought. She had known even before she came here. She shouldn't have come here.

"You'll see," Shae said enigmatically, and Sansa wondered if the other woman did not tell her because she wanted Sansa to keep her mind off of her illness and focus on that, instead. If so, Sansa was almost grateful to her. "Now, come."

Sansa followed her.

She followed Shae back down the hall, past the rooms kept for the courtiers remaining in King's Landing, all of the way to the other side of the Keep, where the Tower of the Hand loomed over them all.

Sansa squinted up at it, reached up to hug her elbows.

Shae eyed her knowingly, and then pulled her along, and Sansa tried not to think about the way Shae had been keeping her upright since they started this journey.

Shae didn't comment on it, either, and Sansa was grateful for at least one thing.

Her lord husband no longer lived in the small chambers allotted to the Master of Coin, Sansa realized, as they walked up the winding staircase to the chambers given to the Tower of the Hand.

And how had he scored that, Sansa wondered, when just some time ago he had been imprisoned for killing the previous one.

Then again, so had Sansa and she was about to sleep in a dead man's bed.

Sansa felt bile rising in her throat.

Shae led her instead to an opulent suite far closer to the King's own chambers than Sansa would have liked, but with a better latch upon the door.

Sansa was more grateful for that than words could express, and suddenly she didn't care if this was the chamber of a dead man.

"These were not Lord Tywin's chambers," Shae said, just outside the door, pausing to give Sansa a long look. She pointed up, to the floor above them. "That's where he stayed."

Sansa bit her lip, wondered if one of Shae's many...skills, was the ability to read what others were thinking. She wouldn't doubt it.

Sansa felt cold all over. She wondered if the day was colder, or if that was residue from the Black Cells. Her clothing itched. She never wanted to wear this gown again.

Shae squared her shoulders, steeling herself, perhaps for Sansa's reaction when she went into these rooms. Sansa didn't know why. She let Shae open the door for her, and stepped inside without another word.

Tyrion was waiting, inside these rooms, sitting at a large table that made him look like a child, and sipping wine straight out of the bottle. Sansa wondered if he was already drunk. The trial, if it could be called that, had only ended less than half an hour ago, she thought.

And yet, he looked very drunk, indeed.

"Sansa," he said, but his voice wasn't drunk at all. It was soft, gentle in the way it only ever seemed to be around her and Tommen and Sansa tried not to think too hard about that.

"My lord," she whispered, glancing down. She realized she was blushing, and realized a moment later why.

She wondered if he had grieved the loss of his father at all. If he had been angry that Sansa was using the whole thing for politics, as Margaery wanted her to.

She shivered.

Tyrion's eyes were softer when she glanced up, less inebriated. He got to his feet, and maybe she had been wrong about him being drunk, even though half the bottle was gone, because he didn't seem shaky at all. "Sansa..."

"These were not Lord Tywin's chambers," Sansa pointed out, then, for lack of anything else to say. Never mind that Shae had just told her as much. She felt the need to say it again. Because it mattered, a lot.

Shae shot her a concerned look. Perhaps Sansa was going mad.

Tyrion smiled at her, gently. He had taken a step forward, but stopped when she spoke. "No, they were not. I did not think either one of us would be comfortable, there."

Sansa blinked at her. These rooms were smaller than those allotted for the Hand of the King, she remembered, from the time her father had taken the position. "Why?"

Shae hesitated. "Cersei had them burned," she said. "She thought perhaps some disease had claimed Lord Tywin, or so she said, so the rooms above us were gutted, and these ones were the only ones to remain usable." She paused. "It happened before you were imprisoned, Sansa."

Sansa blinked, pushed the thought that she should have known that from her mind. "They are..." she spread her hands. "Quite nice."

Words, courtesies, seemed to have failed her today. They had been used too much, earlier, perhaps. She was all out.

Tyrion looked very sad, suddenly. "We will have our own chambers, now," he promised her. "Separate from one another. That is one of the perks of being a married Hand of the King."

Sansa nodded past the lump in her throat, glanced up at her lord husband and opened her mouth.

He raised a hand, expression somewhere between amused and sad. "You needn't insult either one of us by saying something mournful, my lady. I know when I will not be missed."

Sansa flushed. And then, before she could talk herself out of what she was about to do, she stepped forward, bending down a little to wrap her arms around her husband's shoulders in a loose embrace.

Her husband went stiff, and she wondered if it was from surprise or if he was truly as uncomfortable as she, before his hands reached up hesitantly to hold her back.

Sansa gave him a small kiss on the cheek, and her husband jerked a little at the contact, but did not try to push her away.

"Thank you," she said, and Tyrion blinked at her.

"For what?" he asked, voice hoarse, and Sansa swallowed.

"I...for everything you've done to help me, my lord. I...you have been a very good husband to me. I...I know that it wasn't only Margaery's influence that kept me from sharing Prince Oberyn's fate."

He blinked at her, and something closed behind his eyes. They weren't quite so kind, anymore. "Ah."

Sansa swallowed. "My lord?" she asked, hesitant.

"So it was her," he said. "I...wasn't certain," he continued. Then, "Sansa, did you...did Joffrey and the Queen convince you that you must say those things, about Prince Oberyn? Did she..."

Sansa recoiled. "No," she whispered. "I...She was trying to help me, my lord."

"I was trying to help you, Sansa. The Queen..." he shook his head, chuckled. "The Queen has been playing the long game here."

Sansa blinked at him, and suddenly very much didn't want to know what he was talking about. She was afraid that if she did, the feeling of Margaery's soft lips against her own, in the Black Cells wouldn't mean quite as much.

"I said those things about Prince Oberyn because they were the truth," Sansa said quietly, because it was the only thing she could think of to avoid that revelation.

There. She'd said it. She hated how her voice wavered as she said it, as well.

"I don't believe that," Tyrion said quietly. "Whatever Joffrey told you, he can't hurt you now, Sansa. I won't let him, now that I am the Hand. I can promise you that."

He looked like he was about to get down on one knee and promise her that, as well, and Sansa couldn't stand that thought.

"Can you really?" she asked, and hated how biting her tone was.

Tyrion stared at her for a moment, and she wondered if he recognized at all the woman standing in front of him. She licked her lips.

"Sansa, I am sorry that I could not get you out of the Black Cells," he said. "And I am sorry that I asked you to be patient when you were suffering down there. I know...I know it could not have been easy."

Sansa wanted to scoff, and had to remind herself that she had not been the only one locked away in the Black Cells recently.

It didn't much help.

"I don't think you know me at all, my lord," Sansa told him, tone cold, and she hugged herself again.

In the corner, Shae was eying them both, face pinched.

Tyrion's mouth opened, and then closed. "Do you know that Queen of yours?" he asked her, finally. "Do you really know her? Sansa, she is not as much a friend to you as you think she is. She manipulated you, if she is the one who convinced you to say these things, and now a man who may not even be guilty is going to die for it. Tell me what she has on you, and I can help you."

Gods, he sounded so eager, too. Like he really could help her, and Oberyn, who was going to die fighting the Mountain very soon. Like Margaery really was some evil shrew, forcing her to make choices that Sansa could not make for herself.

 _She is not as much a friend to you as you think she is,_ he said.

He didn't know her at all, Sansa thought. Didn't know that friendship and manipulation came hand in hand with Margaery Tyrell, or he would never have said those words.

After all, Margaery had gotten her out. He hadn't managed that, and here he was, threatening Margaery in order to let a man Sansa had condemned to die walk free. A man who had made his confession, to Sansa and the King.

This time, Sansa did scoff, though she didn't feel at all like doing so. She had spent so long in the Black Cells. Lying to the King was only going to get her thrown back down there, didn't he see that?

"Yes," she said. "I know what she is, and that is why I spoke as I did against Prince Oberyn. Because I know the Queen."

_And you don't._

Tyrion gave her a long look. His eyes were hooded now, and she could see how much he wanted to reach for his bottle of wine again. He didn't, merely stood there in the middle of the room, far too close to her, fist clenched.

"Sansa..." he cleared his throat. "I approached the Queen about an alliance that would free you from the Black Cells. Free you, and send you far away from here. And...she had no real interest in it. Instead, she convinced you that you needed to do this."

Sansa licked her lips.

_"This place is poison. I...I would never want you to stay here, if you could leave and it was in my power to help you go."_

She shook her head. "No," she whispered. "No, that's not..."

His eyes were soft. "She's been playing with you since the start, Sansa. The Tyrells hate the Martells, and now she has Oberyn Martell right where she wants him." He sounded angry then, but his eyes were still soft, as they looked at her.

She hated it.

Sansa lifted her chin. "You're right, my lord," she said, because the words were spilling out of her now, ugly truths that she couldn't hold back, not with that gaze on her, so sympathetic and annoyed at the same time.

Annoyed at Margaery, the one who had gotten Sansa out of those cells while Tyrion had only handed her empty promises.

"What I said about Prince Oberyn. You were right about it."

Tyrion's gaze flitted up to hers. "What did Joffrey threaten you with?" he demanded, ever the caring knight trying to help the damsel in distress.

Sansa felt a flare of hatred rise up inside her, and was surprised into nearly choking at the feeling.

"No, that is not what I meant," Sansa said, and shook her head. "I meant that you were right, that what I was saying wasn't the truth."

Tyrion sucked in a breath. "Sansa..."

Gods, why did he want to save Oberyn so badly? Why, when it was the one thing Sansa had ever done that had been playing the game, as he liked so much to call it?

The thought occurred to her that he wasn't doing this for Oberyn's gain at all. That some part of him genuinely thought he was doing this for her. Because he thought her a sweet, foolish little girl, easily manipulated by people who weren't really her friends.

He didn't know how it felt, to cling to Margaery in the darkness of the Black Cells, knowing that she was the only comfort Sansa might have before her death.

Margaery hadn't manipulated her. Sansa knew the difference between the Margaery who manipulated everyone around her for her family's sake, and the woman who had held Sansa in her arms and told her to _breathe_.

Margaery hadn't been manipulating her. She had suggested the last thing she thought might stand between Sansa and the scaffold, and it had worked. And it had been Sansa who had made the decision in the end.

"I said those things that I did about Prince Oberyn because I did not want to be dragged down for his mistakes."

Silence fell. Shae did not look surprised, though her jaw twitched.

Tyrion stared at her.

"Perhaps you don't know me as you think you do, my lord," Sansa said into the silence that followed, because he had left her down in the Black Cells with nothing but empty promises, and now he thought he knew everything about her. Knew that she was some poor damsel in need of rescue.

 _I can't do this for you_ , Margaery had told her. She needed to do it, to save herself, and she had.

And Margaery knew her, where her husband never would. She'd proven that easily enough, when she descended into the Black Cells and convinced Sansa to do something Sansa had never thought she would.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "You are my wife," he told her, voice cold, and Sansa stared at him. "I can help you, but I can't do that if you don't-"

"You don't know me at all," Sansa repeated, because it felt good to say those words. Righteous, and she wanted him to admit it, as well. Needed him to. "I wish you would realize it. I wanted it, my lord. Couldn't you see, from how well I acted, on the stage? I am sick of you, sick of this," she gestured between them, "happening over and over again. Getting promises from you that I know you cannot deliver to me."

She took a ragged breath, looking down at his shocked face. It was possible she had never said so much to him at one time. Or at least, so much to him that was absolutely true.

"I killed Prince Oberyn with that damning testimony, and you don't think it was me at all because I am your sweet, innocent wife, so in need of your protection."

She was breathing hard.

She felt like she was laughing, but she wasn't.

In the corner, Shae crossed her arms over her chest.

"I do know you," Tyrion repeated again, and Sansa turned away from him in disgust. "I may not know this Queen you profess to know so well, but I do know you."

Sansa blinked at him.

"Sansa, I don't want you speaking to her again," Tyrion told her, and his voice was cold and final in a way that he had never used with her before. "She's poison, and I know what it means to you, having a friend here, but that is just the problem, don't you see?"

No, no Sansa didn't see at all. She only saw Margaery, stepping into Sansa's cell like an angel, kissing her lips and whispering to her that she didn't know how to save her, but please, Sansa, don't leave me.

Sansa stared at him, unable to speak. As if her tongue had been cut out of her throat, Sansa thought.

Tyrion eyed her, looking a little worried now. "She's your friend because she wants to use you, because she knows how lonely you are here. That is all. And this...this would be for the best."

Sansa didn't speak. She thought she might start gagging, if she did.

She wanted to scoff at him, but Sansa couldn't breathe.

He seemed truly nervous now, that she wasn't responding. "Hate me if you like," he said softly, "but I know you, and I know what you did today was not of your own volition. And I _am_ still your husband, for all that means nothing otherwise."

There was some undercurrent of anger in his voice then, and Sansa straightened, hearing it.

She was glad he was angry. It gave her an excuse to be, as well.

"If you take my last friend in King's Landing from me like this, I shall go to the King," she said, and her voice didn't sound like hers at all.

Tyrion stared at her. "And tell him what?" he asked her, and _there_. She didn’t know exactly how she knew, from those words, from the cold stare Tyrion was sending her, from the way his hands were fisting and relaxing.

A cold shiver ran down her spine.

He _knew_.

The bottom dropped out of Sansa's stomach. She felt herself go pale.

"That you want him to give you the permission I will not to continue seeing his wife, the woman you are fucking?" he asked her, and the anger grew until there was a vein popping at his throat.

Joffrey had the very same vein pop on his neck, when he got angry.

Sansa sucked in a breath.

She had been such a foolish girl. She had known there was some possibility of Tyrion finding out. Shae knew, and her loyalty was to Tyrion above all, even if he didn't figure it out on his own.

But Sansa had never seriously thought about that day happening. All of her fears had been far too focused on whether Joffrey would find out.

This was not how she would have wanted her husband to find out the truth.

She swallowed. Shae's eyes narrowed, but her anger didn't seem to be directed at Sansa at all, and there was some relief, in knowing that.

"Tyrion," Shae hissed, but Sansa's husband ignored his whore.

"Sansa, I am trying to protect you," he repeated. "I know you may not understand that, but-"

And Sansa did laugh, then. She was tired of this condescension. Tired of it from Oberyn, who had used her to kill a man, tired of it from the Grandmaester, who had thought her incapable of lying. Tired of it from her husband, who thought her incapable of deciphering who meant to hurt her and who did not.

The imprint of Margaery's lips against her skin burned, now.

"Trying to protect me," she repeated. "No, that is not what I would say, were I to go to the King."

Tyrion's brow furrowed. "Sansa..."

"I would tell him, instead," Sansa said, cold now, and she didn't recognize the snow icing through her veins, "that my husband, before the trial, plotted to steal me away from King's Landing. To openly disregard the King's justice, and commit treason. I would wonder to him why that was. Why you were so willing to have me sent away before I could make my confession to the King, when I was willing to make it."

Tyrion took a step back. Shae's eyes were wide, but the rest of her face expressionless.

"And that is all I would have to say," Sansa continued, and her hands were shaking now, even if her voice was not. "He would do the rest."

She had learned too much from Margaery.

Tyrion stared at her. Sansa stared back. Inwardly, she was screaming.

"You think me some innocent child," Sansa told him. "I may have married a Lannister, who thinks himself my protector, but Northern blood still flows through my veins, and I killed a man today. And I didn't do it because the Queen told me to."

Tyrion raised his hand. His hand, still clenched in a fist. Sansa recoiled, the bravado of the moment before lost.

Joffrey had never struck her. He always left that to the Hound, or another of his Kingsguard.

In the corner, Shae took a step forward, eyes flashing.

Tyrion's eyes widened and he lowered his hand. "Sansa..." he sounded disgusted, and she couldn't tell whether it was at her or himself. He shook himself, stared down at his hand.

Then he turned, and marched out of the main room, into the doors which were clearly his chambers. The door slammed behind him, loudly.

Sansa flinched, at the sound. And then she did wilt, as she had been afraid she was going to from the moment she left the throne room.

Shae, however, was there before she could hit the floor, reaching out and wrapping an arm around Sansa's waist, pulling her in.

Sansa let out a shuddering breath.

"I didn't mean it," she whispered into Shae's gown, because she could feel the stiffness of Shae’s arms around her, even as she held Sansa. "I didn't...I wouldn't do that to him. I...I wouldn't. I just...I can't lose her, not now." She swallowed. "Not after...You have to believe me."

Shae didn't respond, merely ran her fingers gently through Sansa's hair, and said nothing.

Sansa took in another gasping breath, and shook her head.

She had thought she was Sansa Lannister, coming out of the Black Cells, and perhaps that was true. She didn’t feel like Sansa Stark at all anymore, because Sansa Stark would not have made threats like that, would not have been angry enough to do so.

Because it hadn’t all been desperation, just then, to see her lover uninhibited.


	219. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Margaery also burns a bridge...

Margaery wanted nothing more than to go to Sansa, the moment the trial was over.

But Sansa had disappeared, and Margaery didn't think it wise to go all of the way to the Tower of the Hand, after the drama of the day. She knew that the eyes of the court would be sharper than ever, especially upon Sansa, and it would not do for Margaery to follow her there.

Besides, she was still confused about where things stood between them. The Sansa she had encountered in the Black Cells had been a vastly different woman from the one who had stalked out of Margaery's chambers, insistent that Margaery was not enough for her, anymore, not with the promise of Dorne so quickly stolen from her.

But what she had witnessed in those cells, when she asked Sansa to speak against Oberyn, convinced Margaery that there was still something there. A spark, which, if Sansa was in fact willing this time, they could flame into something more.

No. It was foolish, cruel, even, to be thinking about such a thing after what Sansa had just been through. The girl would need her space, and understandably, Margaery couldn't help but think. She knew that she would, in Sansa's position.

Not that she had ever been in Sansa's position, and Margaery sighed a little, worried about the other girl. She had known the toll what had happened today might take on someone like Sansa, and she had meant that promise she'd given Sansa in the Black Cells, that they would pick up the pieces together.

But that did not exactly mean Margaery would know how to do that. She knew only that she was tired of doing this without Sansa still by her side, and if that meant they would no longer share a bed, Margaery thought she could manage that, so long as Sansa was all right.

She almost couldn't believe it had happened, this day. As if it were all some terrible, wonderful dream, and she was going to wake up and discover that Sansa was still down in the Black Cells, that her plan had failed from the beginning and she was soon to join the other woman.

She had told Sansa to lie, to say whatever she had to if it meant Oberyn would be the only one to die this day, and Sansa had done it.

She had really done it. And, more than that, she had been better at it than Margaery had expected.

Margaery shouldn't be so impressed, not with the sight of Sansa shaking as she stood on the accused's stand, body rail thin and pale as snow, but she was, and her hands were shaking again when she watched Sansa get released after Oberyn had to deign to help her with the lie, in the end. Margaery was surprised that Joffrey had let Sansa talk on for so long, for surely he had to know the terrible liar that she was, much as Margaery cared for the girl; that they only needed a few key sentences from her.

"I thought the little bitch was making up the whole thing, about that letter," Joffrey whispered to her, when the trial was over and Sansa freed from her chains. He seemed content to remain sitting in that ugly throne while the people milled about the throne room, gossiping to one another in shock over what had just happened. Margaery wondered how many of them were astute enough to realize the lie, or if they had all bought it with the same stupidity that Margaery expected of them in all other matters.

Margaery glanced sideways at her husband. "Why, my love," she said, forcing down any offense at the word he had used to describe Sansa, an impish smile on her face which she didn't feel at all, "Lady Sansa was only confessing the truth, after realizing what her foolish loyalty to Prince Oberyn was gaining her, in the Black Cells."

They had the letter, tucked away, with a false seal of the Prince of Dorne cooling upon it, just waiting to be brought forth by the guards who would find it while searching Prince Oberyn's chambers, later today.

Margaery supposed that Cersei would want to ensure that Sansa at least looked at it, before this trial by combat. That she could recognize it, lest anyone (Dorne) call her out on the lie.

Trial by combat.

Margaery had known that Oberyn would demand as much, because he was a stubborn man and when backed into a corner, he was going to get the one thing he wanted out of this whole affair. Still.

That didn't mean she had to like it, at all, and there was a part of Margaery that very much wanted to kill the man herself, innocent of the charges against him or not, for forcing Sansa into this situation. For forcing her into a situation where she would feel such guilt, when Margaery had been doing the one thing she could think to do, now, in order to spare Sansa.

Because she would blame herself, Margaery knew. No matter what the outcome, Sansa would blame herself for someone death, and it was Margaery who had forced her into that position.

Joffrey squinted at her, and then seemed to decide she wasn't making fun of him, for he smiled. "Yes," he said. "At least she knows her place, finally."

Margaery's smile dimmed, a little, when the Hand of the King turned to glare at them, and then marched his way out of the throne room.

"We're going to have to do something about him," Margaery said, nodding in Tyrion's direction, a frown pulling at her features at the reminder he posed, to what could have been if her foolish lady hadn't- "He doesn't believe it, I don't think."

That was an understatement, Margaery couldn't help but think. He'd looked livid, during Sansa's confession, and that anger had not been directed at her, Margaery thought, but rather at Margaery herself, or perhaps his sister. He had to know, then, where Sansa's words had come from.

Joffrey patted her hand. "You let me deal with that," he told her, and Margaery was reminded of how her ladies had overheard how happy Joffrey was, to name Tyrion Hand of the King, so long as it meant he might have a real excuse to kill him, without having to fabricate charges against him.

She hadn't meant that, Margaery thought, a little desperately. She had no intention of bringing Tyrion down, because she had no doubt that the unhappy little man was more than bitter enough to bring down the rest of King's Landing with him. It was a wonder he hadn't done so at his own trial, now that she thought of it, now that she knew him somewhat.

She forced herself not to shudder, wondered if Cersei had such plans about her, as well, if she were unable to give her husband children.

Cersei, whose help had been integral in planting that fucking letter, who had sent in a whore into Oberyn’s chambers to do so for them. It didn’t matter that he was no longer using them and that Ellaria Sand appeared to be once more, after her interrogation proved her innocence in any plot to kill Lord Tywin. No one in King’s Landing would question a whore going there.

Cersei, who had sat smug through the trial and Sansa’s confession, just as if she had come up with the idea herself. Margaery supposed the woman had to congratulate herself on having a son who appeared to have come up with one good idea on his own. Even if that idea had been fed to him through Margaery. Margaery had made sure that he presented it to his own mother as his idea, however. There was little reason for Margaery to be involved in such a plot unless she wished to bring Cersei's attention down on her relationship with Sansa, or onto the Martells.

Margaery had not trusted the boy, Littlefinger’s connoisseur, or whatever the one who fucked Loras so much was called, but Cersei had her own methods, for all that she detested her brother’s former habits, and she apparently had a pet good enough at forging seals as he was at whatever it was he did down in the tunnels below the Keep. Sometimes, Margaery hated the woman’s efficiency more than she did her incompetence.

There was one Margaery would much rather have gone to, but she had known that to do so would be foolhardy, just as it would clearly be foolhardy to go to him in the future.

"Of course, my love," she said, because nothing in Margaery relished the thought of dealing with Sansa's husband, when he was one of the only allies Sansa had left, even if Margaery had lost all chance of allying herself with him.

She shook her head. Best not to think of that.

"I should go," she said, giving her husband a butterfly smile as Cersei stood to approach them. "All of the ladies will want to be gossiping about this, and I wouldn't want Sansa Stark catching airs."

Joffrey laughed, gave her a playful little shove. She wondered if he realized that she was one of the only people he willing initiated touch with.

It wasn't as if she enjoyed the thought.

Margaery stood up, gave her husband a little curtsey, ignored Cersei's ever-suspicious gaze, and went on her way.

It did not take her long to reach her destination. She knew exactly where she was going, even if she had never been there before.

Still, Margaery paused outside the door, taking a deep, slow breath.

Her ladies were getting better at keeping their eyes on things going on within the Keep, Margaery knew. They'd had only a little bit of practice, in Renly's camp, and then before that, the ones who had lived at Highgarden.

But this was so much more dangerous, and Margaery did not want any of them risking their lives, the way Elinor had, on her orders.

Did not want any of them dying for her.

But then Megga had told her something Margaery knew none of them were supposed to know, and if she had found it out, surely he had found out that Margaery knew.

She was getting sick of their little talks anyway, mostly one sided. Sick of learning from him about the Sparrows and what he would tell her about the war effort, that she might keep herself informed, and not knowing what exactly it was he got out of it.

This was merely the straw that broke the camel's back, Margaery thought, as she knocked on the door.

He had been at the trial, but left before Oberyn had even been escorted back to the dungeons, grim and silent. Margaery had known that, and wondered if he would even be in his chambers when she arrived, but the small noise she had thought she heard moments before died abruptly at her knock, and Margaery had her answer.

She knocked again, and wondered what sort of man left a queen waiting. What it was he didn't want her to see.

Then she glanced around, and realized that Loras had been following her. Of course he had. Someone on the Kingsguard had to be with her at almost all times, and he must have recognized the look on her face to mean trouble.

It didn't mean she had to like it. Her brother had come to the understanding that his sister hadn't wanted him going to Dragonstone, playing into Cersei's hands, but he was still of the unfortunate belief that he was smarter than Cersei, that he could have outlasted her.

_"Do you all think me so weak that I would die on the first day of a siege?"_

Margaery shook her head. Her brother was a fool, no matter how much she loved him, as her grandmother had always said. Funny how Margaery had never realized it until now.

No, that was too harsh. What she had said to Tyrion was true; he wanted to take Dragonstone out of some misplaced loyalty to Renly, but he didn't understand. Margaery didn't think him weak at all. Just too honorable, the way Renly had been.

He wouldn't expect one of his own soldiers to stab him in the back at the moment he thought was his great victory.

Cersei would.

Of course, it didn't matter now. Jaime had been sent to Dragonstone in his stead, and both Cersei and Loras were furious about it.

"Come in, Your Grace," a soft voice said from within the room, and Margaery stiffened, wondered how the man within had known it was her.

Then again, he didn't get the title he has for nothing.

Margaery wasn't sure what she expected the Master of Whispers' rooms to look like. Dark and mysteriously empty, like him, or filled with the secrets of everyone he watches, there for him to look over when he wished.

She didn't know, knew only that there was something deeply disturbing about going into them alone, even as she waved for Loras to remain back.

Her brother looked less than pleased at the order. Margaery left the door open a crack.

Varys' chambers were not like that at all. They were plain; perhaps plainer than most noble lords', but there was nothing sinister or otherworldly about them, and Margaery was almost disappointed.

Varys himself was standing with his back to her, looking at a scroll, and his head lifted when she entered, but he did not turn around.

"You left the trial rather quickly today," Margaery said, feeling the need to speak first. She swallowed, and pointedly did not look at anything else in the room, keeping her eyes on Varys, her tone perhaps foolishly mocking as she asked, "Are you well?"

Lord Varys' back stiffened, even as he faced away from her, and Margaery bit back a sigh. "Your Grace." He half-turned. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Lord Varys," Margaery murmured, closing the door behind her. There was no use of pretense, now. The pageantry had ended for the day, and Margaery had things she wished to say. "I wanted to speak with you."

Lord Varys raised an almost gone brow. Of course she had, Margaery thought, if she had come to his chambers after the very quiet evening meal she had shared with her husband, clearly seeking him out. Gods, she didn't know what this man wanted from her.

"Oh?" he asked, and she wondered how he managed to seem so amused and expressionless at the same time.

Margaery smiled thinly. "In all of the excitement of today, I wasn't able to seek you out before now," she said, and Varys blinked at her, his eyes narrowing in that way that always unsettled her, as if he could read more about her posture of her mind than he could her words.

"Yes, it was a rather...exciting day, was it not?" he asked her, and damn him, he looked almost amused. Damn him to the Stranger, Margaery thought, for throwing her into this position in the first place.

Margaery squinted at him. "I cannot say I am not glad of the way it turned out," she said finally. "Things could so easily have gone differently, and the better for it."

Varys raised that brow again. "Could they have?"

Margaery shook herself, annoyance flashing pointedly over her features before she made a show of burying it, and she hoped she was a good enough actress to fool this man into believing her sincere. Someone else, perhaps, but she had never gotten a handle on Lord Varys, the way she did most in King's Landing, these days. Still, though. Let him know that she knew of his involvement in Sansa's predicament, knew that he had been the one to send Lord Tyrion to her in the first place, as a potential ally, weaving his little web around them the way he did in all things. She had very little to hide, just now. From him, anyway, who knew all. "Actually, that wasn't at all what I came here to speak with you about, my lord."

He did glance up, then, his expression going flat once more. "I am not a lord," he told her. "You and others in King's Landing insist on calling me that, when it is not the case. I think if we are to be quite candid with one another, we should skip the titles, should we not?"

Margaery's lips quirked into a small smile. "I think if we were to manage that, someone might believe our meetings to be of a more...clandestine reason."

Varys eyed her, reaching for his quill. He rolled it between his fingers, looked over it at her again. He didn't have nervous gestures, Margaery thought. That was for her benefit, not his own. "I don't think anyone would suspect us of that particular treason, Your Grace," he told her.

Margaery smiled. "Perhaps not." She cleared her throat.

"What was it you wanted to ask of me?" he asked her, and Margaery hated this. First with Tyrion, and now with Varys, feeling as if she was way over her head in a game she was winning.

She folded her hands in front of her. "Lady Sansa told me something I found of rather great importance, recently. That you were the one who snuck her to the Martells, the moment Tywin Lannister was dead."

She hadn't, of course. Sansa had hardly spoken of her escape, and Margaery had taken one look at the scar on her neck and resolved not to ask anything of her she did not volunteer freely, of that time.

Perhaps that had been part of the problem.

Margaery's ladies had been the ones to figure that out, because Lord Varys was not the only one with his little birds.

Lord Varys glanced toward the window. He set the quill back down on the table, and clasped his hands behind his back. He almost looked nervous then, but not quite. Because he had wanted her to find this out, Margaery realized, and straightened a little.

Her ladies were good at playing spies, but he had been the Master of Whispers for much longer than Margaery had been a queen. The question now was merely why, by the Seven, he would have wanted Margaery to find out such a thing. Whether it had to do with her willingness to force Sansa into the position she had today, or something else entirely.

Gods, there were days Margaery hated politics. She wanted nothing more, in this moment, to find Sansa, to curl up with the other girl and reassure her, and here she was, playing politics with the best of players in King's Landing, and Margaery felt horribly out of her depth, here.

But, "I see," was all he said.

She shook her head. "But I don't."

Varys glanced back at her. "I'm afraid I don't understand the confusion, Your Grace. I would think the Kingsguard hovering outside the door would be here to arrest me, more than protect you, if you thought I had committed such treason."

But they both knew that wasn't why Loras was standing outside the door at all.

Margaery licked her lips. Loras had insisted on accompanying her here, but she hardly ever thought of him as a member of the Kingsguard, when she surely should have.

"Who are you, Lord Varys?" she asked.

There was a stillness that entered the air of the room after Margaery's question, and she thought it boded ill. She almost desperately wished to take the question back entirely.

But Varys didn't seem annoyed, by the question, nor did he seem angry. Instead, he was amused, as he gave her his full attention. And then that amusement turned to something else, something she couldn't identify, as Lord Varys' eyes roved over her form, almost speculatively. Margaery was struck the absurd urge to cross her arms over her chest, even as she knew it a silly notion.

It wasn't as if someone like Varys could find her form pleasing, anymore.

She felt like she was being measured up for something, and Margaery hated that she did not know what that something was.

Finally, Varys sighed, his eyes downcast once more. "Merely one who wishes to help the realm, You-"

"No," Margaery interrupted, and Lord Varys blinked at her.

"No?" Now he was amused again, damn him. She wondered if he had been amused when he agreed to the Martell's plan to sneak Sansa out of the city. Wondered if he had known how spectacularly that plan would go awry, but done it anyway, merely to see if that might benefit the realm.

She shook her head, because she was done with the shit answers just now, thank you very much. Sansa had lied to an entire courtroom full of people, had lied to the King, no matter that he had asked for it, and Margaery, who had told her to say those lies, had not been able to tell that she was lying at all.

Margaery was always able to tell when Sansa was lying. It was one of the things she so adored about the other girl and Margaery had looked into Sansa's eyes and believed every word of her accusations against Prince Oberyn, as if she had not told Sansa herself to say them.

She was getting very tired of lies just now, and she didn't like the thought of this sneaky little man, at her shoulder, lying to her for some unknown purpose, allying with the Martells when Margaery had thought she understood the way his allegiance worked.

Sansa had lied, and Margaery would have lost her today if her lies were any less believable than they were.

Sansa had lied, and Margaery had almost lost her far earlier than this, far earlier when she might never have learned that Sansa really could lie when her life depended on it, and she had learned that it was partially because of this man.

"Since the moment I arrived in King's Landing," Margaery said, "I've felt your unpleasant eyes on my back, your gaze following my every move, calculating, watching to see what I would do. I don't know what it is you want from me, but know that I no more like being a tool of yours than I do a tool of my lord father's."

And she had risen above being more than just a tool for her father. She would not do that only to become a tool of a man whom she didn't even know, especially one whose game she could not determine.

Lord Varys smiled at her rather thinly. "I told you, Your Grace, I merely wish to serve the realm."

Margaery sighed. "I could have the King arrest you for aiding Sansa Stark and the Martells in her escape from the city," she threatened, but Varys merely smirked.

"Could you, Your Grace?" Margaery felt suddenly cold. She repressed a shiver, knowing that, even though Lord Varys was staring out the window once more, he was watching her.

That was what the Master of Whispers did, after all.

Margaery had never felt less powerful, since marrying Joffrey. Less like she was completely out of her depth, and the thought had her breathing a little more quickly.

She thought the Master of Whispers probably noticed that moment of weakness, as well.

Because she remembered, just then, where Sansa had been in the moments before Varys had likely spirited her away. And Lord Varys would no doubt have known that, if he was waiting for her to...what, say her goodbyes?

Margaery raised a brow at him, leaned forward, opened her mouth, and then shut it. She ground her teeth together.

"I have, sometimes, enjoyed our...exchanges," she told him. "Of information. You have been one of the few people within King's Landing whom I feel truly does care about it, for all that you are willing enough to aid traitors in kidnapping an innocent girl, and you have provided me with much information about the smallfolk which has helped House Tyrell to keep them from starving. But I will not sacrifice more for them."

Lord Varys eyed her for a long moment. "A pity," he murmured. He looked her over again, and Margaery had the distinct impression that his gaze was not quite so speculative, this time. "Perhaps you are not who I thought you were, Queen Margaery. I hope you do not regret such a decision."

Margaery stared at him, a question on the tip of her tongue that she did not dare to voice aloud without losing more than she already had, by this exchange.

She had more questions than answers now, and she hated that.

And then she shook her head. "Perhaps I won't, Lord Varys," she told him, and then turned and strode from the room.

She did not start shaking until she was certain the door was shut behind her, and Margaery wondered if she was determined to burn every bridge which might find its way to an ally, these days. Or if everyone around her was willing to do so for her, if she did not.


	220. TYRION

"Casterly Rock remains ours," Joffrey announced to the room, grinning, just as if the whole plan to keep out Stannis Baratheon's had been his from the start. "Our plan to flood them out worked, and Stannis and his hordes have continued North in shame."

Tyrion supposed he ought to expect that, by now, for Joffrey to claim credit for anything his rule did well, whether it was his idea or not. Still, it rankled. Rankled in a way that  Tyrion suspected it would not have, a week ago, and he wondered whose fault that was.

He shouldn't be so bothered by it, he couldn't help but think. It was not as if Sansa was his, in any way that truly mattered, whether she was his wife or not. And yet. Here he was, a man out of time with the rest of the plotters in King's Landing, knowing that his own ideas were given to someone else, just the same as his godsbedamned wife.

"North?" Mace Tyrell questioned, and Tyrion frowned, at the reminder of the control the Flowers had over the court, that so many of them sat on the Small Council, and one of them had nearly taken the position Tyrion was now holding. Mace looked perplexed, which was not an unusual look on the other man, and Tyrion found himself wondering for the first time whether the Fat Flower had any control over the machinations of his House, or if he merely did as he was told by his mother, and the rest of the ladies of House Tyrell. "Without returning to Winterfell?"

Still, Tyrion had to agree with Mace; that was the direction he had expected Stannis to take as well, which was why, glad as he was that his plan to keep Casterly Rock had worked, he had been leery of leaving Winterfell in only the hands of the Boltons for that time, if Stannis was attempting to trick them into leaving it undefended.

And now, it seemed, Stannis was no longer even interested in the place.

Joffrey grinned, leaning forward a little, hands pressing down flat onto the table. "Apparently they don't think their army capable of taking it now, and now they're wandering aimlessly about in the snow, losing rations and men by the day." He sounded downright pleased. "Soon enough the snow will be done with the traitor, and we won't even have to bother with him."

Tyrion bit down on a smirk; he knew that, for all that Joffrey professed to love war, the little coward would be glad if that did occur.

Mace looked nearly as pleased at Joffrey's words, and Tyrion wondered if it was because he was merely the sycophant Tyrion was beginning to take him for or because he was glad to see the enemy of his former king brought so low. Everyone knew the...closeness with which House Tyrell had viewed Renly Baratheon, despite their ability to turn towards his enemies' side the moment he was cold in the grave.

Tyrion wondered if it were not perhaps a little of both, and the thought brought him up short. These damn Tyrells had plots within plots, and where a week ago he had thought that a happy challenge, now it was nothing more than a nuisance, highlighted by his wife's recent behavior. A reminder of how badly he was failing at the game, of late.

He and his wife were not speaking. He didn't know if it was by her design, or his own, or some mutual, silent agreement between the both of them, but he wondered if Margaery Tyrell was pleased by the outcome, either way. Pleased to know that her little plots had worked out just as she intended them to, with Sansa further attached to her side and Tyrion unable to touch her, what with her supposed treason being only what the King had asked her to do, while she'd had Tyrion about ready to commit treason on his own.

She could hold that over his head as well as Sansa could, and he had no doubt that, unlike Sansa, Margaery Tyrell would be willing enough to use that blackmail to his detriment, if he moved against her.

He'd underestimated her from the beginning, should never have approached her, and that thought had Tyrion staring suspiciously at Varys, as well, though the other man seemed not to notice. Varys, who had told Tyrion to go to Margaery in the first place, and the man was always five steps ahead of everyone else. Tyrion would not put it past him to have known what Margaery would do with such an alliance.

His wife glared at him, now, every time he insisted on sharing the evening meal with her, even if his mostly consisted of alcohol and hers was barely touched. They didn't speak, just ate (or didn't, as the case may be), in relative silence, unless Shae interjected something, staring at them both in exasperation.

He couldn't figure out if Sansa was angry because he had tried to (ha!) forbid her from seeing the woman she cared for far more than she ever would her own husband, or if it was because of the way he had lifted his hand at her, but either way, Tyrion wasn't going to ask.

She must have known he would never be able to follow through on that threat, Tyrion thought tiredly. For gods' sake, he hadn't even been able to do his husbandly duty by her on their wedding night, nor any night since, and now she thought him capable of hurting her?

But Shae wasn't speaking with him, either. Oh, she was still sharing his bed, but the things they did in that bed now were passionate in an angry sort of way, rather than gentle and excited, as they had always been before. When they did speak, it usually ended in an argument of which neither of them could convince the other to change their stance on.

Who knew that his making Shae Sansa's lady would have had such an impact on the woman? he thought, in annoyance. She'd been annoyed enough with the prospect in the beginning, and now she was attached to Sansa in a way that not even Tyrion could say he was.

And now here was his king, treating him with the same silently acknowledged disdain that his own wife was.

He didn't understand Sansa's anger, truly, and Tyrion had been thinking diligently about it for some time. He knew she was friends with the Queen, but surely she had some modicum of sense within her, to understand how the Queen had used her to get exactly what she wanted, as she had used Tyrion-

"Congratulations, Lord Tyrion," Varys said then, folding his hands together on the top of the table, and Tyrion half turned in his seat to stare at the other man.

"Pardon?" he asked, and Cersei, where she sat in Margaery's usual place today, glared at her brother. And Tyrion wondered at that. He knew that, could she help it, Margaery did not miss her chances to observe what was being decided by the Small Council, sitting at her husband's eyes and distracting him with lurid activities under the table when something of particular importance was being decided upon. Wondered where the little queen was, when she so liked to keep her hands in a little of everything, these days.

Including his wife.

Wondered if that was indeed where she was, now.

Varys gave him an odd look. "I said congratulations," he repeated. "As I understand, this was your idea."

Tyrion waved a hand dismissively; cognizant of Joffrey's annoyed look. "I was only serving the realm," he parroted Varys' favorite phrase, and the man eyed him, something shifting in that gaze that Tyrion truly did not want to think about, just now. It was giving him a bit of a headache, if he were being honest.

"Indeed," Cersei said coldly, clearly not wanting to linger on any triumph of her imp brother's, and then cleared her throat. "Now, on to other matters-"

"I have a matter to bring before the King," Tyrion interrupted her, because he enjoyed the red spots that appeared on her cheeks when he did so, and he was still very much aware of the fact that she was sitting in Margaery's seat, so very close to her son. He wondered if she thought no one would notice.

"Do you?" Joffrey drawled, but he leaned forward then, looking interested. Tyrion was reminded of the warning Margaery had given him, about his sister and her son plotting his demise, and wondered if it had been the truth, or another piece in her game of manipulation, to hurry along his willingness to share information with her.

"Yes," Tyrion said, and bit the inside of his cheek. "Given the nature of Prince Oberyn's trial by combat," he said coldly, "the smallfolk and the people at large are going to need some sign of the King's...benevolence. To allow them the peace of mind that the Prince of Dorne is so in the wrong, and their King acts only out of their interest."

Joffrey narrowed his eyes. Beside him, Cersei mirrored the expression.

"And why should I provide further proof of my benevolence?" Joffrey asked, disdain dripping from his tongue. "I am the King, and if they have any sense, they will be glad that Stannis Baratheon is not. I've allowed Lady Sansa her freedom, have I not?"

Tyrion swallowed, allowed himself to wonder, for a brief moment, what sort of King Stannis Baratheon might have made. A piss poor one, no doubt, but perhaps not as terrible as Joffrey. "You have indeed, Your Grace," he said coolly, "but that hardly affects the smallfolk, I'm afraid. They know little of the Lady."

Joffrey tapped his fingers impatiently on the table.

"What did you have in mind, then?" Cersei asked, annoyance clear in her voice and on her face.

Tyrion smiled. "Repealing the laws you recently enacted about those...interested perversely in members of their own sex," he said.

Joffrey blinked at him. "What," he said, and it was hardly a question, he seemed so blindsided by it.

"The Black Cells and those within the Sept are filling up with those seen to be guilty of such laws," Tyrion told him, gaining strength as he continued, a small part of him enjoying the sight of Cersei's raised eyebrows. "Frankly, there isn't enough space for all of them, and if we're to keep killing those who don't fit, soon enough King's Landing will be empty. If Your Grace were to instead show mercy, and to repeal those laws-"

"No," Joffrey interrupted, looking disgusted, now. "I am the King, and I will not repeal some law just because my people do not like the punishment for it." He was turning purple, now.

Ah, he didn't want to be embarrassed by repealing one of his own laws. Tyrion supposed he ought to have thought of that, because of course that was the reason Margaery Tyrell had not brought up the subject. After all, to repeal one of his own laws wouldn't be merely a matter of pride, but an indication that their benevolent king had no idea what the fuck he was doing. That he was weak.

Still, Tyrion may have been the first to suggest repealing it, but Margaery was not alone in her concerns, and the cells really were filling up. The people thought of the new laws as a witch hunt. Joffrey had to know that, at this point.

"Oh? Do you have some...interest in being rid of such a law, Lord Tyrion?" the Grandmaester asked, looking wickedly amused.

Tyrion snorted, despite himself. "I should think your reputation would be called into question before mine, Grandmaester. But I understand you don't need to head down to the brothels to find your entertainment."

The old man guffawed in imagined slight, but didn't deny the charge, and Mace and Varys exchanged glances that were almost amused.

Well, if they wanted entertainment, Tyrion supposed he could put on a show.

"The Seven Pointed Star is a book widely left up to interpretation," Tyrion said calmly. "And right now, the interpretation that those more interested in their own sex are perverts worthy of death is far more in line with what the High Sparrow believes than what the High Septon practices. Just ask Lord Baelish some time."

Cersei scoffed, looking utterly disgusted. "I suppose we could trust you to know that," she muttered, and Tyrion stiffened at the threat, but forced himself to relax in the next moment.

Joffrey eyed him. "The people like the old hermit," Joffrey told him.

"Indeed, they do," Tyrion responded, because he was paying attention to that now, and there were far too many of those people for his liking. "Some might say they like him even more than they do the King, and that would be a dangerous thought, indeed."

Joffrey's eyes flashed. "I am their king," he snapped, and Tyrion rolled his eyes.

"Of course you are," he said, the words hardly soothing. "But you should also remember that there are far more smallfolk in this city than there are gold cloaks. And if they are merely going to keep filling up the prisons rather than obeying your laws, well, they're hardly respecting you, are they? You've tried this, and you fucked it up. You might as well clean up your mess now and be made to look better than fanatics."

Joffrey glared at him. Cersei reached out and put a hand over Joffrey's. "And you think that repealing that law at the trial will appease them?" she asked, something hard and serious in her gaze.

Tyrion nodded, because why the fuck not. Let her be suspicious. Let her wonder just what the fuck this was accomplishing. "Yes. The people want it, and it will remind them of their hatred toward the King's enemies. And the King need not look like a fool; after all, he was only acting on the advice of his councilors, and a crazed, barefoot old man."

Joffrey ground his teeth. "Fine," he said. "They can have that, if you think it will help so much. For now. But the Mountain had better fucking win," he said, with another glare towards his mother.

Cersei smiled at her son. "The Mountain has just returned to King's Landing, soaked in the blood of our enemies, my love," she said. "And he is more than up to the challenge of a Dornish snake."

Tyrion straightened. Joffrey grunted.

"He'd better be," he said, and stood to his feet, the meeting apparently adjourned, for him.

Tyrion glanced at the others and shrugged when they turned to him for direction. He wondered if they reveled in how much of a joke they all were, these days. The Small Council fought over by Lannisters who had no fucking clue what they were doing, and Tyrells who wanted very much to be rid of the Lannisters for good, along the same lines of Stannis Baratheon's wishes.

Cersei eyed him, and then followed after her son, the deed done.

Tyrion would have what he wanted today, it seemed.

There, Tyrion thought, standing to his feet and making his excuses to the Grandmaester when the man approached him for his attention. Tyrion had no patience for him, not anymore. There. Let Margaery's spies get back to her on that, that she might deliberate on why Tyrion was still helping her, after her betrayal. On whether he was helping her at all, or sending her some sort of message about her and the Lady Sansa, about her brother.

He would like to see this Tyrell Queen squirm, for once.


	221. MARGAERY

"Margaery, dearest," Olenna said, as Margaery entered her chambers at the woman’s summons. She was sitting on the divan in the middle of them, slippers on her feet and wearing head to toe black. They weren't going out to the gardens today, it seemed. "Do sit down."

Her tone didn't allow for any questioning. Margaery sat down, feeling all of thirteen years old again.

Olenna eyed her for a long moment, and Margaery told herself not to squirm. There were times when squirming in front of Joffrey could get her killed.

Margaery was more concerned with letting down her guard in front of the woman who had taught her how to keep it up.

Then Olenna clapped her hands, and two ladies walked into the room, serving them tea.

Olenna didn't speak during the time that tea was poured and cheese laid out for them, and Margaery took her cue from her grandmother, staying silent as well.

Her grandmother had called her here the moment Margaery was done eating the noon meal with Joffrey, so she wasn't especially hungry for tea, but then, Margaery supposed that the hour was rather late.

Joffrey's appetites had run in a different direction, before they finally got down to eating.

She had a feeling she knew why her grandmother had called her here. They'd talked before about Margaery's plans to free Sansa, and about why those plans had nothing to do with furthering the Tyrell name, after Loras pretty much told her it was a condition of his agreement to help free Sansa, and Olenna had made no secret of her feelings about the whole thing then.

Help free Sansa. Margaery almost wanted to laugh, now. No matter how carefully laid her plans were, they'd meant nothing, in the end.

Olenna pursed her lips as she took a drink of her tea, and then grimaced, reaching for the sugar. Rather than picking up her usual pinch, she ignored the spoon altogether to dump some of the white powder into her cup. One of the ladies moved forward to help, and Olenna shot her a scathing glare.

Margaery stared at the abomination that had become her grandmother's tea.

"You can go," Olenna told the ladies, as she brought her tea cup to her lips. They scattered gladly enough, shutting the door behind them.

Margaery knew that they were not brave enough to attempt to listen on the other side, and she turned back to her grandmother expectantly. Sometimes, she rather pitied her grandmother's servants.

Olenna took another sip, and then nodded. "There we go," she muttered, and Margaery made a mental note not to touch any of the cheese. "Now, then."

And now her eyes were on Margaery once more, and Margaery tried not to squirm as she took a drink of tea.

And then Margaery couldn't take it any longer, because she had learned patience from her grandmother, but she was still her father's daughter in other ways.

"When I was younger," she said, attempting to keep her voice mild but even she could hear the angry trembling of it, "I wanted just to be exactly like you."

Olenna raised a brow, sipping at her tea. "Oh?" she asked, and Margaery hated the condescending tone.

She let out a dry laugh. "And now, I wonder if that was because I so admired you, or because that was what you wanted me to want." She shook her head, because the thought had never occurred to her before when it should have, and she couldn’t say the answer, even now.

She had been thinking it through, and no other explanation would come to Margaery. She did not understand why her grandmother would agree to Margaery's plan of sneaking Sansa out of the city unless she had somehow known about the accusations Cersei planned to level against Margaery. Known that Tyrion Lannister would be Margaery's only hope of doing away with them quietly.

And that...caused the anger to bubble up in Margaery once more, because she had been naive, once upon a time, thinking that her grandmother shared the important things with her. As it turned out, she was as much a pawn as her brother and father had even been, and the thought sickened her, that she had been so arrogant, then.

Olenna stared at her. "I don't understand what I am being accused of," she said, after several long moments. "Do you think me able to peer inside your mind and change its contents now, dear? I know the vast majority of Westeros thinks me some sort of witch, but I thought you had more sense than that."

Margaery gritted her teeth. "Yes," she said bluntly. "I think you can do just that, when it suits you to."

It was what Olenna had taught Margaery to do, after all.

Now Olenna looked terribly unimpressed. "And I suppose that is not the only accusation you are going to hurl at me today. Well? Let's hear the rest of it."

But Margaery couldn't speak, for several long moments. "I know that I was reckless, with the...situation we discussed," she said softly, not meeting Olenna's eyes. "But I would have thought that you would keep your promise not to lie to me outright, at least. I'm not my father."

Olenna eyed her, tea cup clattering loudly as she set it on the table. "I never said you were," she said finally, shrewd eyes, Margaery had no doubt, taking in her every emotion, just now.

Margaery squinted at her. "I don't..." she shook her head, the hair she had not tied up today tumbling a little in front of her face. "Grandmother, I care very much about her."

She didn't know how to articulate what she wanted to say, didn't know how to let her grandmother know how frightened she was, that if the situation repeated itself, Margaery wouldn't try to do the exact same thing that she had done.

Olenna reached out, placing a hand over Margaery's. Margaery stared down at them.

"I would not have agreed to allow you your plan if I did not think it had merit," Olenna said calmly. "Because, regardless of your reasons, bringing the North under our control, rather than the Lannisters', would have been a sound move."

"It would have led to a war," Margaery said, snatching her hand away. "And besides, you didn't allow me my plan at all."

Olenna gave her a long look. "Do you know that Robert's Rebellion is not the first war I have lived through, my dear? Merely the largest. The Lannisters are not so indispensible to the realm that losing their alliance would have destroyed us. Merely your father's ego."

Margaery bit her lip. "Grandmother, please." Say what you brought me here to say, Margaery said with her glittering eyes. She was tired of this dance, just now.

Olenna harrumphed, leaning back. "Very well." She gave Margaery a hard look. "What you tried to do was foolish and reckless, and could have gotten your brother, whom you dragged into your scheme, not to mention your entire family, killed. All for the sake of a traitor's daughter and the wife of a Lannister, whom I understand you have taken into your bed, despite all indications that that might be the stupidest thing anyone in your family has ever done. Have I missed anything?"

Margaery flinched as though she had been slapped. She was a fool to think her grandmother didn't know about the extent of her relationship with Sansa. "I...had to try something," she said, aware that she had asked her grandmother for those words but desperately attempting to excuse what she had done, somehow. "Grandmother, she was going to die."

She had always been her grandmother's favorite child, after all. It felt strange, getting yelled at by the woman, even if Olenna never lifted her voice to do it.

"Just because you are the King's wife does not have you invincible, nor your House impervious to the King's anger, should he turn on us. There is a reason the Martells fought on the side of the Crown during Robert's Rebellion, and it is not because they were fond of the King keeping their sister captive nor of the prince who had replaced her to run off with a child half her age."

Margaery shook her head, because just once, she sought an acknowledgment, some proof that her grandmother was not made of stone. "I know it was foolish, and I know it could have gotten us all killed." She paused, and Olenna waited, saying nothing. "And yet. Grandmother, I...I don't know what to do about her. I couldn't just..."

She couldn't finish the thought. Somehow, saying it to Sansa in the Black Cells was very different than saying it to the hardly amused eyes of her ruthless grandmother.

"Yes well," Olenna sniffed, took a sip of her tea. "Thank the gods there is someone left in our family who is sane." She gave Margaery a long look. "You are not as smart as you think you are, my dear. I understand that may be a hard concept to grasp, with an opponent such as Cersei Lannister, but you ought to let her be a lesson to you, rather than mocking her stupidity. I have been playing this game far longer than you have been alive."

"I know that, Grandmother," Margaery said softly.

"And you do not make the decisions in this family," Olenna continued, as if Margaery had not spoken. "I do not care if the woman you're sleeping with is the Maiden herself; you _come_ to me about your plans, you do not _tell_ me about them once they are already in motion. That is not how we do things. Do you understand?"

Margaery licked her lips. "I couldn't..." She shook her head. Her grandmother didn't want to hear those excuses, she had made herself very clear.

"You couldn't what? Lose a girl you barely know?"

"I do know her," Margaery interrupted, lifting her head. Olenna reached for her tea cup, lifted it to her lips, but it did not hide the flash of surprise on her features quickly enough.

Margaery knew that her grandmother could not understand the feelings Margaery had for Sansa, could not understand the full extent of the motivation Margaery had in her attempt to sneak Sansa out of King's Landing.

Olenna had chosen those who entered her bed not out of any affection for them, but out of the use they might be to her. Keeping herself from being wedded off to a Targaryen might have been a smart move, in the end, but Olenna had grown fond of Luthor, she was often saying.

Fond of him, the way she was fond of her favorite steed and her favorite flavor of tea, today diluted with sugar.

She had never felt for someone the way Margaery felt for Sansa, and she could not believe that the girl she had spent years training would fail her for such a...common thing now, Margaery knew that as much about her grandmother.

Still, she sought that acknowledgment, that there was some facet of Margaery her grandmother could not and would not understand, not this time.

Because Margaery had spent years under her grandmother's tutelage, and she had never felt herself capable of those feelings greater than fondness, either.

Margaery had always been her favorite grandchild. She swallowed, because she could see that her grandmother wanted to have this conversation even less than Margaery did, and changed the subject to yet another issue weighing on her. "Why did you let me enact my plans at all, if you thought them so doomed to failure?"

 _Why had she played with Sansa's life, risked it so needlessly?_ was what Margaery dearly wished to ask, but she still valued her own head. There was a part of her still trembling in anger, a part of her which knew that she could not forgive her grandmother for this, even if she could forgive her grandmother for anything else the woman threw at her.

Olenna sighed. "I will not be here with you forever, my dear," she said quietly, and there was a world weariness to her voice that had Margaery shivering.

Her grandmother had always been a statue, a woman made of stone who would outlast every king Westeros named. Margaery had never conceived of anything else, not when she was a little girl and certainly not as she aged.

"I...I know that, Grandmother," she whispered hoarsely. "But I don't..."

"And one day," Olenna continued, no longer looking at her, "You will be forced to act on your own, without me. Will be forced to play this game without the assistance that I can provide you. I wanted to see how you would fare, when that day comes. What you would do, were I to give you that much of a leash."

Margaery swallowed, and then felt cold anger rise up inside of her. "You didn't, though," she accused softly. "Oh, you said you would, but you were just manipulating me, manipulating Sansa, and you'd already had Rosamund Fucking Tyrell ready to speak against Prince-"

"Language," Olenna snapped, for all that she had used the same foul language before Margaery countless times. "Rosamund Tyrell cleaned up the treasonous mess you hadn't even begun plotting coherently with that dwarf, and you ought to thank her. She displayed far more loyalty to this family than you did."

Margaery closed her eyes, breathed in deeply, and let it go. That was never going to happen. She didn't care what Rosamund might have to say to justify herself about it, Margaery hadn't seen anyone else stepping up to betray Sansa. "I'm sorry." She licked her lips. "But if I had known what your plans were, I might have been able to help you. I'm sorry, but-"

"Are you?" Olenna asked, but didn't wait for a response. "I know that you care about this girl. And I am not...without sympathy, for the struggle that must cause you." She certainly looked it, though. "But I let you enact that plan because you need to understand that you are a queen, my dear, and not some commoner, free to give your heart to whomever you please." She leaned forward, taking Margaery's chin in her hand. "But the throne your family has gotten you must always come first. I thought you understood that, when you agreed to marry Joffrey, else I would never have let your fool of a father push you into this."

Margaery swallowed. "I..." She hadn't been pushed into this, Margaery wanted to say. If anything, it had been her willingness which had convinced her father to move so quickly, in aiding the Lannisters against Stannis.

She wanted to keep arguing. Wanted to argue that in the end, she had chosen her family over Sansa, and the betrayal stung in her heart, even if Sansa had no knowledge of it. Could never have knowledge of it.

Tyrion might have told her of their suggested alliance, might have told her how Margaery pulled out of it, but she would never know why. Margaery couldn't do that to her.

"Margaery," Olenna said calmly, and Margaery swallowed, because her grandmother didn't understand. Margaery did know her duty.

That was the problem. She had understood the extent of her ambition, had understood her duty, and then Sansa had come along.

Olenna let go of her. "Though I must say, everything worked out in the end."

Margaery flushed. "Everything worked out in the end?" she repeated incredulously. "It was a terribly risky move. I was uncertain that Joffrey would even agree to it, and it so easily could have gone wrong." Sansa nearly died anyway.

Olenna waved a hand. "He may be a fool, but he knows that the Crown can ill afford the number of wars it is in right now. A peaceful way to end the war with Dorne without making him look like an idiot while also gaining him some of the legalized bloodshed he so loves was always going to appeal to him. And the Lannisters would never dare kill their only link to the North, no matter what she is accused of."

Margaery shook her head, shocked when she should not be by the flippant way her grandmother referred to Sansa's life. "Then why-"

"That is not what I asked you here to speak about, in any case," Olenna interrupted, and Margaery lifted her head. "It's about Willas, Margaery."

Margaery stared at her, felt her heart speeding up at her grandmother's words. She had been foolish, trying to sneak Sansa out of the city, but she also understood that the way she had manipulated Sansa in the Black Cells, no matter how much she had convinced herself it was merely to save the other girl's life, had been cruel.

She had been motivated by an anger at Willas' worsening condition as much as she had out of fear of what would happen to Sansa, and she had shoved Sansa into an untenetable position.

She understood why Sansa had not approached her since then.

Margaery swallowed thickly, hated for the hundredth yet another problem with her being the Queen; that she could not just return to her home whenever she pleased, that she was stuck here, with her husband, while her brother wasted away.

Olenna gave her a long look, and then reached out, taking her hand. Squeezing it.

Margaery felt tears clogging at the back of her throat.

"Is he...when..."

"Your brother is going to live, Margaery," Olenna said, gently, as she squeezed Margaery's hand again.

Margaery sucked in a breath. She hadn't even realized she was no longer breathing.

"He..."

"The maesters were able to learn the identity of the poison used on him," Olenna said, "and reversed the effects before they could kill him. He will have a long recovery ahead of him, but he will recover. There is no doubt about that."

Margaery choked on air. "He..." she shook her head. "What took them so long?" she asked, because her brother had been wasting away, near death, this entire time, and she, she...

Willas would live.

"They were looking in the wrong direction," Olenna said, still softly. "The poison was from the Vale and not from Dorne at all." Margaery stiffened, upon hearing that, and saw in her grandmother's eyes that she was not the only one to think of what that might mean. "They were so focused in their efforts on finding a Dornish poison that they did not consider other areas, when doing so could have seen Willas healed weeks ago." She sniffed. "They will all be punished for their efforts, of course."

Margaery had no doubt of that. Willas was her other favorite grandchild.

Still, she could hardly think about that.

Willas would live.

Willas would live.

The words were pounding in her skull as she left her grandmother's chambers, and Margaery paused outside the door, her world blackening around the edges.

She was afraid that if she kept walking, she was going to collapse, and so Margaery merely leaned against the wall and did nothing at all.

She could hear Elinor calling out worriedly to her, but she ignored the other girl, couldn't respond to her.

Willas would live.

"I need, I..." she cleared her throat, cheeks flushing when she could finally see Elinor again. "I need to speak to Prince Oberyn in the cells. I want...you to arrange it," she said. "However you see fit, only know that it must happen."

Elinor swallowed, glanced sideways at Megga. "Your Grace," she said carefully, "are you certain that is wise? We could not divine a way to get you down there before to see Sansa without great difficulty."

And Margaery snapped.

"Do you think I don't know that?" she demanded.

Elinor flinched, and Margaery pursed her lips.

"Look, I'm...I'm sorry," she said, gentling her voice. "But I must speak with him. I...I think I may have..." Gods, she was going to be sick. "I think I may have consigned an innocent man to his death."

She told herself that she couldn't possibly know that. Oberyn Martell was a rogue who had offered Sansa hope only to steal it away for his own means, and he was probably perfectly capable of finding a poison harvested from the Reach capable of killing a man. He was a master of poisons, after all.

But she had known, had been certain before, and she couldn't say, now. That scared her.


	222. MARGAERY

"Your Grace," Oberyn said, his voice rather stiff as she ducked into his cell and the door slammed behind her, though Margaery supposed he was under no obligation to be kind to her, in his current state, and she would not have trusted it if he was.

She was wearing nothing more than servants' clothes, and it had been a long time since Margaery had snuck about in such outfits. Certainly before she was ever a queen, Joffrey's or Renly's. They itched.

The guards hadn't recognized her face as she stepped down into the Black Cells, though Elinor had made a valiant attempt to conceal it beneath smudges of dirt and oil that were meant to keep her from looking too obvious, but Margaery had been terrified that they would recognize her anyway.

She had almost decided to risk it anyway, because Tyrion Lannister had gone down to visit both Oberyn and Sansa before, and even if he did have less to lose than her, she was the Queen.

Still, she'd done it, and of course Oberyn had recognized her the moment she stepped into his cell, dim light and all.

She had to know, Margaery reminded herself. She had to do this.

Willas would live.

"Prince Oberyn," she said, stepping further from his cell door, staring at him with what she thought was a suitably bland expression.

She didn't know how to face him, Margaery realized. Didn't know what to say to him, despite the words she had practiced before her mirror, now that she was here.

"It is kind of you, to come and visit me, here," Oberyn said, gesturing about to his musty cell. "And strange. Does your husband the king know you are here?"

Obviously, he did not.

Margaery shrugged. "What the King does and does not know will not hurt him," she said, and Oberyn stiffened at the words, before a slow smile spread across his face and he nodded to her. He climbed to his feet, just acknowledging that she was his queen.

"I would like to apologize for what happened to your brother in that tourney. I should not have been so hard on him," he said into the silence, when it was clear that Margaery was not going to make the first overtures.

Margaery raised a frosty brow, surprised despite herself by the topic he chose first, but annoyed enough with her own indecisiveness now that she was here to take him up on it. "To which brother are you referring, pray tell?"

He flinched, and then his lips spread into a wide grin. "Your fire is lost on King's Landing, Your Grace. And I was referring to Ser Loras, but I see that it is another apology you seek."

She lifted her chin, because she was not going to patronized by this man.

"My lady Sansa is of a very forgiving nature," she said coolly, "And thus cannot be brought to blame you for her former predicament, and no doubt feels guilt for her part in your demise before the King." She swallowed. "She is very similar to someone else I love."

Willas was always so forgiving, since they were children. At first, Margaery had loathed him for it, and then pitied him.

Now, she did not know how she felt about that particular trait of his, at all.

He nodded. "Your father should never have allowed Willas to participate in that tourney, Your Grace. He was too young, and he has suffered the price of your father's ambitions ever since. I am sorry for what happened to him then, but whether it was I or any other lord, that tourney would have had the same end."

"He has...Why you scoundrel," she snapped, stepping closer to him, before reminding herself that she was a queen and it would be foolish, to get too close to him. He could use her as some sort of hostage, if he pleased, after all. She took a step back.

"My father may be an ambitious man, but I would think that the Red Viper would understand that. It was your sting which felled my brother that day, and which he has suffered from ever since. And I have spent a lifetime watching him suffer for it, pretending to find happiness from the most menial of tasks while you remained safe in Sunspear or traveling the kingdoms, writing your horseflesh letters."

"I apologized to your brother long ago," Oberyn said quietly. "And we reached an understanding. I do not seek to apologize for it again, but for what it is worth, you should know that I care for him as a friend. I understand that he is ill. Does he yet live?"

Margaery ground her teeth. "He recovers, but remains at the door of the Stranger as we speak," she told him. "And I cannot go to him because I must remain a faithful wife and companion to my husband the King while-" she cut off abruptly, glaring at the Prince of Dorne. "I don't feel guilty for asking Sansa to testify against you."

She swallowed, and wondered if he bought the lie as Joffrey bought everything that emerged from her tongue. Wondered if he believed her yet, or if she would need to sell it.

It wasn't Oberyn whom she wished to convince, coming here, anyway.

Willas would live. Willas would live, and it was Sansa's testimony, the one Margaery convinced her to say, which was going to kill Oberyn, his supposed friend.

The friend every other member of the House Tyrell had loathed since the day he felled Willas, no matter what Willas had to say on the subject.

Gods, she'd been such a fool.

He lifted his chin, looked amused. "So it was you. I thought the plot had a bit too much guile in it to belong to our king.” And then he paused, the amusement vanishing from his features. “I don't expect you to, after getting what you wanted."

"That scar your lady placed upon her neck will mar her for the rest of her life," Margaery pointed out unnecessarily, for in the time Prince Oberyn had spent in Sansa's presence since that horrid day, he must have surmised as much.

He flinched. "A battle scar. It was what she wanted, Your Grace," he told her levelly, and Margaery glared, wanted to rail at him that he didn't know a damn thing about what Sansa wanted or he would never have killed a man, but refrained.

Refrained, because she wasn't sure that he had, anymore.

"As if you cared about what she wanted. You never had any intention of taking her to Dorne, did you?" she asked calmly, for she had worked that much out in recent days. "She was the decoy, the distraction for whatever you were doing here that could not be overseen."

Whatever he had been doing here, not killing Lord Tywin. Whatever it was, surely it was destined to destroy the Lannisters, the House she had married into, was it not?

Margaery had every right to continue hating him. Her brother's words to her, spoken a lifetime ago, no longer applied, not here.

Oberyn raised a brow. "You are a smart little queen, and wasted on a creature like Joffrey Baratheon," he said, and Margaery rolled her eyes.

"She thinks that you had honorable intentions," Margaery continued, because she knew Sansa Stark, even if the other girl had been avoiding her since being released and Margaery had not tried to push things by seeking her out. She would have convinced herself by now that what she had done was totally wrong, that she should never have spoken out against a scoundrel like this one.

She was wrong, to think that.

"She has not worked it out yet, how you used her for your own ends. But she will."

Willas will live. Willas will live. The words beat with the sound of her heart.

He blinked. "You did not tell her your suspicions?" And he sounded genuinely surprised, and Margaery stiffened.

Tyrion had been acting strangely lately. Margaery had thought it merely because she had backed out of their alliance to protect her own family, but now that she thought about it, he had been acting strangely before that.

Margaery shook her head. "I did not think that her decision to betray you should be made in anger, for then she would regret it forever. And I have no doubt she had already thought it, and is merely refusing to acknowledge it."

"She regrets it, then?" he sounded quite saddened by the news, and Margaery resisted the urge to roll her eyes once more.

"For now," she said, more harshly than she'd intended.

He nodded, looked strangely saddened by that knowledge. Margaery didn't want to examine that thought for too long, but then she was, and it was swirling around in her head until-

Margaery sighed, folding her hands before her, because one thing still did not make sense to her. Oberyn’s eagerness to confess his guilt when Lady Rosamund spoke against him. His willingness to help Sansa in her lies when she couldn’t quite finish them on her own. "You didn't kill Tywin Lannister, did you?"

Oberyn raised a brow at her. "A strange question to make, so late in the game. I did confess, and Lady Sansa seems quite certain of my guilt." He sent her a shark's smile, but Margaery had seen that expression on her brother Loras' face often enough.

"Because you wished to demand a trial by combat," she whispered, taking a step back from the bars. "And because you knew that the Lannisters would damn you either way. They looked for a way to pin Lord Tywin's murder on you the moment it happened, and only chose Lord Tyrion because they could find none. And you confessed because you knew you would be fighting the Mountain."

Oberyn leaned forward, pressed his cheek into the bars and gave her a long look. "Whoever did kill Tywin Lannister, Your Grace, robbed me, and Dorne, of my chance to avenge my sister and her children upon him. And there is only one man left to revenge them on. I would have that debt paid before he drops, as well."

Margaery swallowed, forced herself not to take another step back. "And if you don't win?"

He shrugged. "Then Dorne will have a vengeance upon the rest of the Lannisters for my death when my lady remained at my side while I was in King's Landing and swears me innocent. But I will win." He grinned at her.

Margaery was less than impressed. "You seem quite sure."

Prince Oberyn leveled his gaze at her. "I am as sure as you were that I would be the man charged with Tywin's death when you and the Queen Regent pushed for Tyrion's trial to be hurried along, no matter who asked that Flower to speak on Lord Tyrion's behalf," he said, and Margaery took a slight step back.

"Your brother has repudiated you," she said, and there was the small flinch, the twitch of his jaw that Margaery had been waiting for, some sign that this man was made of flesh and blood. "He has no more wish to continue this war than my husband does, and seemed glad of an excuse to end it in placing all of the blame on your shoulders. He claims that your fate belongs in the hands of the gods, for the act of treason you confessed to having committed, refusing his orders not to act on your hatred of Lord Tywin. It is..." she inclined her head, "A good draft of a letter, he sent us. And he wrote that your trial tomorrow will decide only whether you will return to Dorne at all. Perhaps the King will let you read it, before your trial."

Oberyn gave her a long look, and she could see the anger bubbling up inside of him, but he did not let it loose. "My brother will do what he must to protect our people from tyrants," he said.

Her chin wobbled even as she spoke. "I don't regret it," she repeated a variation of her earlier words.

Oberyn nodded. "I hope your brother does recover," he said, and she cocked her head at him.

"And then?" she asked.

Oberyn blinked. "And then?" he repeated.

"When you have killed the Mountain, and gotten your vengeance. What then?"

Prince Oberyn took a step closer, and Margaery took another step back, could have damned herself when she saw the look on Prince Oberyn's face, sympathetic in a way she had never wished to see.

"Then, I will return to Dorne a free man, my sister's death avenged. Her children's deaths avenged." He shrugged. "What happens next is more my brother's interest than my own."

Margaery blinked. "You cannot believe the Lannisters will allow you to go, a free man, when Lord Tywin is still dead?"

Prince Oberyn shrugged. "Perhaps not, but they will have no reason to keep me here that will be believed when I have won a trial by combat. And they war amongst themselves like children. They are not the force Tywin Lannister was."

Margaery eyed him. "Perhaps. Good day, Prince Oberyn."

He eyed her. "Good day, Your Grace."


	223. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The calm before the storm...

Sansa lifted her chin, staring at her reflection in the mirror.

Behind her, Shae finished tying her gown, and stepped back. "There," she said, reaching out once more with errant hands to smooth down the dress, the wedding gown Sansa had worn the day she wed Tyrion Lannister.

It had been Cersei's orders, that she wore the gown to the trial. That she reminded everyone there that she was a Lannister, that the North belonged to the Lannisters, not to the Martells, and that she was an enemy of Oberyn Martell.

Tyrion had frowned when he learned what Cersei had decided on, but he hadn't objected to it, either, and Shae had simply led Sansa along, taking her back to her chambers after the messenger left and helping her into it.

The dress didn't fit.

It was far too large, and Sansa felt like she was drowning inside of it, until Shae began to work the ties into some semblance of order, yanking the gown - and Sansa - every which way until it at least resembled what it had the day Sansa had married her husband.

And all the while, she was frowning into the mirror, staring at Sansa's small waist as if it was made of the darkest of poisons, and -

No. It was best not to think of poisons, just now.

"There," Shae repeated, though she still looked displeased. "It's a mess, still, but at least it won't fall off in front of everyone."

Sansa paled at the thought. "My other dresses..." she hedged, glancing nervously back in the mirror at Shae.

Shae gave her a long, disapproving look, and then patted her on the shoulder. "I can have a seamstress work on them," she said, and Sansa felt a wave of relief wash over her. She reached up to squeeze Shae's hand, and then hesitated, letting her own hand fall.

"Thank you," she breathed, and Shae stared at her for several long moments in the mirror before she pulled back, a small, sad smile on her face.

"You'd better be going," she said finally, and Sansa blinked at her.

"The...it doesn't start for another hour at least," she said, but Shae shook her head.

"I understand that the royal family is sent out in their litters before the smallfolk have time to find ways into the arena to watch," Shae said, but there was a sparkle in her eyes that suggested she was speaking of something else entirely. "They will be leaving soon."

Sansa just stared blankly at her. "Yes," she agreed slowly, "And mine will come with my lord Tyrion's, I understand."

And then Shae was stepping forward, reaching out and placing her hand on Sansa's shoulder this time, turning the other girl around to face her. "You might as well make good on what you threatened Tyrion with," she told Sansa bluntly. "The Queen will still be getting ready, but not for much longer."

Sansa's mouth fell open. "Shae..." she said, glancing nervously toward the shut door, as she felt a rush of heat over her body.

She hadn't been able to face Margaery, since the day of the trial. The day Sansa had repeated the words Margaery told her to say. It had only been a couple of days since Sansa had earned her freedom with those lies, but she knew that Margaery had mourned them all the same.

But the trouble was, Sansa didn't know what she would say, if she encountered the other girl in private. They had not exactly been on the best of terms, before Sansa's arrest. In fact, Sansa hadn't even known what terms they were on, then, and if she'd had no idea then, she was even more confused, now.

Shae wasn't smiling, though, when Sansa looked back at her again. "Tyrion was angry," she said. "Because he wants to protect you. But I do not think that you should heed the words he spoke in anger. He is not Joffrey."

"I know that," Sansa said, shrugging off Shae's suddenly hot touch, though she did not know if she knew the other woman's words at all. They sounded strange in her ears, ringing. She had not meant to threaten Tyrion the way she had, and she had apologized to Shae after, if it could be called that.

Still, she did not regret the words as much as she had expected to. She had spent the last few nights tossing and turning in her bed, unable to sleep for the comfortable warmth of it, so different from what she had experienced in the Black Cells in nights previous.

She had heard Shae knocking on her door twice each night, asking if she were well, if she needed anything. Sansa had feigned sleep each time the door opened.

No, she did not regret what she had spoken in anger to Tyrion as she had thought to. Her bed was still cold despite its warmth. Still, "And I hardly think I should antagonize him further."

Shae shook her head, and there was a frustration in her features which Sansa couldn't help but think was hardly warranted for the situation. "He has a very set mind about things," she told Sansa, finally, her lips pursing as she spoke. "It does not always mean he is right."

Sansa blinked at her. "Do you love him?" she blurted, the words coming out before she could stop them.

She had a sudden memory of herself, standing in the accused's box before the Iron Throne, looking up at Margaery as the other woman's words from the Black Cells reverberated through her head.

Shae took a startled step back. "Do I...?" she bit her lip, glancing toward the door once more. They both knew that Tyrion was on the other side, waiting. It had taken much longer to wrangle Sansa into her gown than it should have.

But Sansa had to know.

"You're telling me to go to Margaery, even though he told me not to," Sansa repeated, her words coming out slowly now, for she was trying to make just as much sense of them as she was trying to make Shae see. "So I would like to know." She lifted her chin. "Do you love my husband?"

Shae stared at her, then dipped her head. "You have very little time left to do so, my lady," she said softly, speaking to the floor now in lieu of Sansa. "I can make your excuses to Lord Tyrion. The dress doesn't fit and you need to see a seamstress for a quick fixing."

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek, annoyance flashing through her suddenly. "Perhaps I will," she said, and tried pointedly not to think of the last time she'd had any conversation with Margaery, what it had been about.

Oberyn's trial was today, and she could not forget that.

The man, Ser Gregor, was fighting to avenge her own honor, what little of it Sansa had left being a sham nonetheless, and that was why she had to struggle to fit into a gown which should have fit her.

And it might all feel a little less horrible if she had Margaery's arms around her, just now.

Shae dipped her head, and then walked to the door, opening it for Sansa.

Sansa hardly heard Shae telling Tyrion where they were going, hardly noticed the shrewd, annoyed glance Tyrion sent her way, and then they were walking along, down the hall, and Shae did not attempt to make secret of where they were going, Sansa couldn't help but think.

They stopped outside the corridor of the Maidenvault, and Shae dipped into a little curtsey. "I will find a seamstress we can tell your problem to," Shae told her, not quite meeting Sansa's eyes, and Sansa was struck with the desire to say something, but nothing would come out.

Shae spoke before she could, in any case.

"I know what it is to be quite alone, my lady," she said, reaching out and squeezing Sansa's hands. "And I do not think it right that Tyrion should deprive you of that. But I also don't think it right for you to threaten him the way you did."

Sansa blinked at her, and then Shae was gone, moving along the corridor as if she had never been. Sansa was rather uncertain what had just happened, but then her feet were moving of their own accord, apparently not heeding her at all as they made their way down the hall to Margaery's chambers.

Ser Loras was guarding Margaery's chambers, as he always seemed to be, and he didn't blink twice at the sight of Sansa approaching, though he didn't look pleased at the sight.

Sansa supposed she could understand why. She knew that the two siblings confided almost everything in each other, in a way she had never felt she was able to do with her own siblings, though she thought now that had been born of her own arrogance rather than theirs, and no doubt he knew of Margaery's recent issues with Sansa.

She wondered if he knew what had happened in the Black Cells, as well.

Loras gave her a once over, and then he was knocking on the door, opening it to annouce her to the Queen inside.

Sansa squared her shoulders and took a deep breath, and knew that both actions did not go unnoticed by Loras, where he stood in the doorway. And then the door was shutting behind her, Ser Loras gone, and Sansa took another breath.

Margaery was standing in the middle of the room, her dressing almost finished, it seemed, for only Elinor was still in the room, and Sansa bit down the sharp spike of jealousy she felt at the sight of the other woman alone with Margaery, where she should not.

She had been the one to walk out of Margaery's chambers, after all, had she not?

And now that she was here, facing down their twin surprised faces, Sansa had no idea what to say. She chewed on her lower lip, and stood there awkwardly, hands at her sides, waiting for one of them to speak.

"Sansa," Margaery whispered, moving abruptly away from Elinor, who looked to be doing the finishing touches on her gown.

And it was a beautiful thing to behold, all Tyrell greens with not a hint of gold in it, covering her form in the best areas while showing off the rest of it, and Sansa thought that the Lannisters would never let her have a gown like this one.

Would never let her have a gown that showed off her body as much as it did that she was a Stark first, and a wife second.

Not that it mattered, anymore, for she was no longer a Stark at all, Sansa couldn't help but think, and she blinked, shaking her head.

"Wh...What are you doing here?" Margaery asked, and that wasn't happiness at all in her tone, the way Sansa had imagined it in her head. Instead she sounded nervous, and Sansa couldn't abide that at all.

Because Sansa was far too nervous about this whole thing, Margaery and Oberyn and this trial with a man crueler than the Hound had ever been but of the same kin, and she needed to be standing alongside someone who was not, if only for a few moments.

She bit her tongue, and then she was moving forward, moving and not realizing until the last moment that Elinor was rushing out of the way, that Margaery was opening up her arms and letting Sansa fall into them.

It felt like coming home, after a long time in a horrible world of cold, damp walls and filthy straw, and Sansa clung to the other woman, desperately breathing in the scent of flowers.

"Margaery," she breathed, pressing her forehead against the other woman's. She needed to feel the warmth of Margaery's body against her own, needed to know that the other woman was close, if she was going to do this.

"Sansa," Margaery breathed, and her voice sounded wet. Sansa lifted her head, stared into Margaery's eyes, and took a step back. "Sansa, you can't be in here."

Sansa swallowed. "I..." Get out. "I understand." She started to move towards the door, not even realizing that she was walking backwards until Margaery reached out and latched a hand around her wrist.

"No!" she cried, and Elinor, standing in the back of the room, jumped a little at the sonund. Sansa stared.

"No," Margaery repeated, and now she was smiling as if she were embarrassed. "I only meant...Joffrey will be here soon, to escort me to the arena," she blurted. "He can't find you here."

Sansa licked her lips. For just a scant moment, she wanted to ask why not. Why Joffrey couldn't find them here, and damn all the consequences.

And then she nodded, lowering her eyes to the floor so that she did not have to see the look in Margaery's.

"I know," she said hoarsely, and hated how sad she sounded, childish, almost.

And then she heard the sound of Margaery sighing, and she lifted her head, finally meeting the other woman's eyes. Margaery moved close, wrapping her arms around Sansa's waist and pressing their foreheads together once more.

"I don't want you to go," Margaery said finally, and her fingers were brushing gently through Sansa's hair. Sansa closed her eyes, felt the warmth of the other woman against her, and wished that the barriers between them would vanish for good.

They didn't, and Sansa was still far too aware of Elinor's presence, standing in the corner of the room.

"I asked Joffrey if he might spare you the sight," Margaery continued, and Sansa realized once more what she was talking about, that this trial Margaery had asked Sansa to speak up for was happening now, and there was not a damn thing she could do to stop it.

Her forehead wrinkled, and she wanted, for just that small moment, for the world itself to end, that she might forget all of this and just pull Margaery into her bed once more, that everything that had happened of late didn't matter at all.

"He said you had to go," Margaery continued, which Sansa had already known from Tyrion. Of course she had to go. She was the reason the trial was happening, she was the one whose word Oberyn himself had questioned, and she was the one being defended by the Hound.

Sansa thought back to how all this had started, an innocent enough walk into King's Landing with Lady Rosamund walking along beside her, and she didn't know how they had found their way here.

She was about to see a man killed for her lies, and she didn't even know how to feel about it. Felt strangely empty, in a way that she knew she should not, with such a thing weighing down on her conscience.

For Joffrey, Cersei, the lot of them, had made it very clear that they didn't think Oberyn was going to win. Tyrion had conceded, over supper with Joffrey which Sansa had not at all wanted to attend, that Oberyn might have been capable of winning before his imprisonment, that the imprisonment and his violent capture beforehand had no doubt weakened him.

Still, he looked nervously at Sansa as spoke those words, and Sansa couldn't help but wonder what his plans with Margaery had been, to free her. No doubt Margaery was of the same mind with Joffrey and Cersei, however.

Sansa didn't know enough about fighting to say what she thought for certain, but she knew that she was weak enough from her time in the Black Cells, and-

And then Margaery's hand was wrapping around Sansa's neck, her other hand pressing against Sansa's cheek, and Sansa lifted her head, swallowing hard.

There was nothing else, for that scant moment, but Margaery, before her. No Oberyn, no Elinor, no trial comprised of Sansa's mistakes.

Nothing else mattered, and it felt, for a brief moment, rather wonderful.

"I know," Sansa said quietly, and then shrugged at Margaery's attentive gaze. "Tyrion told me as much. Joffrey wants me there to remind the people why the trial is happening to begin with."

She had asked her husband not to make her go to this. Begged him, really. It was the first time since their fight that he had looked sympathetic, but then he told her that she must go, that Joffrey himself had insisted upon it.

After all, Ser Gregor was her champion, even if Cersei had been the one to choose him and Sansa'd had no part in any of this beyond her confession, and she needed to be there.

It would make the people love her, he'd said, and Sansa felt something in her sink, at the words. For she knew it would not. She was to come along to remind the people that Oberyn's accuser had not been Joffrey, but another.

Ser Gregor may have been a member of the Kingsguard, after all, but he was fighting to defend Sansa's claims, for all that she had not been given the choice of him as her champion.

And that was a terrifying thought.

Margaery licked her lower lips, and Sansa watched as Margaery's eyes trailed down to Sansa's lips, as she visibly seemed to restrain herself.

Sansa closed her own, for several seconds.

And then Margaery was speaking again, and Sansa'd not had enough fuel to aide her during her time in the Black Cells, enough happy memories to choke out the bad, so she listened.

"I'm sorry, Sansa," she said, and Sansa lifted her head, confusion filling her. Margaery looked away. "I'm sorry that you'll be forced to watch this. That was never my intent."

Sansa forced herself to smile, to reach out and touch Margaery's arm. "I know," she agreed. "Margaery, I know."

Margaery pursed her lips. "Perhaps..." her voice was hesitant now, and it reminded Sansa just how uneven of ground they stood on, now.

Things had been different, in the Black Cells, where the desperation of her situation crowded in all around them and Margaery was the only one to bring any sense into Sansa's world, but it was different here.

Oberyn was about to die, and Margaery had been the one who had told her to speak those words and save herself, to speak out against Oberyn, but Sansa still wanted her.

She just...wasn't certain how much, and that thought was horrible, because what Margaery had told her in the Black Cells...

_I love you, Sansa Stark._

Sansa pulled away, not wanting to answer the question Margaery no doubt wanted to ask, but the other woman persisted, pushing the words out even as there was another knock on the door.

"Perhaps we might speak again, when it's over," she said, and Sansa swallowed hard, because no, she couldn't give an answer for that, not when she was about to-

"Margaery?" Ser Loras' voice called from outside the door. "It's the King."

Margaery straightened, moving almost instinctively away from Sansa. "Elinor," she said, her voice soft, "Escort Lady Sansa out once we've gone, would you?" she asked, and Elinor reached out, snatching Sansa's hand in hers and pulling her out of the main room just as the door opened to admit Joffrey.

And Sansa never got the chance to answer Margaery's question. She hated the sickening amount of relief she felt, at the realization.


	224. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I know it's probably very unlikely that Sansa would hear much of Oberyn's conversation with the Mountain from where the royal family was sitting during the fight, but just bear with me, guys. It's all in the name of angst.

"Watch this, Tommen," Joffrey called out to his brother, smirking, his words buzzing with excitement and drink. "Might make more of a man of you," the little hypocrite said, and Sansa bit her tongue and glanced at her husband, watched as he tried to refrain from rolling his eyes.

She was not quite certain that he managed it, but then, Joffrey wasn't looking at him at all, so Sansa supposed that was something.

Tommen, where he sat beside his mother gave Joffrey a look Sansa couldn't interpret, and hugged himself. His mother took another sip of her wine.

The journey to the arena from the Keep had been fraught with enough danger for Sansa, and, she suspected, for Tommen as well. The people had been near rioting, throwing rotting fruit at the King's caravan and jeering.

Their king was not popular with the people, and the people did not see any reason not to let him know this, when he was killing a Prince that had been well liked, for all that he was accused of murder and other things.

The one time Sansa had opened the curtains, she saw two men doing something lewd before the procession, a blatant rebellion against the King's law, before the Kingsguard shoved them out of the way.

Ser Gregor, the newest edition to the Kingsguard, was not there. Well, Sansa had thought, he wouldn't be. Not when he was the one fighting in the trial, not yet.

Sansa had glanced at her husband, but he hadn't seemed to notice. His gaze was dark, and he wasn't looking in Sansa's direction at all, where he sat across from her in the carrier.

Still, she was nervous, when she did not see him as everyone was seated in the arena, and the prisoner called for.

The trial was about to begin, and Sansa hated how many nobles and peasants alike had gathered to watch it, excited to see two men rip each other apart and call it the will of the gods.

She was abruptly reminded of the first tourney she had witnessed, the one that had taken place when her father agreed to become Hand of the King, a lifetime ago. Reminded of how naive a little girl she had been, thinking that watching men fight would be like it was written in the songs.

She swallowed hard, and knew that she needed to keep from being sick. Being sick would only call Joffrey's attention on her during a trial that almost was her own, and Sansa couldn't allow that.

Instead, she glanced toward Margaery, where she sat at Joffrey's side, and was surprised that the other girl was looking right at her.

Well, surprised wasn't the right word, shouldn't have been, but Sansa was surprised anyway, and she faced forward again. She pretended she didn't see the slight wince Margaery gave, either.

Margaery had not seemed bothered by the riots the smallfolk had given, on their way to the arena. She had smiled and waved when they arrived, and promised food, and that seemed to calm down the worst of them, for the time being.

Sansa swallowed, and watched as the jugglers and jokers prepared the way for the trial to come.

Sansa had never witnessed a trial by combat. Her father had always been prepared to swing the sword himself, to bring the North's justice on those who had been given a fair chance to speak, though Sansa had never witnessed those.

Her brothers had, even Bran, and they always returned to Winterfell somber enough.

This event was hardly a somber one. The nobles sat drinking wine and talking amongst themselves, and the peasants cheered for what they knew was coming. Joffrey was grinning, and Margaery was at least pretending to find his excitement infectious.

Sansa hated everything about this, most of all that this had almost been her trial. That the trial right now was not taking place to decide whether or not Oberyn had killed the Hand of the King, but whether or not he had done everything else Sansa accused him of.

She wanted to curl up and die. She wanted to admit that everything that had come out of her mouth had been a lie.

She bit the inside of her cheek, was silent.

And then someone threw a rotting fruit, and it fell at Cersei's feet. She glanced up sharply, anger filling her features.

Joffrey's eyes flew to his mother's feet, and then he was on his own, waving for a bugle to sound so that he could gain the attention of the smallfolk outside the arena, and the peasants and nobles within.

He looked furious, but Sansa was surprised by how well he was able to mask that, as he spoke. Sansa wondered if perhaps he actually did understand how unpopular he was. If he was more than just angry and embarrassed that his people hated their king, but afraid.

If that was why he had agreed to repeal a law he had been so enthusiastic about.

"As a gift to my people, on this day of judgment," Joffrey announced, "I am repealing the law against those of the same sex being with one another carnally." He grimaced. The crowd began to cheer, loudly. "I have spoken with my religious councilors and with the High Septon, who has assured me that these are the interpretations of dusty old men, during the time of Aegon the Conqueror, and not the laws of the gods themselves, and I have no interest in upholding the beliefs of the Mad King's family."

There was more cheering then, and Sansa swallowed, and wondered how so many people could suddenly find themselves cheering for Joffrey, denouncing his enemies.

"When the Dragon girl comes across the Sea," Joffrey continued, and Cersei's eyes grew wide in alarm even as Tyrion swore under his breath at Sansa's side, "We will denounce her as we do her family's ancient and decrepit laws!"

And that had even more cheering, as the smallfolk called for something they didn't understand at all, and Tyrion merely snorted.

"Damn fool has managed to turn their opinions faster than I expected," he said, and then sent Sansa a sideways glance. "Perhaps he learned that from his wife."

Sansa stiffened, but said nothing.

Her husband had been making such snide little comments since the day she made it out of the Black Cells and he confronted her about her relationship with Margaery. She didn't know what to make of them, knew only that her threats against him had been baseless, and he held some part of her survival once more in his hands.

She had been stupid, to say any of those things. Stupid not to realize that, however much she depended on Tyrion's secrecy in that area; she depended on his protection in so many other ways, as well.

She should never have opened her mouth. Should have just agreed not to see Margaery again, when she had made no attempts to approach the other girl on her own since then.

Sansa shook her head, and hoped her reaction had not shown on her face.

Perhaps she shouldn't have agreed to open her mouth at her confession, either, Sansa thought; as she gazed out at the cheering people once more.

"Come, my lady," Tyrion said, rather loudly, as if he knew and for some reason cared about the turn her thoughts had made, "Why don't we take a turn before the fight starts?"

Sansa glanced up at him, a bit startled. "I..." she gulped. She had been avoiding being alone with her husband since the night she was freed.

She supposed she couldn't avoid him forever, though. This would be good enough practice, for that. After all, they would not be entirely alone.

Sansa took his arm, and let him lead her through the crowd. They passed Cersei, who gave Tyrion an annoyed look, then downward, to where Lady Olenna sat with the other Tyrell ladies, removed from her granddaughter and her son, where they sat near the King.

Sansa wondered why they were pausing here, glanced at her husband, but he was eying Olenna with something like murder in his expression.

When he spoke, however, that tone was entirely different. Olenna half-turned to face them, raising an eyebrow at the sight of Lord Tyrion and Sansa before her.

"You've returned at an odd time, Lady Olenna," Tyrion said cheerfully. "Is everyone simply convinced that your grandson Lord Willas will survive, now?"

Olenna eyed him, cracked the nut between her teeth, before her eyes flitted to Sansa. Sansa swallowed hard, forced herself to smile, though she felt like doing anything but. "He will be fine," Olenna said. "The maesters have concluded as much. They hadn't when Cersei Lannister fled back to the capital, of course."

"Of course," Tyrion looked amused.

"Besides," Olenna waved a hand to the proceedings before her, to the arena where Prince Oberyn's guilt or innocence would be decided by trial of combat. "One has to find their entertainment somewhere, and from what I had been hearing of King's Landing, there certainly has not been a dull moment since your father dropped."

Sansa flinched, having forgotten how capable the Queen of Thorns was of speaking her mind.

Beside her, her husband looked equally flummoxed. "I...see," he stuttered out.

"Though I suppose everyone here seems to have profited from it," the Queen of Thorns went on. "Cersei has returned to her son, my oaf of a son can now congratulate himself on his ability to keep the King safe with his overcompensation of an army, Joffrey has his unfettered freedom once more, poor deprived boy, and you've become Hand of the King." She tutted, nodding toward the arena. "Everyone save Prince Oberyn, of course."

Tyrion coughed. "Yes, well..." He cleared his throat. "My father was a very powerful man. It seems only natural that, in his death, his power would move to others."

She eyed him, looking even more amused. "Go and run back to your lions, Lord Tyrion, Lady Sansa. You're boring me, and the fighting hasn't even started yet."

He blinked at her, before giving her a little bow and moving on. Sansa scrambled to keep up with him.

They sat just as the guards escorted Prince Oberyn out to the arena, undoing his shackles only at the last minute. Ellaria Sand, brought out of her house arrest to witness the fight on behalf of Dorne, ran forward to throw her arms around the man, then through his hair, then touched his cheeks.

Their foreheads touched, and Sansa badly wished she knew what they were saying, before she remembered that she was no longer a friend of theirs.

"For fuck's sake," Tyrion muttered, a little too loudly, and reached for a glass of wine a serving girl was trying to be rid of, "They could have at least given him some armor."

Cersei's voice was snide, when she responded. "He insisted against it. Said it would merely hinder him. It's hardly our fault if he has a death wish."

And then Oberyn was waving a hand, and one of the serving girls was moving down into the arena, handing him a mug undoubtedly filled with wine.

"And he shouldn't be drinking," Tyrion continued disapprovingly, even as he took another gulp of his wine. His thigh felt hot against Sansa's.

"He's going to die," Joffrey said, a grin in his voice. "You wouldn't begrudge him that, would you, Uncle?"

"He looks like he's going to a feast," Tyrion muttered, setting his drink down on the bench beside him, and Sansa had to admit to that.

Prince Oberyn hardly looked like a man going to a fight that would allow the gods to determine his guilt or innocence, Sansa thought idly, as he practically skipped into the arena, a smug look upon his face, confidence radiating off of him.

The people's cheering grew louder, and Sansa looked up, paled at the sight of the man Cersei had scoured Westeros to find. The man who stood at least a head taller than any other man she had ever seen, who marched into the arena silently, wearing full body armor and carrying a sword.

Ellaria's eyes widened, and she muttered something that had Oberyn's face going somber as he reached for his spear.

Ser Gregor came to a pause in the middle of the arena, and Joffrey grinned again.

"He's going to rip the Dornish bastard apart," he said, clapping his hands together before he reached for Margaery's, gave it a squeeze. Sansa turned away again, grimacing at how gleeful the King sounded.

He was, she thought in horror. Ser Gregor was going to rip Oberyn apart, all because he was disputing the lies Sansa had spoken against him.

Sansa had caused this. Whatever the outcome of this battle, she had caused it, and Sansa swallowed loudly, never more aware than this moment that, whatever the outcome, she was going to be a killer by nightfall.

And then the Grandmaester was moving down into the arena, eying Ser Gregor with something like wariness before he spoke.

"In the sight of gods and men," the old man rumbled, "We gather to ascertain the guilt or innocence of this man, Oberyn Martell, of the accusations the Lady Sansa has laid against him. May the Mother grant him mercy, the Father give him such justice as he deserves, and may the Warrior guide the hand of our champion-"

Joffrey rolled his eyes and waved a hand, clearly bored, and the bugles sounded, declaring the beginning of the fight. The Grandmaester looked startled, and then bowed, moving as quickly as he could out of the arena, to the cheers of the crowd.

Sansa hated them all once more, and hated herself most of all.

Once upon a time, she had dreamed of being a queen, whom the people would love. Now, she was not quite certain that mattered, anymore.

And then Oberyn was pulling Ellaria into a hard, passionate kiss, and moving off to fight his opponent. Ellaria reached out for him again, but he kept walking, brandishing his spear high.

Joffrey rolled his eyes as the man swung it several times through the air. "Get on with it already," he muttered, even as the crowd cheered. The Prince of Dorne was a well enough liked man, with the smallfolk. He frequented their markets as much as he did their brothels.

"Have they told you who I am?" Oberyn shouted to Ser Gregor, and Sansa heard him rumble an answer that sounded too much like, "Some dead man," for her liking.

She swallowed thickly, glancing at her husband. Tyrion did not look at her, for the fight had well and truly begun, then.

Joffrey laughed outright, and reached for a piece of mince pie being passed around on a tray by a serving girl. He fed it to Margaery, who made eyes at him just as if they were not going to watch someone die on Sansa's watch.

"I am the brother of Elia Martell," Oberyn said loudly, swinging his spear again. "And do you know why I have come all of the way to this stinking shit pile of a city?" he asked. "For you."

Sansa glanced nervously at Joffrey, and saw that Margaery was doing the same. But Joffrey merely leaned forward, head resting on his chin, as he watched.

Sansa did not know anything about fighting, but she thought Prince Oberyn was nimble on his feet; for all that Ser Gregor was brutal.

Tyrion winced and hissed at the appropriate times, and that gave Sansa some idea of which lands were important and which were not.

"I am going to hear you confess," Oberyn snapped, "Before you die. You raped my sister. You murdered her. You killed her children. Say it now, and we can make this quick."

Cersei smirked at the words, but Margaery was not smirking. Ser Gregor lunged.

"Say it," Oberyn repeated, shouting now. "You raped her. You murdered her. You killed her children."

Tyrion stared incredulously at Cersei, but she wasn't moving now, merely watching without a word, her face blank as it had been since Prince Oberyn revealed himself to be more than a match for the champion she had chosen for Sansa.

"You raped her. You murdered her. You killed her children."

Oberyn fell, and Sansa cried out, ignored the look Tyrion sent her. Cersei sat as still as stone.

Joffrey straightened in his seat. "Kill him," he called out loudly. "Kill him!"

When Oberyn flew across the arena, she gripped Tyrion's hand. He eyed her, but did not pull away. It was Oberyn, however, who drew the first blood, slicing his spear across Ser Gregor's side, then his thighs.

"Elia Martell, Princess of Dorne. You raped her. You murdered her. You killed her children!" he cried, a war cry, as his spear plunged into Ser Gregor's chest.

Blood flew out of the man's mouth, and Sansa grimaced at the sight.

She had forgotten, awash in all of her guilt, that Prince Oberyn had confessed to being a murderer.

Joffrey's mouth fell open. Beside him, Margaery looked shocked as well, though muted, and she buried it quickly as she did every other genuine emotion she felt, Sansa thought bitterly.

"Dying?" Oberyn demanded, as Ser Gregor panted on the ground. He circled the Mountain, a look of disappointment on his features. "No, you can't die yet. You haven't confessed."

And then he ripped the spear free. Sansa grimaced again.

"Say it," Oberyn demanded, as Ellaria cried out something unintelligible from the sidelines. "Say her name. Elia Martell."

"Damn fool, move away from him," Tyrion muttered.

And Sansa...Sansa understood why Oberyn could not do so, despite how foolish it seemed to stay close to a sleeping giant. Or...a dying one, she supposed.

Because she had lost her family to these Lannisters, and she could hope for some acknowledgment of that guilt from them, too.

"Say her name," Oberyn went on. "You raped her. You killed her children." He pointed to the crowd, to the Lannisters. "Elia Martell. Who gave you the order? Is it the man we fight over now?"

The Mountain was silent.

Oberyn moved closer. "You raped her! You murdered her! You killed her children!" And then, quieter, but not quite quiet, "Say it. Say her name. Say it!"

And then the Mountain...moved, and Sansa jumped in her seat, as she watched the creature knock Oberyn onto his back, turn over, force Oberyn down.

They grappled in the dirt before the Mountain pushed Oberyn into it, grabbed at his head.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat, horror filling her as blood flew from Oberyn's head, as his head slammed into the stone floor of the arena and Ser Gregor's hands fell down to grasp at him.

It took Sansa a moment to realize what those hands were doing, and then she felt bile climbing up her throat.

The two men wrestled in the dust in blood, but the Mountain had the upper hand in his strength, and Prince Oberyn couldn't pull away.

"Elia Martell of Dorne," the Mountain rumbled, and Sansa paled at the agonized screams ripping their way past Oberyn's throat, at the horrifying, popping sound of a skull, crushing beneath the Mountain's fingers. The Mountain sounded almost gleeful, in his confession. "I killed her whelps. Then I raped her." His hands slammed down again, an Sansa felt her stomach turn. "Then I smashed her fucking head in. Like this!"

He drew back his hand, the blood on his gauntlet shining in the sunlight, and then it came down, with a sickening crunch.

Ellaria screamed, hands going up to cover her face.

Sansa bent over, and was sick all over her shoes.

When she lifted her head, it was to the sight of Tyrion's wine glass, pressed close. She didn't hesitate, took a sip, and was sick from that, too.

And then she was watching Cersei smirk, as she leaned forward in her chair, no longer looking bored for the first time since the beginning of the fight, when she realized it would not be so easy as she had thought.

Ellaria's scream echoed through the arena.

Oberyn's blood poured out into the arena, flowing around what remained of his head.

The Mountain collapsed onto the ground beside his decidedly dead opponent, and Sansa shivered at the sight of the smile on his face.

Joffrey stood to his feet, grinning and pulling Margaery up with him. He took another sip of his wine, and it looked so much like blood. He stumbled a bit, and then righted himself. Sansa wondered if he was drunk on wine or pure glee, at having seen something so gruesome.

"The gods have made their will known!" he called out, to the shocked silence of the audience. "Oberyn Martell has faced their will, and died the cowardly murderer he was!"

The audience was silent for a beat after Joffrey's words, and then the cheering began, hesitant at first before it grew.

Joffrey offered his arm to Margaery, and she took it, giving her husband a smile that even Sansa, in her current state, could see was shaky. They walked from the arena without another word, the people letting them pass without a protest between them.

Sansa stared at the prone body of Prince Oberyn, the bloody gouges where his eyes had once been, what remained of his head, well after the screams of Ellaria Sand died out and the Mountain had been dragged away, choking on his own blood

She stared until the Kingsguard came forward to remove the bodies, stared as the prince was dragged away carelessly.

He was dead.

She had thought, for a silly, hopeful moment, that he would live, that perhaps he would still make good on his offer to take her far from this place, as unlikely as that was after her confession, even after her betrayal.

But now he was dead, like her father, her mother, Robb, everyone who had ever attempted to help her.

And she had killed him. She had ensured that his eyes were gouged from his head, that he was slaughtered like...worse than an animal.

"Sansa," Tyrion murmured, and shook her shoulder. Sansa yelped, and tried to pull away from him. He gave her a look she couldn't read at all. "Come on," he told her.

Sansa shook her head, mouth parted as she stared at him. "W-where?" she asked shakily.

Tyrion eyed her. "Back to the Keep, Sansa. Come."

He held out his hand.


	225. SANSA

Sansa shivered, as she sank down onto the bed that didn't feel like hers at all, for she had only been sleeping in it for two nights, now.

It was cold, despite the thin blanket Tyrion placed around her shoulders.

She didn't know where Shae was, and Sansa felt tears pricking at the back of her eyes, tears that she could not afford to let loose. She would have shed them, around Shae, after blustering for a little while. Tyrion could not see her tears, after everything they had fought over recently.

"Sansa," she heard his voice, from a long way off, "Breathe."

She sucked in a breath of air, reminded of when Margaery had told her to breathe, in the Black Cells.

Margaery had told her a lot of things, in the Black Cells, and Sansa had done every single one of them as Margaery instructed. Without thinking. She'd done them and now Oberyn...Oberyn...

She pulled in one shuddering breath, and then another.

She couldn't even get sick, Sansa realized. Her stomach merely felt empty.

"I lied," she whispered, staring down at her hands, which were trembling slightly, and she could see Oberyn's blood all over them.

Tyrion didn't respond, and Sansa couldn't stand the silence.

"I lied, I lied, I lied." The words grew louder as she spoke, and she shivered again, hugged herself with those bloody hands.

She glanced up then, at Tyrion, and jerked when she saw the look on his face. The lack of surprise there. Guilt flashed up her neck in hot red.

"Sansa," he murmured, far too gently when she knew he was angry with her for what she had done and how she had threatened him, "I know."

"No," Sansa shook her head. "No, you don't understand. I..." She swallowed hard, sunk back a little on the bed.

Tyrion gave her a look that was equal parts exasperated and soft, and moved toward the door. Moved away, to leave her there.

Sansa couldn't have that.

"I would never do it," she whispered, though the words sounded astonishingly loud in the room.

Tyrion paused, in the doorway, but didn't turn around.

"I didn't mean it, what I told you. If you...If you forbade me from seeing Margaery, I would never tell Joffrey how you tried to help me," Sansa said, looking down at her hands again rather than the rigid lines of her husband's shoulders. "I wouldn't."

Her husband let out a deep sigh. "I'm not going to forbid you from seeing her," he said, his voice whisper soft. "I see now how important she is to you. But I think you should ask her why..." He did turn around then, and Sansa dragged her eyes up to meet his raw gaze. "Sansa, she was prepared to commit treason with me, in order to save you from this place. And then...she changed her mind."

Sansa licked her lips. "She still saved me," she said, and couldn't meet Tyrion's eyes again.

"No," he told her. "She manipulated Joffrey into keeping you alive. But you're still here. You're still here, Sansa."

Sansa's voice caught in her throat. "I..."

"I don't blame you for what you did," Tyrion said, moving closer, now. Sansa flinched back, and he froze, raised his hands slowly. "I wish that things might have gone differently, but he was wrong to drag you into his politics, into Joffrey's ire. What you did was perhaps the only thing you could have done that would guarantee your life."

Sansa sniffed. She knew that. She knew that, but the sight of Oberyn, his brains bashed out into the sand, his face no longer recognizable at all...

She couldn't get it out of her head.

Tyrion reached out then, cupping her cheek. "Just...don't forget to breathe, Sansa," he said, and Sansa tried to lean into the touch, and found herself feeling sick for it.

There was a knock at Sansa's door, and she glanced up, for it was still partially opened, but could not see whoever was on the other side of it.

Tyrion sighed, pulling away. "There's someone here whom Shae thinks it would be good to let you speak with, just now," he said, and there was some level of disapproval in his voice, which told Sansa everything she needed to know.

She was surprised that he had agreed to it, after how avidly he had argued against Sansa ever seeking out Margaery's company again.

She wondered if she looked that horrible.

She lifted her head, a little wide eyed, blinked at the sight of Margaery, standing in the doorway of her chambers, in front of Shae.

Her eyes were doe soft, as they glanced between Sansa and Tyrion, hands at her sides.

And Sansa didn't care what Tyrion thought of Margaery, how he thought she was manipulating Sansa, Sansa could remember to breathe again, now that Margaery was here.

She didn't notice Tyrion leaving, shutting the door behind himself and Shae. Didn't notice the look he sent Margaery, as he did so. Didn't even notice the stiffness of Margaery's shoulders as she stepped around Shae in order to get to Sansa.

Saw only Margaery, standing in the middle of the room now, watching Sansa with an expression that was strangely hesitant, for that woman.

They didn't speak for several moments, and then Sansa started to shiver beneath her blanket, again.

"Sansa," she heard Margaery's voice, and glanced up, noticing how close the other woman was only when their noses touched. She got the impression that Margaery had been calling her name for some time, now that she was kneeling directly in front of her. "Are you with me?"

Sansa blinked. "I..."

"Sansa," Margaery repeated, reaching out and squeezing her hands until they began to sting and Sansa attempted to pull them away.

"I'm with you," Sansa whispered, choking on the words. "Margaery..."

"You've had quite a fright," Margaery murmured, giving her a sympathetic half-smile, just as if they hadn't both suffered that fright, in their own ways. "Joffrey should never have forced you to watch that."

Sansa sucked in a breath. Of course he should have. She was the accuser, and so of course she had to be there. Joffrey had said as much.

"He forced you. And...I've seen death before." She had. Prince Oberyn's death, while horrible and far...messier, paled in comparison to that of her own father's. She knew it did. It had to, because that had been her fault as well, and surely she never would have repeated it if it were so-

Margaery's smile was sad, then. "I know."

They sat in silence for a long time after that, Sansa attempting to get her breathing under control, and Margaery simply...there, for her. Like she always was.

Tyrion was wrong about Margaery. Sansa didn't know why she had changed her mind, but she also knew that Margaery had risked getting caught as the queen, to go down to Sansa and speak to her in secret. To convince her to save her own life.

"I don't think that we should...be so close," Sansa finally admitted, glancing away from Margaery for the first time. The words were reminiscent of the first time Tyrion had tried to warn her off Margaery, when Sansa hadn't listened, but he hadn't understood then, either. "It isn't safe."

Margaery's smile, having half-grown when Sansa finally began to speak, faltered. "You are my dearest friend in King's Landing, Sansa. I know that I have failed before, but I will keep you safe from Joffrey's wrath. I swear to you that."

"No," Sansa shook her head, and she was shaking again. Gods, she had just killed a man. Had just bashed his brains out with a false testimony. "No, you mustn't. You don't understand."

Margaery leaned forward, eyes intent. "Then help me to understand, Sansa."

Sansa swallowed hard, looked away. "Everyone who wants to help me dies, Margaery. I can't...I can't watch you die, as well. I won't."

Margaery's eyebrows rose to her hairline. "That's what you're worried about?" she asked hoarsely, and Sansa almost thought she was poking fun at her. Except that Margaery would never do that, surely. "Sansa, look at me."

Sansa swallowed hard, and met her eyes.

Margaery gave her a timid smile. "Sansa, I'm not going anywhere," she offered, and Sansa felt her breath escape her body in one small whoosh. "I swear that to you. No matter what happens, I will be here with you for as long as you want me to be. But I...please don't push me away again. I can understand that you would be angry about what I asked you to do, but don't push me out because of it."

Sansa gulped, glanced down at her hands. Margaery was clasping them once more.

"I'm not angry with you," she said to those hands. "I wouldn't have agreed to do what you asked if I was angry with you."

Margaery swallowed audibly. "I...I'm surprised your husband sent for me, frankly," she said, and Sansa was relieved at the change in topic. "We did not exactly part on the best of terms, recently."

Sansa licked her lips, because no, she didn't want to talk about that, either. Didn't want to know whatever it was that Margaery had done which Tyrion thought of as such a massive betrayal.

Margaery seemed to take the hint, with Sansa's silence.

"You should wash," Margaery said decisively, giving Sansa's hands another squeeze. "You've been in a cell for so long now, I fear you've taken the smell out with you."

Sansa blinked at her. "It's been three days," she rasped out, and wondered if her voice would ever stop sounding as if she had been screaming.

Margaery smiled. "And so?" she asked.

Sansa blinked again. "I...not right now," she said softly. "I don't think..."

Her hands still looked covered in blood, when she glanced down at them, free of it or not, and she did not want Margaery washing them clean. That she knew for certain, if nothing else.

Margaery nodded. "Well then," and she pulled back, dropping Sansa's hands into her lap. "Perhaps something to eat."

Sansa squinted at her.

"Sansa, have you eaten today?" Margaery asked suddenly, standing to her feet, now.

Sansa glanced away.

"You have to eat," Margaery insisted, voice almost plaintive. "Your time in the Black Cells has diminished you, but you were wasting away long before that."

Sansa shook her head, looking away. "I'm not hungry," she recited that same old lie, but Margaery was having none of it.

"Sansa."

Sansa lifted her eyes, ashamed to find them wet with unshed tears. "I can't," she said, stubbornly.

Margaery shook her head. "Because of Oberyn," she surmised, and Sansa flinched, nodded.

"My mother and brother died at a...at a wedding feast," Sansa said quietly, even though Margaery surely knew that, had no doubt figured out why Sansa found it so difficult to eat, these days. "After they'd just eaten their fill. Every time I eat, it turns to ash in my mouth, and I wonder if I'll die like that, too, in minutes."

Margaery thought for a moment, her eyebrows pressing together prettily before she leaned forward. "Would you be averse to trying something that might help? Something like what we did before, where I fed you."

Sansa shrugged. "I...I suppose," she said softy, then flinched again, at the deadness of her voice. "Yes," she agreed.

Margaery smiled, smoothing down her gown. It was one of her nervous habits, Sansa thought. One of the ones she had gained more recently than she'd been married to Joffrey, just like her hands shook when she thought no one was looking.

Sansa marveled in the sight of it. The reminder that Margaery was just as much of a human being as the rest of them, cruel as it sounded.

Margaery grinned. "I'm glad, my little bird," she said playfully, going to knock on the door, no doubt to call for Shae to bring some food.

The nickname made the emptiness in Sansa's stomach feel sour, for the first time since she'd gotten back to her chambers. "Don't call me that, please," she whispered, and Margaery glanced up at her.

"Not all names must be forever tainted because of who says them, Sansa," she said softly. "Just like food does not have to be tainted because of how your family died."

And then she was moving away from the door, moving to kiss Sansa, her lips gentle and sweet, and Sansa melted into the embrace and almost forgot that she was still alive because of another man's death, then.


	226. MARGAERY

Margaery struggled with the urge to fidget, as she took her seat beside her husband in the throne room.

She didn't much like the fact that she was here, listening to Joffrey preside over matters that he was more than happy to fuck up. She didn't much like that her grandmother seemed to believe her incapable of protecting their family on her own now. And she didn't like at all that Sansa was nowhere to be seen, that Margaery had to curb her time around Sansa because there were two jealous husbands to contend with, now.

Oh, Tyrion had been gracious enough, when he sent Shae to ask for her when Sansa needed her. He knew as well as Margaery that she was the only one, between the two of them, who would be able to give Sansa what he needed, and Shae knew better than he when Sansa was at the end of her rope.

And now Tyrion Lannister knew this about the both of them, Margaery didn't know how to regard him. She could see well enough in his willingness to work with Margaery again, even in this small thing, that he cared about Sansa, where the rest of his family did not.

That he genuinely did wish to help his wife was not up for dispute, in Margaery's mind. But what she didn't know was how far Tyrion would be willing to go. Whether he regarded Margaery as a threat now not just in the politics of controlling her husband but also in his marriage.

Margaery knew that the two of them weren't sharing a bed, knew Sansa to be beyond relief over that, but she had been studying Tyrion Lannister recently, a habit born of her need to find true allies.

She wasn't as certain as Sansa that he didn't care for Sansa in the way Sansa thought a person could only care for one other person at a time, and Margaery was uncertain what to do with such a realization.

There was a reason Shae, for all her clear compassion for Sansa, also seemed jealous of her, Margaery knew. And unlike what men thought, those jealousies were not usually unfounded. Shae was also willing to help Sansa, but who knew how long that would last, if Tyrion's unclear feelings for his wife developed into something more...clear. And then Sansa would not only have lost an ally in her relationship with Margaery, but a friend, and Margaery did not want her to lose the few of those who remained, either.

She shook her head. She couldn't be thinking about this right now, in front of the entirety of the court, and sitting at Joffrey's side. She had far more important things to worry about.

Well, other things.

Like Joffrey fucking up the entire matter of Sansa's trial and confession just to insult the Martells, as she thought he was not above doing.

By the gods, she had no idea why the Small Council thought allowing him to deal with Ellaria Sand was a good idea, but here they were, standing before the woman whose lover Margaery had ensured would die.

She couldn't meet the other woman's cold, dark eyes as Joffrey issued his complaints against her with the same vivacity he had used in his accusations against Sansa.

Margaery knew she should have been expecting this. Ellaria had not been an innocent in her lover's attempts to smuggle Sansa out of the city, and indeed was guilty of the heavier crime, in that matter, nearly killing Sansa.

Margaery could not forgive her for that, nor for the fact that she was willing enough to pretend that it had been under Prince Oberyn's orders. She knew that it was for the woman's own protection, but the scar on Sansa's neck...every time Margaery looked at it, it was another reminder that she had been complicit in the Martells' plans, had allowed Sansa to go because she had thought it was keeping the other girl safe.

And Ellaria had placed it there.

"You kidnapped the Lady Sansa alongside Prince Oberyn, held her against her will, and nearly killed her. I would have your throat cut in the same manner if I thought you worthy of such a death. But I am a merciful King," Joffrey said, leaning forward meanly in his chair and glowering down at Ellaria.

Margaery wanted to snort at the words but knew that would be far from appropriate, here, whatever her family's supposed rivalries with the Martells entailed.

Ellaria stood before the Iron Throne, hands chained together, the rest of the Dornish party behind her, also in chains, surrounded by Lannister gold cloaks rather than Kingsguard.

They all knew that, whatever Joffrey decided here and now, he would not be allowed to go too far. A condition of Prince Doran's willingness to repudiate his own brother had been the return of the Dornish party, unmolested, after Oberyn's trial by combat.

And while Margaery could not say that Ellaria and her ladies had gone unmolested by the Lannister gold cloaks, despite her best efforts, any sort of punishment which Joffrey might attempt now would only be seen as provoking the Dornish once more.

Still, Margaery was unsure if her husband understood that as she did.

"Therefore," Joffrey continued, and Margaery blinked, "I will allow you and yours to return to Dorne, since I know that, besides your kidnapping of a young woman you believed would face a horrible fate at the hands of an executioner under your lover's orders, you are not guilty of the wrongs your Prince Oberyn was."

Ellaria stared at him. "Your Grace, I don't understand. The war-"

"Prince Doran is happy to sue for peace, once what remains of his people here have been returned," Joffrey crowed, and Ellaria fell silent at those words. Margaery knew that the woman had been kept under arrest in a room with her ladies until Oberyn's trial by combat, but surely she must have known. Known that Dorne was not coming to their aide, or they would never have allowed Oberyn to fight in the first place. "His messenger has brought us a letter, saying as much. He has no more wish for war than we do, and repudiates the deeds his brother committed, while he was here."

Which was the coldest thing Margaery thought she could imagine doing to a member of her own family, but she knew that it was the only option Prince Doran had. His people might be capable of waiting out a siege, but they knew the Lannisters would never stop with Joffrey at their lead, and they did not have the resources to wait out a siege on both sides of their borders forever.

He was doing what he thought was best for his people, at the cost of his own brother, what Margaery didn't think she would ever be able to do, and she had to admire him for that, even as she wondered at his plan, now.

For surely he had not forgotten his family's grievance against the Lannisters, both with Elia Martell and now with Oberyn. Margaery thought perhaps her grandmother might have been willing to let one of her family fall for the good of their House, but she could not imagine that the woman would let such a thing go, either.

"Doran is happy to sue for peace," Ellaria repeated, voice dead, her mouth pursed even as the words chewed their way out of her. Her anger was set in stone, however, not fiery hot in the way that Prince Oberyn's had been.

Margaery feared it more than she had feared his fire, just now.

Joffrey grinned. "Yes. You and the others will be sent back to Dorne, as a gesture of that peace, without charges against you further. You should be glad we believe you only attacked my lady aunt under Oberyn Martell's orders. Your goodbrother can decide what to do with you. Or, wait," and his grin spreads, "You aren't his goodsister at all, are you? Just some slut who birthed his traitor brother's bastards."

Ellaria sucked in a breath. Perhaps her anger was not as stony as Margaery believed. "And Oberyn?" she asked, her accent heavy in the silence.

Joffrey lifted a brow. "Oberyn?" he repeated, looking genuinely confused, though this very topic had been pushed through the Small Council that morning. "What about him? He's dead."

Ellaria closed her eyes, breathed in deeply, before opening them again, and Margaery could not blame her for that. The callous way Joffrey had said those words...If it had been Sansa...

"His remains, Your Grace," Ellaria said, and her voice caught in her throat, near the end. "If it please you, I would have them returned to Dorne with me, as would his brother, I am certain, so that he can be buried with his family in the manner befitting a lord of a noble house, and indeed, a prince."

Her voice was quiet, far from the headstrong, sensual woman she had been when she had arrived in King's Landing. Margaery almost mourned the loss, and it had her wondering if one day soon, she would notice that the remains of the Sansa who had come out of the Cells was as changed as Ellaria, if what she was seeing of the girl now was not just the shock of her ordeal.

"Hm," Joffrey said, scrunching up his face in pretend bemusement, and Margaery tensed at that playful tone, for Joffrey was always at his most dangerous when he was playful. "That's funny. I don't believe his messenger mentioned those remains being a part of negotiations."

Ellaria looked as if she had been punched in the stomach, and Margaery winced, and hoped no one saw.

Her husband was cruel. She couldn't afford to react to every cruel thing he did in the same manner.

He'd told the Small Council he wanted Prince Oberyn's remains dumped in with his sister Elia's, what was left of them, ashes in the Sept. Of course, he wanted Cersei's pet former maester to examine him first, to figure out what sort of poison he'd used to kill the now dead Mountain, and how.

The Mountain had fallen mere hours after the trial, and if there was one saving grace of the horrid display Margaery and Sansa had been forced to watch, that was it.

Somewhere, Margaery could steal hear the sounds of Oberyn Martell's screams.

Tyrion had gone pale and flat out scolded Joffrey for the idea, told him that they were indeed going to be sending those remains home where they belonged, in Dorne, and that if he had any sort of mercy and sense, he would know that it was necessary. Joffrey had been furious, but Margaery relieved, because she knew that if this were her brother, she would want him home, as well.

It was strange, she thought, that Prince Doran had not enquired about his brother's remains, in the letter his messenger brought. Perhaps he had not wished to call Joffrey's wicked attention to it, or perhaps he merely thought it a given, that of course Prince Oberyn, traitor or not, would be returned to his family to be buried.

Elia Martell had not been. Ned Stark had only been under Tyrion's leadership, not Joffrey's, and then only as a point of negotiation with the Starks.

"Prince Oberyn's remains." Joffrey sent her a nasty smile, but finally answered her inquiry. "No, they will remain here, where they will be safe within the Sept. Far more befitting of a traitor than he deserved."

Margaery closed her eyes. It at least afforded her the relief of not seeing the fury on Tyrion Lannister's face, where he stood not so far from the Iron Throne.

But how had he not expected Joffrey to do this very thing, Margaery thought. Did he truly think Joffrey had listened to everything the Small Council had told him to do, while Tywin Lannister was Hand of the King?

"Your Grace," Tyrion snapped, cold anger in his words, though he kept them quiet enough that the nobles could not hear them.

Joffrey held up a hand. Margaery bit the inside of her cheek as the Hand of the King fell silent, as a kicked pup.

And here he thought that Margaery was a danger to Sansa. As far as she saw it, at the moment, the only danger that Sansa was in was remaining under the protection of a weak husband, unable to protect her in the ways that Margaery was willing to, and she blinked, wondering abruptly where that thought had come from.

Ellaria folded, her weak, shaking legs nearly giving out beneath her, until one of her ladies, just as frail and tired as she, reached out and took Ellaria's shaking arm.

"Your Grace," Ellaria said hoarsely, and Margaery could hear the tears clogging in her throat, "I beg of you, please, to return Oberyn's remains to his family. I-"

"He will be with his family," Joffrey said, "In the Sept. More blood than a slut like you, in any case."

Ellaria's eyes widened. "Your Grace, please," she cried, and shook out of her lady's hands, falling to her knees before the Iron Throne. "He-"

"Was a traitor, and hardly deserves a proper burial," Joffrey said. "What remains of him ought to look quite a picture, beside what remains of his sister and her children."

All killed by the Mountain, the creature whose corpse had been handed over to the former maester Quyburn as Oberyn's had been, as part of his experiments, no matter that this was in direct violation of the gods' will concerning the dead.

Cersei didn't care about such things, after all.

But Joffrey understood the symbolism of what he had just laid out for Ellaria all too well, Margaery thought.

He couldn't have the victory of a war against Dorne, needed this peace as much as the Dornish, but he could have his victory against House Martell.

She ground her teeth, and wondered if it had even been worth suing for peace in the first place, if Joffrey was only going to insult the Martells like this.

"Your Grace," Tyrion spoke up then, "Your father consented to having Elia Martell and her children buried in the Sept because they were of the royal house, and even he understood the need for peace, at the time." He cleared his throat, clearly waiting for that admonition to sink in. Clearly it didn't. "Prince Oberyn was not a member of the royal family, and-"

"Neither was Elia Martell or her brood," Joffrey said. "House Baratheon is the royal house, and the only house which deserves to be buried so close to the gods."

Tyrion closed his eyes, looked like he was refraining from saying something very stupid. "Your Grace," he said finally, "There is no precedent for someone who is not a member of the then royal house to be buried in the Sept of Baelor. Not when they have been judged and found wanting by the gods."

Joffrey waved his hand. "Well, there's always a first time." Ellaria let out a startled cry.

"Princess Myrcella," Ellaria gasped out then, and Cersei stiffened. "She...Dorne would give her back to the Crown happily, if that is what Your Grace desires, and keep our alliance with you, in exchange for Prince Oberyn's-"

Cersei's eyes had widened, and she had opened her mouth, perhaps to take the woman up on her offer, but Joffrey spoke first.

"Prince Doran alone has the authority to make such an offer, not a slut like you," he told Ellaria bluntly. "And besides, the Crown is not so furious with House Martell that we would demand the return of my sister from their ranks."

“Joffrey...” Cersei began, glancing wildly at her son, and Margaery wondered what it was like, to know that a daughter’s life was in the hands of a son like Joffrey. “Perhaps you should-”

Joffrey held up a hand, silencing her. “Myrcella’s betrothal to Prince Trystane will remain intact, despite your lover’s traitorous attempts to separate them, and, indeed, the alliance that House Lannister and House Martell have maintained these past years over an old and misplaced grievance which Prince Doran has made it clear is not at the forefront of his mind.”

Ellaria's eyes darkened and she stood to her feet. For a moment, Margaery thought she was going to actually lunge at Joffrey. Margaery almost would not have blamed her.

Then she stood down, and Joffrey was telling the Dornish party that a ship - a Tyrell warship, the very same one which had dragged them back here in the first place - had been arranged to return them to Dorne.


	227. SANSA

After Joffrey's decision about Ellaria, after the letter whose existence Sansa had sworn to was produced with Prince Doran's own seal upon it, after Prince Oberyn's remains were examined and burned, at Joffrey's command, and haphazardly dumped in with his sister's, Ellaria was quick enough to take her leave of King's Landing.

Sansa was wickedly relieved at the knowledge. Relieved that the woman wouldn't still be here, hating her for what Sansa had done to her lover, Sansa was sure of it. And relieved, in a more cowardly way, that the Tyrell warship sitting in the harbor would be leaving, as well.

But none of that explained why she insisted on going down to the harbor to see Ellaria off.

Shae thought it a foolish idea, and said as much. And when Sansa still insisted, she said she would not allow Sansa to go at all until Sansa had acquired Tyrion's permission. Sansa had been slightly amused at the thought of Shae forcibly keeping her from going, until she remembered how sorrowful Shae had looked, the whole time Tyrion had been kept locked away in the dungeons, and she couldn't deny the other woman that, even if something in her blood boiled at the thought that she needed Tyrion's permission simply to go to the harbor, where she never had before.

Sansa thought of Prince Oberyn's brains, plastered against the sand of the arena, and felt herself going a little green, which seemed to end the argument, in Shae's head, as she led them both to Tyrion.

Tyrion took one look at Sansa, as she worded that request, and gave her the permission Shae demanded.

Shae was furious. "And when the King demands to know why his lady aunt is visiting with Ellaria Sand?" she asked scathingly.

Tyrion, sequestered safely from Shae's wrath behind the desk of the Hand of the King, raised an eyebrow. "I don't believe the King has found Ellaria Sand guilty of anything," he pointed out mildly, which only made Ellaria more furious, Sansa could tell.

The woman placed her hands on her hips, glaring. "Tyrion Lannister-" she began rather loudly.

Sansa cleared her throat, glancing back towards the open door. There was no one beyond it, but she had grown rather used to paranoia, running around with Margaery in the past.

Shae's expression hardened, but she closed her mouth.

Sansa glanced at Tyrion. "We won't be gone long," she promised. "Just to the harbor."

Tyrion gave her another long look. "If that's what you want," he said, and Sansa hated how emotionless that tone was, the same tone he had been using in all things with her recently, as if he thought her a spy planted by the Tyrells against him.

At least, Sansa could not think what else he might be accusing her of, in the safety of his own mind.

Shae grabbed up Sansa's cloak as they passed back into her chambers with an annoyed huff, placed it over her shoulders, and clipped it into place. When Sansa tried to keep the hood down, Shae was more than happy to let her know what she thought of that, as well, pulling it back into place.

And then they were leaving the Keep, for the first time since Sansa's imprisonment, sans the short journey to the arena where Sansa had sat passively by and watched as Oberyn-

Sansa shook her head to clear it, following diligently behind Shae when the other woman realized she wasn't about to take the lead and took pity on her.

They managed to avoid the city, the way Shae led, and Sansa was glad of that, for Tyrion had not insisted that they have guards accompany them, but Sansa was certain to leave the room before he could bring it up.

The Sparrows might be turning the smallfolk mad, but Sansa wanted nothing to do with that, didn't want to think about it.

She'd killed Oberyn.

One crisis at a time.

"You don't have to do this, Sansa," Shae said, as they neared the docks, and there was far too much sympathy in her voice for Sansa's liking. "Ellaria Sand, she...has just lost the man she loves. I doubt she will be in a fit mind to see you."

Oh, Sansa didn't doubt that for a second. Ellaria might even have the courage to tell her what no one else would. Sansa was counting on it.

"I...Yes I do," she said quietly, and wished that Shae could just understand, for Sansa did not have it in her heart to explain that reasoning.

Shae gave her another long look, and then stepped into place behind her, let Sansa lead the way up to where the Dornish party was surrounded by a dozen green cloaks.

Green cloaks, and the very sight of them had Sansa reaching up to finger at the scar marring her throat.

Ellaria's head jerked up as Sansa neared, as if she had somehow sensed her presence, and Sansa was suddenly glad for the hood Shae had insisted she wear, that she could duck under it a little in order to avoid that piercing gaze.

She needed to come here, had to apologize to Ellaria in person even if she could offer her nothing else, but a part of her hated squirming underneath that gaze, all the same. It reminded her of the way Prince Oberyn had looked the Mountain in the eyes and demanded to know the truth of him, of the secrets he'd kept, all that time.

Sansa closed her eyes, and then startled, as she heard the rattling of armor, the green cloaks coming near.

"My lady?" he asked, clearly recognizing her even with the hood, and now everyone in the little party was staring at her, Sansa took it off, let her hair fall loose.

She had never noticed how red her hair was before now.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, and Sansa wondered if he thought she was here to kill Ellaria, or worse, try to join her on this ship again.

The warship escorting Ellaria and the rest of the Dornish back to Sunspeare was armed to the teeth, and Sansa shuddered at the sight of it, wondered if this was the very same warship which had brought her back to King's Landing, and if so, how Joffrey had managed that, on so little time.

Still, she could believe it.

"My lady?" the same guard repeated, when it became apparent that Sansa wasn't actually capable of speech, at the moment.

Shae cleared her throat, stepping forward. "My lady wishes to speak to Ellaria Sand before she departs," she said calmly, and Sansa didn't understand how she could be so calm in this situation, with so many green cloaks staring at them, with the Dornish all eying Sansa so coldly.

"My lady," one of the green cloaks said, then. "Surely you do not want to speak to this woman, the slut of the man who so used you."

Sansa flinched, at the way he said that word, glaring at Ellaria rather than Sansa. Used.

She'd gained some popularity amongst the people, for her 'brave' words against Oberyn, though Margaery told her that had more to do with the law Joffrey had repealed before Oberyn's brains were crushed out of his head than because they didn't like the man.

Of course they wouldn't want a sweet, innocent girl like her associating with the woman Olenna Tyrell called the Whore.

Sansa lifted her chin, and didn't speak, figured she might as well allow Shae to continue speaking for her, now that she had started.

Sansa didn't care if anyone thought it was cowardly, and for once, Shae didn't seem to mind.

"She is quite insistent," Shae said, before crossing her arms. "Unless you would like to explain to the King why his dear aunt was not allowed to speak to the woman whose lover stole so much from her?"

There were angry mutters amongst the Dornish, save for Ellaria, who still only stared at Sansa, weakening her resolve with every second that passed and that stare continued.

The green cloak cleared his throat. "Two minutes," he told Sansa, ignoring Shae as if she had not spoken at all, before snapping at the guards to help him get the rest of the Dornish party onto the ship.

The captain stood frowning down at them from the top of the bridge, eying each new Dornishman with more disdain than the last.

Ellaria waited, surrounded by the green cloaks and standing so close to Sansa she might have reached out and touched her now, until they were all aboard, before she inclined her head for Sansa to speak.

Somehow, that was what Sansa had been waiting for.

She licked her lips, swallowed hard. She could see the anger radiating off of Ellaria now, where she had seen only cold, hard lines before, now that she was close enough, and Sansa wanted to simultaneously step back and lean into it at the same time.

She was here to apologize, Sansa reminded herself. It was up to Ellaria to feel whatever she did for Sansa once that was done, though of course she knew Ellaria would only continue to loathe her.

And now that she was here, standing in front of Ellaria, Sansa did not have a clue what to say. She stood silent, mouth slightly parted, hands at her sides, mind blank.

And then Ellaria spoke.

"It wasn't so long ago I was boarding another ship, to Dorne," Ellaria said, and Sansa flinched at the reminder. Ellaria's face softened in spite of the anger still radiating in the woman's eyes. She glanced up at the ship in question, eyes unreadable, now. "I don't expect that this voyage will be any more successful than the last."

Sansa's head jerked up. "I...What?" she asked.

Ellaria's smile was a little colder, now. "Do you really think the Lannisters will let me and my fury at what happened to Oberyn return to Dorne, to influence Doran's mind? No. They will do what I did not have the courage to finish, with you."

Sansa blinked at her. She wanted to tell the other woman not to worry, that the Lannisters would not overestimate a woman. It was not within their nature, as she had learned throughout her years in their captivity, not even in Cersei's.

Or perhaps that was just wishful thinking, because Sansa did not want to think of the Lannisters killing a woman innocent of anything save compassion on the ship finally taking her home.

But then her mind focused on the second part of what Ellaria had said.

"You told me you were prepared to do it," she said, and hated how accusing her voice sounded.

She had no right to be accusing this woman of anything, after taking Oberyn from her the way she had.

Ellaria swallowed. "I have daughters of my own, sweet girl," she said, reaching out and gently brushing her thumb along Sansa's cheek. Sansa struggled not to jerk away. "And Oberyn...would never have forgiven me for killing a child, no matter the justness of the cause."

Sansa shivered at those words. "Ellaria..."

Ellaria pulled her hand away, abruptly. "Please," she said, interrupting the apology Sansa had barely been able to formulate in her mind. "I don't want to hear it, my dear. Give me that as much, or I will say things now that I will regret for a lifetime, later."

Sansa choked. "I...All right," she whispered, because, worded like that, she couldn't refuse the other woman.

Ellaria's brows furrowed. "I wish that things would have gone the way my lover wanted," she said finally. "I think you would have been very happy in Dorne, and you will not be happy, here." She cleared her throat. "But you shouldn't..."

Sansa swallowed when the other woman didn't continue. "I shouldn't?" she asked, and hated how damn hopeful the words seemed, like poor Lady had been, just a pup in need of some acknowledgement.

Sansa had killed this woman's lover. Ellaria owed her nothing, and they both knew it. She didn't...She didn't even know why she had come here, tormenting this poor woman.

"I know that you will, and I know that I might not seem to believe it now, but Oberyn spoke for you at that trial. He must have had a reason for doing so, and so neither of us should blame you for what happened," Ellaria gritted out, and then one of the Dornish pages was stepping forward, taking Ellaria by the arm and whispering something in her ear as the Tyrell guards looked on with their glowers.

Ellaria nodded, giving Sansa one last sorrowful look, before she allowed the page to lead her up the narrow bridge to the warship. Her ladies already waited on it, and one of them reached out as if to take Ellaria into her arms, winced when Ellaria did not go to her.

Sansa's jaw felt slack as she watched the Dornish party dragged onto the Tyrell warship, stared in shock as the bridge slowly lifted, Ellaria no longer looking at Sansa at all.

But Sansa understood why Ellaria did not take comfort in the other woman's arms. Could see it in the stiffness of her spine, as she turned toward the horizon, in the hard line of her lips.

That had been the same look on her features, as she threatened to cut Sansa's throat. She could not afford to be weak now, and there was something very admirable in that, even if Sansa could hardly believe what Ellaria had just said to her.

The Tyrell guards who would not be traveling on the ship turned to go, sparing Sansa glances that were rather rude. Of course. They did not understand why she, after turning evidence against Oberyn, would want to associate with those they thought filth.

Sometimes, Sansa hated King's Landing and its politics.

"My lady," Shae was saying, taking Sansa's arm, bringing her back into the moment. "We should go back, now."

The words roared in Sansa's ears, and she felt tears pricking at her eyes. "This...I..."

"Sansa," Shae repeated. "We should go."


	228. MARGAERY

Margaery learned that Ellaria had left from one of her ladies, summoned to her chambers to let Margaery know that the King had need of her. She was surprised that there hadn't been much more fanfare with it, that her husband the King had not tried to parade the woman before all the court in his effort to see Dorne brought low.

Perhaps even he understood that that would be taking things too far, Margaery thought glumly, as she nodded to Meredyth's summons. The King awaited, after all, even if she loathed the thought of whatever new terrors he would see fit to throw them into now.

She thought she was likely the last person in King's Landing to know about Ellaria's departure, and wasn't as unhappy with the fact as she knew she should be. She knew the fanfare her husband would have put into the whole affair, letting Ellaria leave in a Tyrell warship, with Tyrell guards who were under orders not to let her out of her quarters once she was inside them, neither her or any of her ladies.

Margaery stood to her feet, smoothing down her dress with a sigh and setting aside the book she had only halfheartedly been paying attention to, anyway.

Her mind was far too caught up in other matters to enjoy reading anymore, whether it was for pleasure or for knowledge, and that was one thing that Margaery regretted about becoming a Queen, whether Renly's or Joffrey's, for the amount of time that she could call her own seemed to be similar with both of them, even if Joffrey's methods of taking up her time were a bit less...enjoyable.

She had wished she could see Sansa, after Ellaria's departure, because she knew Sansa, knew she would be wracked with guilt twice over, once Ellaria was gone, and Margaery wanted to offer her some reassurance, even if it only led to Sansa hating her for what she had done. For she knew that Sansa would soon hate her for it, would blame Margaery for the cock up she had made of attempting to help the other girl just as she had done with Janek, and that was part of the reason that Margaery had been avoiding having a real conversation with her, since Sansa's emergence from the Black Cells.

That, and she hated the thought of Sansa turning away, as she had before, cold to Margaery's advances for far longer than Margaery had been aware of, perhaps most frightening of all.

It was only a matter of time until Sansa realized that she had been used, that she could have been free of King's Landing altogether, after all, and when she did, she would realize that she would not have had to speak against Oberyn Martell at all were it not for Margaery. That Tyrion had been making plans to see her freed for good, without the stain of a life on her conscience. Margaery wanted to take what time she still had left, with Sansa, but she didn't know how to find it.

But the King demanded her presence, apparently, and so Margaery followed Meredyth Crane out of the Maidenvault and toward the throne room.

"Did he say what it was he wanted?" she asked, fully expecting to pass the throne room and keep on toward her husband's chambers. She thought he ought to tire from these spectacles at some point, but it would seem that wasn't to be.

After all, her husband had as vivacious an appetite for violence as most men had for sex, and all men needed to be entertained like children.

Meredyth gave a small, elegant shrug of one pale shoulder. She looked tired, and Margaery couldn't blame her. She had been running her ladies ragged, of late, even if the cause was one Margaery was not going to apologize for. "Something about a good announcement in the war," she said, and here, in an abandoned corridor, Margaery let herself roll her eyes.

"I'm shocked," she muttered under her breath, and Meredyth laughed.

"Yes, he seems to be having more and more of those, doesn't he?" she asked, turning down the next corridor.

Margaery nodded. "At least he's keeping himself busy with tales of other men's exploits. I'm only glad Ellaria Sand is no longer in the capitol, to catch his ire," she said, and tried to pretend that she didn't envy the other woman, for that, no matter what it was that Ellaria had just lost.

Or perhaps that was merely the anger she felt over the amount of guilt in her, rearing its head.

Willas was recovering well now, the maesters said. When Margaery made sure to announce it at supper the evening before, she'd seen how hard Cersei was gritting her teeth, one hand clenched around her glass of wine, as Tyrion Lannister congratulated his sister on the rapid recovery of her husband with a knowing smirk.

And even that hadn't quite managed to be rid of the annoying, niggling guilt she felt, in the knowledge that Oberyn Martell had died for a crime he hadn't committed.

Well, perhaps he had committed the crime he had been accused of. For all of her bluster in his cell, Margaery still wasn't entirely certain of her theory, there. She wasn't certain what admitting to her that he hadn't done it would have gained the man, and wasn't certain if he would have bothered to see her as worthy of that information.

Hells, she wasn't certain what he'd been doing down there, confessing to a crime he only may have committed, in order to spend the next weeks weakening away in a cell only to fight a man renowned for fighting abilities.

But she doubted he had been guilty of the crime Margaery had been willing to see him dead for. If so, the poison wouldn't have been so easily fixed, for she knew well the Viper's reputation, knew that it was well deserved. Willas would live, and if Oberyn Martell had really wanted to kill him, wouldn't he have made it more difficult to save him?

Gods, she didn't know anymore. Was uncertain of anything, at the moment.

She made it to the throne room, sat down beside her husband and waited for the last of the nobles to trickle in. Apparently, Joffrey had sent for her some time ago, and was getting somewhat impatient with her ladies' inability to find her, but Margaery could not bring herself to be much concerned about that. She'd locked her door, when she went into her chambers, for the scant amount of privacy that might offer her.

She smiled at her husband, bent down to peck his cheek, and faced forward.

Saw the moment when Sansa entered the throne room, walking alongside her husband and that woman, Shae, pretending to be nothing more than a humble servant, and Margaery allowed herself to smile sadly at the sight of the three of them. They made a sad portrait, tension running through all of their shoulders, eyes downcast lest they catch too much attention.

Walking along together as if Sansa had not shaken in Margaery's arms, at the thought of being left with a husband whom she knew did not want her.

Margaery's smile dimmed, then.

And then the Grandmaester was making this blustery announcement that so many of them had to be gathered together for, while Joffrey had been content enough not to have so large a captive audience while he was tormenting peasants, or whatever it was he had been doing.

"The King would like to call the court's attention to a marriage which we have had yet to celebrate-" the old man began, and Tyrion, where he stood not so far away from the Iron Throne, paled at the words, eyes flitting to Sansa.

Margaery's eyes narrowed. Now that was interesting. She had heard Joffrey speaking of an upcoming marriage, something that would help them in the war, but had assumed it was the offer of Tommen to little Shireen Baratheon being bandied about in the Small Council chambers lately, not something which should have affected Tyrion in such a way. And Joffrey had been set against that idea from the moment Cersei suggested it, not liking the thought of sacrificing their moral highground to any admittance that he was nothing more than an illegitimate bastard who might need Shireen's claim to the throne.

But before the Grandmaester could continue, Joffrey interrupted him, letting out a gawking laugh and apparently demanding to tell the news himself, for the Grandmaester fell silent with a bemused expression, taking a step back. Margaery shivered when she realized that his attention was also on Sansa.

"Sansa!" He called out in a loud voice, and Margaery felt her heart sink as the other girl stepped forward out of the crowd beside her husband.

"Yes, Your Grace?" And her voice wasn't quavering at all. Margaery was almost proud of her.

"I have the most wonderful news for you," Joffrey told her, almost tauntingly.

Sansa glanced worriedly at Margaery, but Margaery could only give her an inelegant shrug; she had no more idea what this was about than Sansa herself did, and Margaery hated not knowing.

She could almost hear her grandmother's taunting voice in her ears, that if she hadn't been so focused on helping Sansa lately, perhaps she would know, perhaps she would have been able to protect Sansa from this, as well.

Margaery didn't regret what she had done. It was too late for that, she thought, glancing at her husband's jubilant features.

"Your Grace?" Sansa asked, after the pause grew too long.

Joffrey smirked once more. "Do you miss your sister Arya, Sansa?" he giggled, and Margaery's heart turned to ice.

She had been careful to ask Sansa as little as possible about her family unless Sansa herself brought them up on her own, but Margaery knew well the pain the mention of her family caused to Sansa even on the best of days.

And the last time she had learned anything of her family from Joffrey, Margaery vaguely remembered, had been when Robb Stark lost his head.

At the bottom of the stairs, Sansa too had gone frozen. "My sister, Your Grace? I..." she bit her lip hard enough that Margaery could see a bead of blood from where she sat. Her hands clenched in her lap as she leaned forward in her throne. "She was a coward and a traitor," Sansa stammered out. "She ran when you cut off my traitor of a father's head. I have not thought of her since that day."

Behind Sansa in the crowd, Margaery could see Lord Tyrion shaking his head, though she could not tell if this was from sadness on Sansa's part or frustration on Joffrey's.

But Margaery...was reminded once again of how she had almost believed Sansa's words at the trial, despite knowing that they were lies given to her by Margaery herself. Because she could almost believe, in this moment, that Sansa meant what she was saying.

Joffrey laughed again. "Well, it seems congratulations are in order, Lady Lannister, and your sister is no longer the blight to House Stark that the rest of your family is." He grinned, seeming to enjoy the suspense. Sansa gave away her first true feelings; the twitch of her right hand into a fist, though it remained at her side, and she didn't even seem to notice the motion. "The little fiend has managed to elevate herself in the world, though not as well as you. Roose Bolton has asked permission to marry her to his bastard of a son, Ramsay, before he kills off that traitor Stannis. Evidently, she must have learned how to wear a dress, in that time." He smirked. "I've granted it."

"His Grace granted Ramsay Bolton legitimacy for his House's loyalty during the Stark terrors, Your Grace," Grandmaester Pycelle reminded the king, as Sansa went as pale as a sheet at the revelation.

Margaery tried to imagine what it might have felt like, to lose contact with one of her siblings for so long and then discover that they had been used for Joffrey's own gains. To learn that Arya, merely a child, was going to be wed away to some lower born bastard so that he could legitimately steal the Stark home.

She felt a bit sick, at the thought.

Joffrey laughed. "So I did. She won't be getting Winterfell back for that, of course, because it still belongs to House Lannister through you, Lady Lannister, but maybe after the wedding, I'll even let her come and visit you." He smirked, a wicked glint in his eyes. "Two Starks in King's Landing once again. A family reunion. Maybe she could instruct you on how to better please your husband, by then. She must have learned something to get a man interested in her. She was such an ugly, feral little bitch, when last we met."

Sansa gulped so loudly that Margaery heard it from where she sat beside her husband, and Joffrey looked close to crowing at even that small victory.

Margaery closed her eyes, and wished rather desperately that she was pregnant. If only she were pregnant, all of this nonsense with Joffrey could just-

"Well?" Joffrey demanded finally, when Sansa was only silent in turn. "Nothing to say, Aunt?"

And then Sansa Stark let out an undignified squeak and ran from the room.

Margaery found herself moving to stand before she even thought of what she was doing, only remembered herself when she saw her grandmother standing in the crowd, glaring up at Margaery in warning.

Margaery sighed, pretended that she was only shifting in her chair as she ignored the cunning glance Cersei Lannister shot her way, and leaned back in her chair, turning to give Joffrey a dazzling smile when he glanced her way.


	229. SANSA

Sansa could hear Tyrion coming along behind her, desperately trying to keep up with her longer strides as she marched back to their chambers in the Tower of the Hand, but she didn't stop to wait for him, pretended she didn't hear him the one time he called out for her.

She was seeing red, and Sansa didn't think it would benefit anyone if she began screaming at her husband in the middle of the throne room, where everyone would hear it.

When she arrived back in their chambers, however, she stood pacing back and forth, waiting for him to arrive.

When he did, Shae walking along behind him, Sansa lifted a hand. "Out," she snapped, and Shae raised a brow at the anger in her voice, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to care about hurting the other woman's feelings, at this point.

If Shae remained, Sansa would never know whose side she was truly on, between the two of them, and Sansa could not have that. Could not lose one of the last friendships she'd still been able to cultivate, in King's Landing.

Tyrion dipped his head in a shallow nod, and Shae curtseyed and left the room, shutting the door quietly behind her.

Sansa reminded herself to breathe, once they were alone.

"Sansa," Tyrion began, and that was the last straw. Sansa interrupted before he could say whatever it was he was holding back so hesitantly.

"So you've married me and, despite all of your pretty words about having no more choice in this marriage than I, now you turn around and marry my sister to the creatures who helped arrange my brother's deaths. Tell me, my lord, am I supposed to believe you...supposed to keep trusting you, still?" Sansa demanded, tone frosty, throwing the words he had told her from the Black Cells back at her.

"Sansa, Sansa!" he moved forward, gripped Sansa by the shoulders and gave the girl a hard shake before she could pull away from him. "It isn't Arya."

Sansa stared at her. "Wh-What?" she gasped out finally, blinking rather rapidly. "I don't-"

Tyrion gave her a sad smile, though he didn’t look relieved that she had finally spoken. "Littlefinger arranged the whole thing from the Eyrie. Brought some girl with him, pretended she was Arya Stark." He was speaking slowly, she realized, perhaps so that she could keep up with the words. "They're all pretending, because we need this alliance against Stannis."

Sansa blinked at him, realized she was still having a hard time understanding his words. Understanding if she should believe them. Even if it wasn't Arya, someone was being sent into danger as her sister, and... "But...I...do the Boltons know?"

Tyrion nodded. "This wouldn't work if they weren't in on the game. But they don't care. They've their Stark in Winterfell, and the North will rally around them to defend it against Stannis Baratheon."

Sansa shook her head. "That doesn't make any sense," she whispered. "I thought they wanted me to-" she couldn't quite say the words, but it seemed that Tyrion seemed to understand.

"The King is content enough to pretend with the Boltons for now, and when it suits us we will reveal that she isn't a Stark, and defeat the Boltons in your name." He shrugged, and Sansa realized this was perhaps the most explicit her lord husband had ever been with her about his family's plots. "I should have told you earlier. It slipped my mind, amid all of the arrangements." He paused. "I didn't think the Boltons would actually agree to this."

Sansa nodded dumbly. "Who is she, then?" She licked her lips. "The girl."

Tyrion shrugged. "I've no idea. Likely some street rat that Littlefinger found here in King's Landing, getting to play a lady for a few months."

Sansa blinked at that, at the callousness in her husband's voice at the thought of some poor girl suffering such a fate.

"But..." she shook her head, horrified at the thought of some girl dressed up by Lord Baelish as her sister, even if she could not entirely say why. Perhaps the girl had chosen to do this, perhaps she had been happy to pretend to be a lady, but Sansa had spent so long pretending to be what she wasn't that she couldn't help but pity the girl, anyway. "That's worse!"

Or perhaps she could. Perhaps, despite her horror at her sister being married off to further the Lannister goals, the way she had been, Sansa had been relieved enough to know that she was still alive.

Sansa knew that her brothers were dead, killed at Theon Greyjoy's hands. Her brother Robb was not coming back, her mother was dead, as well.

Sansa had been holding out one tiny, flicker of hope for her sister, and the Lannisters had given up on the thought of Arya ever being found again to the point that they were comfortable in the knowledge that she wouldn't reappear once they'd married her off.

Arya wasn't coming back. Wherever she was, she wasn't coming back, and Sansa couldn't breathe, for a long moment.

She dragged in a huff of air, and turned away from her husband, unable to face him. She couldn't think. She couldn't feel the air dragging its way through her lungs.

Gods, she just wanted...She just wanted her family back together, Sansa thought, and now she was beginning to realize that would never happen again.

She was the last Stark, and she was not even a Stark anymore.

The thought sat heavily in Sansa’s chest, and she cleared her throat, because the knowledge that somewhere, Arya might still be alive...It was all she had left to hold onto, with her family.

Tyrion shook his head. "The girl is in no real danger," he assured Sansa. "She's just there to play at being a lady for a few months, and no doubt Lord Baelish has seen that she will be rewarded for it. Most peasant girls never get the opportunity to be a princess."

 _A few months_. Sansa's brow furrowed, because that had sounded...ominous, despite Tyrion's attempts at reassuring her. "Surely the Boltons must suspect that this won't last? If she isn't really Arya, then you have no reason to honor the alliance, once you have what you want from them,” Sansa said slowly, because that was better than thinking about her probably dead sister, or this poor girl who had been dragged in to pretend at being her.

Tyrion shook his head. "The Boltons are busy with preparations for battle." He hesitated, "This battle, Sansa, it is happening. Stannis may have spent quite an extended amount of time at Castle Black recently, but he is days away from Winterfell, and the alliance that we have made with them is perhaps the only thing keeping him from taking Winterfell by force."

Sansa chewed on her lower lip. "I know," she said quietly.

Tyrion eyed her. "I have been so busy of late, that I have not had the opportunity to spend more time with you, Lady Sansa." He paused. "And I understand that you may not see that as much of a hardship, and I regret that, but..." he sighed. "If you wish to speak of it..."

Sansa sighed. "You haven't been not speaking to me because you are busy, my lord," she said, looking down at her hands.

Tyrion sucked in a breath. "Sansa..."

"You want to talk?" Sansa demanded, lifting her head, forcing herself to meet his eyes. "Truly?"

Tyrion closed his eyes for a moment, and then met her stare. "I do."

And...she wasn't expecting that. She should have known that her husband was not a coward, that he wouldn't back down from that challenge, no matter how much Sansa wished him to.

She wiped her hands together, and sank down into the chair at the table in their parlor. Tyrion took the seat across from her, folded his hands together on the table.

Sansa stared at those hands for a long moment, closed her eyes, and they were no longer covered in blood, in her mind. She didn't dare look down at her own, again.

"Margaery told you to say those things about Prince Oberyn, at the trial," Tyrion surmised. "After I told you I was making plans?"

Sansa nodded. "She...she said it had Joffrey's full support. That it was probably the one thing that would ensure I wasn't charged for the crimes I was accused of."

"Because I told him that we weren't going to win the war with Dorne," Tyrion said tiredly, wiping a hand across his face. "Fuck. She was right."

Sansa jerked as her husband uttered the foul word, and he gave her an apologetic smile.

"I see," he said. "And did she say why..." he didn't finish the sentence, but Sansa thought she understood, nonetheless.

"I didn't ask her why, not after the trial," she said calmly.

Tyrion nodded, looking a bit shaky. "I'm still concerned about her hold over you. Sansa, I know you see her as a friend, but after the trial, you were..." he cleared his throat. "And she was the only one who could pull you out of it."

"I killed a man," Sansa snapped, feeling her temper flare. "And is it my fault that I have but one friend in King's Landing whom I believe has my interests at heart?"

"Tell me, Sansa, do you know what the Tyrells' part in Robert's Rebellion was?" he asked, and Sansa blinked at the segue.

"I..." She hadn't much enjoyed tales about the war. Learning about how the beautiful Lyanna had run away with the man she loved had not ended in a pretty tale, the way the songs always did, and Sansa had always flinched away from such knowledge, as a child, even as her brothers craved tales of war.

Tyrion nodded, not looking surprised. "The Tyrells had ever been loyal to the Crown. And when the war started, they declared for the Crown, as well. But Mace Tyrell judged the situation, realized he couldn't be certain which side would win the war, and sat on his fat arse outside of Storm's End. It left him in the unique position of not entering a single fight that was actually won by a Tyrell, and conducting a siege that didn't require much fighting against Stannis Baratheon, before the Tyrells saw what my father did to King's Landing and surrendered to Robert."

Sansa's throat clogged. "I don't-"

Tyrion leaned forward. "My point," he said gently, "Is that the Tyrells have only ever looked out for their best interests, and that makes me wary of them. And I don't know if I am judging Margaery Tyrell unfairly or not, but I do know that what happened to Oberyn Martell was not your fault. You were a pawn in a much larger game."

Sansa's hackles rose, at those words.

"I know that it was selfish of me to betray Prince Oberyn like that," Sansa said. "But I didn't do it because I'm sleeping with the Queen."

Tyrion's head jerked up, and he glanced with wide eyes toward the door. Sansa rolled her eyes. If her husband thought her truly so naive that she would make such an announcement while anyone was around to overhear them, then perhaps the accusations she had made against him that day when she left the dungeons had been true.

But...no. She regretted those words, now. Regretted the awful anger to them, and the strain they had added to her sham of a marriage.

She hadn't realized, before, how much of a friend Lord Tyrion had been to her, since the start of their marriage. Had focused only on her fear of him, of what the Imp might do to her, with her helplessly under his control, and the Lannister name he carried.

Tyrion's lips twitched. "Sansa, I told you before, I understand why you did it. I may not approve of it, and I am sorry that you have taken the life of a man whom I respected and that this only furthered the goals of others more than you, but I do realize that you were not in a position to do anything else without losing your own life. I just..." he sighed, running a hand over his face. "I wish..."

"You asked me," Sansa said slowly, "in the Black Cells. You asked me to trust you." She took a shuddering breath. "Do you really think you would have been able to rescue me, if I had waited on you?"

Tyrion grimaced, no longer meeting her eyes. "Sansa..."

"Do you?" she repeated the question.

Tyrion didn't look at her. "I had made a plan, with the Queen, which might have saved your life. I do not know why she did not follow through with it, but I have to believe she had some reason for it, if she truly cares for you as much as you believe." He paused. "But my plan would have required more time to formulate, without Tyrell support. It, too, relied on the trial by combat, because there was no way to sneak the two of you out of the Black Cells together, though for your supposed sins, rather than Oberyn's. He still would have fought the Mountain. And...he still would have lost."

Sansa licked her lips. "Do you think....Do you think he regretted it, in the end?" she asked, and her stomach was queasy, once more.

Tyrion eyed her. "Oberyn had dealt the killing blow already, Sansa," he said softly. "If he had just stopped asking, had just stepped back, he would still be alive."

Sansa wasn't meeting his eyes, now. "He still only fought because of me."

"No," Tyrion interrupted her, and she lifted her head, then. "He planned for this from the beginning. Confessed so that he could be your champion, could ensure that you would go free once he fought the Mountain and beat him, whatever happened to him. He just did not intend to lose."

Sansa closed her eyes. "Perhaps if I hadn't-"

"Sansa, we all have to play the game of thrones, here," Tyrion told her gently, taking her hands into his. "Oberyn was not going to stop the downward spiral he had thrown himself into until he had revenge on all those involved in his sister's death. I know those words might have brought some hope to you, if he spoke to you of that intent before, but he would not have survived the den of lions on his own, as he was, for much longer. I'm sorry that you had to watch him die like that, however."

Sansa lifted her chin. "We all watched him die," she said, her voice quavering.

Tyrion gave her a sad little smile. "He won't be the last, Sansa," he told her, the ominous words echoing in her mind. "The sooner you accept that, the better you will be at surviving the game."

Sansa covered her mouth with her hand, pulling it out of Tyrion's. He dropped her other hand, and it hung uselessly in the air as Tyrion moved to the door.

He paused in the entryway, glancing back at her. "I am sorry about the girl, Sansa, just as I am sorry about what my family did to you. But that won't stop me from seeing her married as Arya Stark, in Winterfell."

And then he was gone, and Sansa was left to stare after him in shock.

The feeling of sickness didn't come, then. But the tears did. It was the first time, she thought, that she had cried for Oberyn. She wasn't certain whether she even deserved to cry for that man, after basically ensuring his death, no matter what everyone else said about the matter, but she had to, just this once.


	230. TYRION

Tyrion sighed, leaning back in his chair and setting down his quill.

It had been a long day. Fuck, it had been a long week, starting with his wife's trial and never ending from there.

So of course Joffrey had to go and fuck things up with the Martells, and ensure that whatever peaceful transition into their renewed alliance was hoped for would never happen.

They were fortunate the Martells hadn't declared war again, the moment Ellaria Sand arrived safe in Sunspear.

So he was drafting a letter to Doran, some pointless missive to let him know that King's Landing held no more (ha!) ill will toward Dorne, when Cersei burst into the Tower of the Hand, and threw something down on his desk.

Tyrion recoiled at the sight of it, and wasn't certain which he was more frightened of; the dead snake lying coiled up in front of him, or the look on Cersei's face.

“What is this?” Tyrion asked, gesturing to the dead snake, its dead eyes staring out at him as its teeth clamped around a bronze necklace.

A Dornish missive, no doubt expressing their anger over Oberyn Martell’s death.

"What is it?" Cersei repeated, tone full of pent up fury, and Tyrion recoiled a little at the sound of it.

She hadn't yet enacted some grand revenge for the perceived wrong he'd done her, but Tyrion would be a fool not to expect it to come along any day now.

Still, he could not see the danger in a dead snake, so long as it could not suddenly come to life, as the little dragon queen's eggs were said to have done.

He leaned forward a little, staring at it, reaching out to grip the necklace in its jaws. He could admit, it looked familiar, but he did not know why until Cersei spoke.

"There are only two like it in the world," she said softly, but Tyrion could hear still the quiet rage under her words. "The one I'm wearing and the one I gave to Myrcella."

"A threat," Tyrion murmured, closing his eyes, letting the necklace fall. He knew it had been familiar, could see the golden chain glinting off Cersei's chest even now, though the pendant itself was hidden beneath her gown.

"Of course it's a threat," Cersei snapped, clenching her fingers. "My daughter is alone in Dorne surrounded by people who hate our family. It's a threat."

"No note?"

"They blame us for the death of Oberyn Martell and his sister. Are furious that Oberyn's corpse remains here, with hers. Blame us for Ellaria Sand's stupidity. And every other tragedy that has befallen their accursed country." She leaned forward onto Tyrion's desk. "I will burn their cities to the ground if they touch her!"

"Softer," Tyrion admonished her gently, glancing over her shoulder. Between the Tyrells and Varys, spies were everywhere, though he doubted Varys, at least, didn't know of this already.

And he couldn't be certain whom to trust, these days. It had been Varys, after all, who had pointed him in Margaery's direction.

Cersei blinked at him. "What?"

Tyrion glanced around. "We are not isolated up here. Do you think the Tyrells wouldn't love to know-"

"My daughter is in danger and you think I'm speaking too loudly?" Cersei demanded, raising her voice. "They've married my daughter to that traitor's nephew, Trystane Martell, in the dead of night, without any of her family present, and locked away Ser Oakheart. Like some nightmare."

Her voice softened near the end, and she swallowed hard.

Tyrion felt himself soften at the rare show of genuine emotion from his sister. Closed his eyes.

"Does anyone else know?" he asked.

He was surprised. He supposed he could understand why Doran might have been so quick to move. He had repudiated his brother to keep his kingdom safe, but with Tywin's death, the Lannisters had no reason to marry their daughter off to a Martell, regardless of whether they needed the Martells on their side of the war.

They had refused to marry Sansa to Joffrey, after all, and Doran would have been looking to that when he made this decision.

And so Doran had moved first, and married Myrcella and Trystane before Cersei had time to react. It was a smart move, he thought. A power play, and one that was not easily set aside. But.

Cersei shook her head. "No. I...held off telling Joffrey."

Tyrion could imagine why, and almost admired her restraint.

"The marriage is not legitimate without our blessing," he pointed out, and Cersei ground her teeth.

"Do you think I give a damn about the legalities?" she demanded. "That the Martells do? My daughter, the daughter you bartered off to these people like she was yours to sell, has been forced into a marriage with a boy I have never even met, forced into his bed no doubt to seal the contract." She let out a shuddering breath. "She's just a child."

"You were roughly the same age, I dare say, when you married Robert," Tyrion pointed out mildly.

"Well, I'm glad this is a source of some amusement for you," Cersei snapped, turning and marching toward the door.

"Cersei, wait," Tyrion muttered, sighing, and waited for his sister to turn and face him again before he spoke once more. "This isn't a source of amusement for me," he muttered. "I...Did this arrive at the same time as the letter stating Myrcella and Trystane were to be married?"

Cersei's jaw twitched. "No," she said, crossing her arms. "They were two different ravens."

Tyrion barely refrained from asking which one she'd had killed in her rage. He cared for his young niece, after all, and didn't want to see her drawn into such dark politics at such a young age anymore than Cersei did, he imagined.

He tried not to think about how that mindset had been changed once Sansa Stark entered his life. Tried not to think about how Sansa was even younger than Myrcella.

"Then this isn't a threat from Doran," he said, a small attempt to placate her, since he knew it would fail, but he needed to try something. "He wouldn't marry her to Trystane and then threaten her life. It would gain him nothing."

"It would gain him a dead Lannister, one brought low and killed in exchange for that damned Viper," Cersei hissed at him. She closed her eyes for a long moment, and he could see the fear in her face, the fear she was trying so desperately to hide. "I will never forgive you for sending her there if she dies."

Tyrion met her eyes. He feared for Myrcella as much as she did, though he was trying to hide it, but he would not let that slide by without a comment. "Just as you will never forgive me for sending Jaime away?"

Cersei hissed at him, "You should be glad enough I didn't tell Jaime it was you who sent him away. I spared you that, and this is what becomes of it?"

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose. "You spared yourself telling him the truth of why I was sending him away. And I didn't cause this to happen, Cersei, your son did, when he demanded Sansa Stark make a testimony against Oberyn."

And she had better not think he had forgotten that, either.

He would never forget the look of horror on Sansa's face as the Mountain crushed Oberyn's skull.

Oh, he had been horrified by it, as well as everyone else save for perhaps Cersei and Joffrey, but it must have been a different sort of thing, watching that death and blaming herself totally for it.

His little wife had not recovered since. She walked around like a shell of her former self, sighing and speaking very little, where she had never been much more than a shell of the excitable, sweet young thing he had met a lifetime ago, in Winterfell.

And Tyrion hated that Oberyn's death had caused that expression to never leave her face. He still had his doubts that Oberyn had been guilty of the thing he had been accused of and confessed to, but, whether he had done it or not, Oberyn certainly didn't deserve a death like that for killing Tyrion's father.

Perhaps a drink.

And Sansa...didn't deserve to think Oberyn's death was her doing. She'd been just as much of a pawn in this as she had in Oberyn's plans to enact his revenge against the Lannisters, and out of anyone involved in this; she deserved the blame for what had happened the least.

Because he did understand why she had said what she had, even if he didn't believe his wife to be the murderer she seemed to see herself as. She had as much as admitted to him that the King and Queen had told her to say the things she had, after all.

And she was just a child, younger than Myrcella. A child forced to say anything to save her own neck, and Tyrion was not sure he would have done differently, at her age.

He would like to think he would have done differently now, but then, he'd remained silent, when they dragged Sansa away to the Black Cells and set him free at his own trial.

Had squashed down the disgust that bubbled up inside of him, when he didn't speak up and take the blame anyway, to save her.

Cersei let out an incredulous laugh. "Joffrey did not do this. Oberyn had already confessed! He was already set to fight Ser Gregor, regardless of anything the girl said to free herself from the same fate. If the Martells had any sense of the justice they clamor for, they wouldn't be threatening my daughter's head in retribution!"

Tyrion stared at her. "Cersei, Joffrey could have offered to send home Oberyn's remains. It might have placated them enough into being our allies once more. At the moment? The alliance is held together by your daughter, and the Martells know that. That is why they've married her to Prince Trystane."

"Joffrey is the King," Cersei said, a strange calmness overtaking her. "He did what he did because of it, and we do not have the right to question his decisions."

"Horseshit," Tyrion snapped, and her eyes widened at the word. "You've been questioning every decision he's made since he married the Tyrell girl, though I don't know why you couldn't have started that when he decided to lob off Ned Stark's head. If you had stood by me when I told Joffrey not to offend the Martells even more-"

"Father was more successful at handling him than you ever were," Cersei said coldly then, and Tyrion lifted a brow, not in the mood to receive a lecture about handling Joffrey from her. He opened his mouth to cut her off, but she beat him to it. "And do you know why? Because he understood that when you tell Joffrey that he cannot do something, that is the very thing that will cause him to do it." She paused, then ground out halfheartedly, "Margaery understands that; it's why she's so good at manipulating him."

Tyrion blinked at that, stared at his sister, who ever lamented the fact that Margaery could so easily manipulate him, not hearing the small bit of jealousy in her own voice, the realization buried deep that she could no longer do the same.

He wondered at the fact that Cersei was able to admit that, even now, Margaery could hold such a control over Joffrey. Wondered how she could even be objective enough, about this one thing, to realize where she was going wrong with her son.

Tyrion wasn't blind. He'd seen Cersei tell her son 'no' as often as he had done so himself.

And he supposed that her words made sense, as the words of a mother no longer standing with her son, but on the outside looking in, except...

"Our father was hardly the sort of man to use honey instead of a stick," Tyrion pointed out mildly.

Cersei shook her head, words whisper soft now. "Because he also understood that, at heart, Joffrey was terrified of him. That is why he never listened to me, never listens to you. And if you would get that through your thick skull, perhaps he would start."

Tyrion stared at her.

"I love my son," she said softly. "But I love my daughter, too, and I will not see her killed because you don't know how to do the job Father once thought you could." She pressed her hands onto his desk again and leaned forward. "So use the damn chain around your neck and save her, or I'll see it removed as easily as I saw it given to you."

Tyrion bit the inside of his cheek. He didn't comment that she wouldn't be able to find someone other than Mace Tyrell to take it without offending the Tyrells completely, didn't tell her that he knew of her and her son's plans to have him more permanently removed if he fucked up too badly.

Because he could see the pain in his sister's eyes at the thought of her only daughter's death, and, despite everything, for a moment, his sister was human.

"Cersei," he said, deliberately softening his tone, "I won't allow anything to happen to Myrcella. You know that. She is my favorite niece, and I love her as you do."

"Your niece?" Cersei demanded, raising her eyebrows. "Was she your niece when you bartered her off to...what was it, seduce the Martells into fighting for our side, or just your cyvasse piece?"

Tyrion shook his head, trying not to look at the viper holding Myrcella's necklace at all now. "I was doing what I thought was best for this family. To ensure her future."

Cersei scoffed. "You were doing what you wanted because you are the Hand of the King and wanted to make sure I knew that," she snapped at him, and didn't give him the time to deny her words before she continued. "The Martells will never be on our side." She reached down, picking up the snake. "They will never forgive us for the things our family did to theirs."

Tyrion eyed her, sighed as she turned and strode out the door.

He knew she didn't believe him, didn't know what would make her do so, didn't know if that was even possible, but he would do everything he could to save Myrcella.

And while he was at it, he might just take her advice about Joffrey, too. It couldn't hurt to try it.


	231. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have a semi-drunk Sansa

Tyrion was always busy, these days, with the effort to stop Stannis Baratheon from reaching Winterfell, or at least to figure out how great his chances of winning it were.

The Boltons refused to acknowledge the very real worry of the Lannisters that they might lose Winterfell at all, now, and so Tyrion had very little knowledge of how things were actually going, which she knew he hated.

It was, in all honesty, a relief, his busyness. Sansa didn't want to have to deal with her husband anymore than he seemed to want to deal with Sansa's relationship with Margaery, and Sansa was fine enough with that, but she was getting tired of the stilted silences between the two of them in the quiet moments they were together.

But it did lead to a different problem.

"Shae," she said, gritting her teeth as Shae poked another pin into her skin through the gown she was attempting to add to, "I'm fine."

If anything was proof enough that Shae had never been a lady to someone else before she served Sansa, it was the fact that she couldn't do anything with a strip of cloth, let alone a whole gown.

Still, she was determined, and normally Sansa would be touched by that.

At the moment, though, forced to endure Shae's presence at all hours as a sort of babysitter because Tyrion was not available to provide...distractions, Sansa was beginning to grow tired of her.

All the more so because she was beginning to think that Shae was staying so close to her on Tyrion's orders.

It didn't quite get annoying until after the supper meal, which they ate without Tyrion, when Shae came up with the idea of refitting some of Sansa's gowns. Which Sansa didn't see the point of at all, but she waited patiently through the ministrations until she only had one gown left, and then her ire grew, because an idea of what she could do if she were alone had been forming in Sansa's mind all day, and Shae kept holding her back from that.

"What?" Sansa demanded, as Shae stuck her with another pin and apologized softly for it. "Does my husband think I'm going to go and throw myself into Margaery's - the enemy's - arms the moment you leave me alone?"

"It is not that," Shae blurted, wincing, and Sansa blinked at her. She remembered abruptly that Shae had been the one who told her to go to Margaery in the first place, before that trial, and regretted the question.

Still, Shae was following her like a mother hen, these days.

"Then why?" she demanded, and winced a little at how irritated she sounded.

"Just...I am worried about you," Shae said, face pinching. "Sansa, just days ago you were...you were slated to die, wasting away in the Black Cells. Can you not permit me the worry that you might be pulled away again?"

And Sansa...faltered, at that.

She had not thought of the strain her captivity might have on the people who, strangely enough, cared about her, until Margaery snuck down to her cell and looked so near tears Sansa had started tearing up, herself.

But Shae had not come to visit her. And Sansa knew that Shae cared about her very much, had done so for longer than Sansa had known Margaery.

It was easy forget that, when one spent any length of time alone in the dark isolation of the Black Cells, but Sansa should have realized.

She swallowed hard. "I..." she reached up to brush at her hair. "I know that," she admitted. "I just...It's hard," she blurted, and hated herself a little. "Being up here, around people, after..."

She trailed off, but Shae seemed to understand, nonetheless.

"Right," she said, and seemed to be forcing herself to smile and be calm about it, for Sansa's sake if nothing else. "I'll just..." she stood. "I'll go and ask one of the seamstresses for assistance with this," she said, and gestured for Sansa to step out of it.

Sansa gave her an uncertain smile, and let Shae help her out of the gown, before she helped Sansa into a lighter one, one that still fit her.

She had hated that, Sansa remembered. Hated that Cersei did not let her have more gowns, gowns actually made to fit her, new ones that were not threadbare and held together with pins.

It had changed a little, with Margaery. Margaery had given her two gowns already, and seemed to enjoy lavishing Sansa with them, but she had other things on her mind.

Still. Sansa could not bring herself to care very much about it now. Not after spending over a week alone in the Black Cells, wearing the same damn outfit for all of that time.

Shae gave her another uncertain look as she bundled up Sansa's gown and was on her way, and Sansa did her best to look innocent as she reached for one of the few books still in her possession.

The moment she heard Shae leaving their apartments, Sansa was on her feet, making her way to her husband's chambers.

He was not there, after all, and the bed was cold. She doubted he had slept there last night, had more likely spent the night in his study, working away with their commanders, and Sansa tried not to feel any guilt, about what she was about to do.

She knew there was a chance Tyrion might realize them missing, when he returned, for he dearly loved his wine. But she also knew that he was not exactly a hoarder, and drank it by the bottle, when he could manage it, so there was a chance he might not notice the loss at all.

She was counting on the latter as she picked up the key hidden under the candle sitting on the desk beside his bed, and opened the liquor cabinet.

The wine bottles inside stared back at her, tauntingly, and Sansa didn't know which one to take. She'd only ever had sweet wine, the kind that bubbled in the stomach and tasted more of sugar than of alcohol. Robb had told her that she would hate the taste of wine, because it was far too bitter for a girl like her, but that had been a lifetime ago.

Mind made up, Sansa reached for the one wine bottle left open, a bottle of what she believed was Dornish Red, and uncorked it.

The red liquid stared up at her, and Sansa quickly locked up Tyrion's chambers and hurried back to her own, before anyone had the chance of returning and seeing her there.

The first gulp of wine on her tongue made her grimace, wince as it burned its way down her throat, and Sansa started coughing, leaning forward on her bed and struggling not to sick up.

How was it that her husband enjoyed this stuff?

She supposed it was simply a taste to be acquired, and resolved to do so, taking another long gulp, feeling it burn its way down as she struggled to enjoy it.

She didn't know when she had resolved to break into her husband's liquor cabinet, only knew that today she had yearned to be alone so that she could do just that. Because the thought of drinking away her sorrows, drinking away her confusing feelings about Margaery, about her husband, was appealing enough that she was driven to do just that.

Cersei drank all the time, Sansa thought, uncharitably, and while it didn't seem to make her forget a single slight, there had to be something appealing to it for her, as well.

Forgetting about what had transpired in the last few weeks was appealing to Sansa, though she had no idea how much she would have to drink for that to happen.

She stared down at the bottle, wondered if it was indeed Dornish Red, as her husband claimed was the best of wines. Wondered if she had been incredibly foolish, to choose this vintage instead of one her husband might be less likely to miss.

And then she thought of Oberyn Martell, the Dornish Prince whose life she had forfeited with just a few words, no matter what anyone else said on the matter, and her lack of choice in it.

She wondered how much Dornish Red he'd had in his lifetime, wondered if he cared for it as much as Tyrion, as he seemed to believe that the best things in Westeros came out of Dorne.

She'd never made it to Dorne, Sansa thought idly, and as she took another sip, Sansa realized that she never would.

She supposed she had known that before this. Had known the moment she spoke out against Oberyn, or no, before that, the moment the Tyrell warship had dragged her back to King's Landing, that she never would.

It had been a foolish dream, like the one where she thought she would make it back to Winterfell one day, before she died.

Neither was going to happen, and Sansa took another sip straight from the wine bottle, realizing the appeal of that burning sensation that scraped down her throat as she did so.

There was some appeal to the unpleasant sensation in that at least she wasn't thinking about Oberyn's corpse, the bloodied mashed pieces of him that had remained, once the Mountain was done with him-

Still, she kept at it, drinking until the burning sensation in her throat turned to pleasant warmth in her stomach, until the corners of her vision had gone fuzzy, and she was stumbling over to the closet where her boring, tattered old gowns were.

She picked one out, the solid green one Margaery had once had made for her, for that tourney, and stared at it for several long moments.

It was not quite the colors of House Tyrell, Sansa realized now. The green was too dark for that.

She took another swig of the bottle, and grimaced again, and realized a moment later that she was sitting on the floor with the gown in her lap, and there were tears slipping down her cheeks.

She reached up, brushing at one, and wondered where it had come from.

She should stop now, Sansa thought, as she took another gulp. She had the vague recollection of watching Tyrion sit in their chambers and drink, watching him with fearful eyes as he moved towards her on their wedding night.

Wine turned men into beasts, her septa had always told her, but her septa was dead now, killed by men drunk on bloodlust, not on Dornish Red.

She wondered what wine turned women into, and thought of Cersei. Wondered if Margaery had ever drunk enough to throw herself into a stupor, the way Sansa was trying to do.

Except it didn't seem to be working. She could focus on the growing warmth, now almost unpleasant, in her stomach, but she could still think about how much she had messed things up with Oberyn, could still think about Margaery, and where they had left things before Sansa was imprisoned.

Get out, Margaery had told her, and then she had been sweeping into Sansa's cell, trying to _save_ her-

Sansa didn't understand Margaery. What was worse, she was beginning to wonder if she ever had, and Sansa hated wondering that. She took another gulp, thought that perhaps this one was larger than the last.

And it didn't quite burn as much, on its way down. Sansa wasn't sure what that meant, was only sure that one moment, she felt like sobbing, and the next, she was staring at an empty bottle of wine, and wondering how it had gotten to be that way at all.

And she still...didn't know how she felt. Didn't even know if this was what it was to be drunk, because her fingers were tingling and she felt a bit sick, but that was all.

Still, she was dropping the bottle onto the floor, and it bounced a little, but it didn't shatter. Sansa stared at it for a long moment, reached down and stumbled.

She shook her head, and the feeling of sick grew a little, until it was clawing its way up her throat.

She ignored the feeling, because she’d felt it often enough of late, and gods, she was so tired of that feeling, so tired of the helpless anger which accompanied it.

She just wanted…

Sansa glanced back at the liquor cabinet again, shook her head. Even as she was now, she understood that it would be far too risky to drink anymore else, Tyrion find out about it. She hadn’t even meant to finish this one.

That didn't stop the slight longing she'd felt, like she'd felt before when she was trying to get rid of Shae, for just something to forget what was constantly sitting in the back of her mind, haunting her. The sound of Oberyn's screams as the Mountain...

Sansa ambled back over to the liquor cabinet, stared at the next bottle of Dornish Red sitting there so innocently, taunting here...

She couldn't do it, Sansa realized. She couldn't forget it, or she might have at least forgotten a bit of it now, but it was just sitting there, echoing in her ears, and Sansa wasn't forgetting _anything_.

She shook her head, ears ringing, and suddenly it was of vital importance that she go, she needed to go...

Sansa stumbled from her chambers, out into the apartment she shared with her lord husband, and was relieved when no one was there. Her head was buzzing, but it wasn't unpleasant, like the feeling in her stomach.

Everything looked sideways, and she cocked her head, but it didn't seem to help with that. If anything, she only felt sicker.

Getting to the Maidenvault was much easier than Sansa had thought it would be, and here she was, standing outside the doors of Margaery's chambers.

She didn't hesitate to push them open and walk inside, like she thought she usually did. There was something about them that made Sansa feel like she belonged here, that gave her every right to just walk right in.

Margaery, sitting at one of the sofas with Elinor at her side, blinked at the sight of Sansa, stepping into her chambers.

She gathered herself quickly, though, as she had always been very good at doing. "Sansa. What are you doing here?"

She didn't sound happy to see Sansa, and that made her smile a dim a little, but not for long. She knew she wasn't supposed to be here, after all. Was supposed to be quieter about this.

Sansa smiled, and she didn't quite feel nervous, the way she had the other day when she sought Margaery's comfort without quite knowing why after the news broke that Stannis was marching on Winterfell again.

"I wanted...to talk," she blurted, because that wasn't what she was here for at all, but she thought that was the excuse she usually gave.

Elinor and Margaery exchanged glances, and then Elinor was on her feet, hurrying out the door and very pointedly shutting it behind herself.

Margaery was on her feet, too, and for a moment Sansa feared that she would walk out, as well. She didn't. Instead, she moved toward Sansa, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Is something wrong?" she asked, voice so full of concern, and it was that concern in her tone that pushed Sansa to do what she did next, pressing up against Margaery and kissing her hard and desperately on the lips.

Margaery jerked back for a moment, and then she too was pushing into the embrace, wrapping her arms around Sansa's waist and pulling her closer, kissing at her lips with the same sort of ardor she had in the Black Cells, when she finally came to see Sansa, to ask her to kill a man for her own survival.

The thought only made Sansa kiss Margaery harder, and she knew there was something wrong about that, but she kissed her all the same, leaning into the embrace and wishing for all the world that they would never pull away from each other.

She had been so wrong, she realized, to push Margaery away like she had. Stupidly so, and...

She pulled back abruptly, reaching for the hem of Margaery's gown, tugging on the strings, because she needed her, needed Margaery to understand that as she once had-

"Sansa..." Margaery pulled back then, sniffing at the air. Sansa's brow furrowed. "Are you drunk?" she asked incredulously.

Sansa snorted. "No," she said, and realized a moment later how loud her voice was, when Margaery attempted to shush her. "'M not," she insisted, and Margaery stared at her for several long moments, before rolling her eyes.

"Right," she said, before reaching out and grabbing hold of Sansa's elbow. The touch was pleasantly warm, and Sansa leaned into it, closing her eyes. "Sansa!" Margaery barked, and those eyes flew open again.

Margaery laughed, but it was a rueful sound, and Sansa wondered why she was making it at all. "For gods' sake, come and sit down before you're sick all over my bed sheets," she said, and then she was guiding Sansa down to one of the cushioned sofas in her chambers, laying Sansa down on her side on it.

Sansa breathed a small sigh of relief, and then smiled at Margaery, reaching out and running her fingers through Margaery's hair, sniffing at it.

"I miss this," she whispered, and glanced up at Margaery, who winced. Perhaps she hadn't been whispering after all.

And then Margaery was reaching out, pulling her hair from Sansa's grasp and squeezing Sansa's hand tightly in her own.

"As do I," she whispered, and Sansa blinked at her for a moment, and then offered her a hesitant smile which Margaery didn't return.

"Do you think...do you think we could have it again?" she asked hoarsely, and breathed in the scent of the other woman as she leaned in close.

"I...don't know, Sansa," Margaery breathed. And then she was squeezing her eyes shut, the way Sansa had moments ago when she felt a bit sick. "I would like to think so."

Sansa stared at her, realized that she was breathing hard, but so was Margaery, and she wasn't blinking, either.

Sansa...didn't know what to make of that.

So instead, she pressed forward, pushed her lips against Margaery's.

Margaery seemed startled for a moment, and then she was pulling away, and Sansa felt her heart sink into her stomach.

"I..." Margaery shook her head, gently pushing Sansa back onto the sofa. "Sansa, we can't do this right now."

Sansa gave her her best pout, but thought it wasn't working quite in the way she intended when Margaery looked like she was trying hard not to laugh.

And then she was standing to her feet, walking away from Sansa, and Sansa reached out to her, tried to cling to her, grabbed hold of her sleeve.

Margaery paused, turned to face her once more, her face unreadable as ever, and Sansa felt her annoyance growing, at that. "Sansa..." she said, and Sansa tried to yank her down again.

But she lost hold of Margaery's sleeve easily enough, and she felt her lower lip protruding even further.

Margaery was gone for a few minutes, but then she was back, holding a glass of water in her hand, bidding Sansa to drink.

Sansa stared at it suspiciously for a moment, and then took a sip, and she hadn't realized how thirsty she was until this moment. She gulped the rest of it down, heard the quiet tinkling of Margaery's laughter, and thought it was one of the most beautiful sounds she had ever heard.

"Margaery?" she asked quietly.

"Yes, Sansa?" Margaery's voice was just as quiet, and she was kneeling in front of the sofa again, and Sansa couldn't remember why Margaery hadn't wanted to kiss her suddenly.

"I..." she shook her head to clear it, grimaced at the feeling that gave her. "I'm sorry I ran away to Dorne and left you here," she blurted out, turning and staring at the ceiling of Margaery's chambers.

And Margaery...didn't respond to that. Sansa turned to squint at her again, and thought it was shock on Margaery's face, but she couldn't say for certain.

"Sansa..." that though, that was hesitation in her voice. "I...I didn't blame you for that, not for a single second. I just...that's not why I asked you to get out. You know that, don't you?"

Sansa blinked owlishly at her, and didn't respond.

Margaery sighed, and then the door was opening, and Sansa stiffened at the sight of Shae walking into the room, a half step behind Elinor.

Shae took one look at Sansa and sighed, though Sansa thought it was for a different reason than Margaery had done, a moment earlier.

She moved forward, and she was saying something to Margaery in low tones then, before she reached out and wrapped a lithe arm around Sansa's shoulders, slowly pulling her to her feet.

Sansa still felt sick at what felt like a much more jarring movement, but she couldn't think of that at all, as Shae led her out of Margaery's chambers, and they started walking in the wrong direction.

Sansa's feet stopped, and Shae half-turned towards her. "Sansa..."

"This is the wrong direction," Sansa pointed out archly.

Shae looked less than amused. "We're sneaking through one of the servants' tunnels," she said bluntly. "The Queen and I think it would be a bad idea to parade you through the Keep, where anyone could see the Hand's very drunk wife."

Sansa mulled over this for a moment, and then nodded. Yes, that seemed like a sound idea. "Very well," she murmured, and winced at how loud the sound was. "Lead the way!"

Shae rolled her eyes, and pulled Sansa along.

Sansa wasn't quite sure how they made it back to her chambers in the Tower of the Hand, and she didn't think it was all because of the Dornish Red she'd had earlier.

At least part of it was because she kept replaying in her mind the feel of Margaery's lips, pressed against her own, Margaery's breasts, brushing against her own through the thin fabric of her gown.

Margaery, all around her, and Sansa stumbled after Shae into her chambers with a stupid smile on her face.

Shae eyed her. "Do you feel sick?" she asked, and Sansa shook her head, because she didn't feel sick at all. She felt...very good.

Shae shook her head. "Well, why don't you sit on the bed anyway," she suggested, and that was a good suggestion. Sansa moved to sit down, shook her head a little at the whirring feeling at the back of her head.

Shae's look was one of amusement then, and for some reason, Sansa just knew the other woman was laughing at her.

Laughing at how she had found her, yearning for Margaery and feeling sick, at the same time.

Sansa groaned, shook her head, because Shae didn't understand, she thought, just as Shae walked over with a chamber pot and sank onto the bed beside Sansa.

And that sparked a reaction.

"I...I wish..." She shook her head, reaching for Shae where she never thought she had, in the past.

Shae let her, wrapping an arm around Sansa's shoulders and pulling her in, and the gentle touch made tears spring into Sansa's eyes, because it didn't belong to whom she wanted it to at all.

"I miss her," Sansa sobbed, clutching at Shae's gown, knowing somehow that this was wrong, that she should shut her mouth, but she found suddenly that she was incapable of doing so.

Shae ran a hand through her hair. "I know," she murmured. She bent forward, kissing Sansa's forehead. "I know, dear."

Dear. Sansa tried to remember if her mother had ever called her that.

"I miss her so much, it could make me sick," Sansa went on, and she couldn't tell if she was talking about Margaery now, or her mother. "I..."

Her mother, who was dead now, just like Oberyn Martell. Sansa had betrayed her family, and she had betrayed Oberyn. Perhaps there was no hope for her, at all, despite what Margaery and Tyrion and Shae said to try to convince her otherwise.

Shae's fingers were trailing gentle circles in her hair. "Sansa," she said gently, "breathe."

Sansa blinked up at her. "Do you think...do you think what I did was wrong?" she asked. "With..." she had been about to say 'with Margaery,' to ask if Shae had thought her very foolish indeed to walk out of Margaery's chambers that day, as she had, but those were not the words that came out. "With Oberyn?"

She blinked. Shae cleared her throat.

"No," she said, in the next moment, and Sansa blinked at her in surprise.

Because she knew that Tyrion had been silently judging her for that, blaming the rest of his wretched family for it, but judging Sansa anyway, because he'd had some plot to save her, and she had turned on an ally instead of trusting him to do so.

Margaery hadn't talked about it since.

But no one had told her that it was the right thing to do, and Sansa blinked again.

"You don't?" she asked, and her voice was very small, but she didn't give Shae the chance to respond.

"I don't...I don't understand it," she told Shae, wiping at her eyes. "He...he used me. He wasn't the man I thought he was. But I killed him. I...I knowingly sent him to his death, and..." she shook her head. "I'm not the person I thought he was, either. Margaery isn't the person I thought she was."

Shae smiled gently at her, wiped at her cheek. "We don't all fit into little boxes, Sansa, no matter how much easier that would make the world."

Sansa squinted at her, and felt bile rising up in her throat. "I, uh, 'ma be sick," she said, and Shae moved just in time, rushing to reach across the bed for Sansa's chamber pot and holding it out for her.

"For gods' sake," Sansa heard Shae mutter, as her eyes fluttered closed, "It's like dealing with Tyrion in the morning. How much did you drink?"

Sansa gestured vaguely over to the dress; the one Margaery had given her, which of course was ruined now. She hadn't realized, in her hurry to find Margaery that she had spilled what remained in the bottle all over it.

She thought she should feel a little guilty about that, but Sansa couldn't feel much of anything, anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you think it's unrealistic that Sansa would get drunk after one bottle...you have not met my drinking friends, haha. I'm also assuming that Dornish Red is fairly potent because it's seen as one of the best wines in Westeros. I also tried to take into account that Sansa's still pretty slight and thin...  
> Oh, you know what, just enjoy the drunk!Sansa, haha


	232. SANSA

The morning greeted Sansa far too brightly, and the sound of Shae pittering about her chambers was far too loud.

Sansa groaned, turning onto her back and rubbing at her forehead.

Shae glanced up from whatever it was she was doing. "I trust you've learned your lesson?" Shae asked, though there was a hint of amusement in the stern words.

Sansa just groaned again, tried to sit up, and felt a bit worse than she had. "What...What time is it?" she asked, because it was far too bright in her chambers.

Shae still sounded amused when she answered. "After noon," she told Sansa, the words greeted with another groan. "Tyrion managed to convince the King that you were too ill to have the noon meal with them, but he wasn't happy about it."

Sansa shook her head, regretted the motion immediately. "Did I...how much did I have?"

Shae snorted. "I've only known a few people able to get themselves drunk enough to be sick on just two thirds of a bottle of wine, even Dornish Red. You're a bit of a lightweight, I believe the term is," she said, though her voice was fond. "You should be glad that it didn't take you as long as it does Tyrion, or he'd be furious that you drank away his wine cabinet."

Sansa stared at her dully. "I...Does he know?"

Shae raised a brow. "How exactly was I supposed to keep it from him, with you sick through the night?" she asked.

Sansa reached up and rubbed at her temples again. "Is he angry?" she asked, and her lips felt very parched.

As if she had sensed this, or perhaps because she knew it would happen, Shae was suddenly standing in front of her, holding out a glass of water. Sansa yanked it from her hands and chugged it down.

The feeling of thirst didn't quite leave her, and Sansa closed her eyes, because her head was pounding.

"He's not," Shae said, though her lips were pursed, when Sansa squinted up at her. "And you didn't drink enough to look that hung over, dear." She paused. "He said that if you want to get drunk again, next time let him know."

Sansa felt her jaw slacken, but then, she supposed she should have expected that from a man who drank wine like water, even if he was her much older husband.

"Also, Lady Olenna wishes to speak with you in the gardens when you're well enough," Shae told her, and when Sansa opened her mouth to protest, "She was not quite as easy to put off as the King was, I believe, and said she would come here if you refused to meet her there. Shall I tell her you'll be ready in an hour?"

Sansa gaped at her. "I...suppose," she muttered, a bit mullishly, and Shae laughed.

"Do you need help getting ready or should I go and tell her now?" she asked, and Sansa sent her a small glare as she got to her feet.

And...huh. Once she was standing, Sansa didn't feel so bad, after all. Her head still ached unpleasantly, but she hardly felt sick, and she didn't feel dizzy, as for some reason, she'd been expecting to.

"I'm fine," she assured Shae, but the other woman seemed reluctant to go.

Sansa sighed, reaching for one of the gowns Shae had mended the day before, and patiently let Shae fit her into it, trying not to fret over why Olenna would wish to speak with her.

It could only be, she thought, due to her showing up drunk in Margaery's chambers the night before. A reprimand, for endangering her granddaughter so brazenly, and Sansa shuddered, and didn't want to face the woman at all.

She didn't know what she'd been thinking.

Seven hells, she knew exactly what she'd been thinking, but it hadn't worked at all the way Sansa had expected it to, had seen it work for her husband, and she supposed she deserved every word of such a lecture.

Shae finished dressing her, and then she was telling Sansa to drink some more water, to try and eat something of the pastries here before she went off to square against Olenna, and, with one more concerned look, she was off.

Sansa slumped a little, once she was gone.

She'd heard Tyrion complaining often enough that he didn't remember a thing about the days he got very drunk. He said that often enough about their wedding night.

Sansa was beginning to realize he had only said that because he was embarrassed about what had happened that night, or perhaps to spare her blushes.

Sansa remembered everything she had said, everything to Margaery and everything to Shae, and she felt herself going crimson, just now.

But there was nothing for it, Sansa thought. If she had endangered Margaery, she deserved whatever the Queen of Thorns wished to throw at her, and with that in mind, she followed behind nervously as Shae led her to the gardens.

Olenna was waiting inside the very gazebo where she had once asked Sansa for the truth about Joffrey, when she arrived.

Sansa supposed there must be some reasoning behind that, and was rather terrified at the thought, even as she took her seat and one of Olenna's ladies moved forward to serve some wine for the older woman.

Olenna eyed it, and then said, "None for Lady Sansa, I think. Do you have any cold tea?"

Sansa blushed a little more fiercely, and any thoughts she'd entertained about this meeting being about anything else were gone, then.

Olenna gave her a shrewd look. "I find chilled wine to be one of food's few delights left to me, at my age," she said. "I suppose it would be rather foolish to see if you enjoyed it as well, however." And then she was eying Shae. "You can go, girl. I'll have someone call for you when we need you."

Shae arched a brow, glanced pointedly at Sansa, but Sansa merely nodded. Shae turned and left, and moments later, Olenna was dismissing her servants, as well.

Sansa fidgeted in her seat, took a sip of the iced tea one of the servants had poured for her, and wished she was hungry enough to munch on some of the foods left behind by the servants.

Olenna didn't speak, and it only made Sansa want to fidget further, because she had a feeling Olenna was waiting for Sansa to break the silence, and she couldn't think of anything to say that wouldn't only embarrass her further.

Finally, she broke, because she had a feeling that Olenna would be happy enough to make her wait forever if she so wished. "I, uhm, I am so terribly sorry about last night. I..."

Because it was clear that Olenna knew about it, and that was a rather disturbing thought. Had Margaery told her, or did Olenna Tyrell have spies in every corner of Westeros?

Olenna raised a hand, and Sansa fell silent, the blush creeping down her neck, now.

"I've always hated sitting around, drinking tea and knitting," Olenna said. "When I was younger, I used to think it was the idiot sex's way of keeping us women out of affairs they thought we had no understanding of. Or punishing us, for having cunts."

Sansa blushed again. "I don't..."

"But then I started having wine instead of tea, or mixing it in, and these sorts of meetings became more enjoyable," Olenna said. "It helped that I learned they were also a good way to plot without all of the idiots around."

Sansa blinked at her.

"Though I suppose that would be something of a problem, for you," Olenna continued.

Sansa shook her head. "I won't do it again," she promised.

Olenna met her gaze levelly, and Sansa saw the anger there, but she saw something else, as well, something she couldn't define. "No," she said calmly, "I expect you won't."

She words sounded vaguely threatening, and yet didn't at the same time, and Sansa could only bring herself to stare at the other woman in bemusement.

Olenna finally sighed.

"Do you know why we women engage in such...inane activities, Lady Sansa?" Olenna asked, setting her wine glass rather loudly back on the table. "Why we deem these activities important, truly?"

Sansa swallowed. "I don't-"

"Sewing, drinking tea, idle gossip," Olenna continued, and then paused to take another sip of her tea and reach for a cube of cheese, said a word that made Sansa start, before she met Sansa's eyes. "Disgusting, this. It seems as if the Lannisters can't produce anything worth having."

Sansa blinked at her again. She was not entirely certain she was following what was going on. She had come here expecting a lecture, and yet.

"Because it soothes the vast majority of us," Olenna told her. "Tempers that raging fire hanging just below the surface of our outward sanity, reminds us of our place in the world." She glanced down at her needle disdainfully as she wiped a hand on her napkin. "Patience is a virtue, and one every woman bled must learn, and so she must learn to soothe that impatient fire raging in her, demanding more out of a life that will not be kind to her."

"Margaery told me to speak against Oberyn," Sansa blurted out then, in a small whisper, did not need to look at Lady Olenna to know that she had the woman's attention. "And I don't know if it was because she wanted to save me, or if it was because she wanted revenge against the Prince of Dorne, and I can't stand to look at her while I don't know that. And yet I can't bring myself to pull away from her. I'm..."

Lost.

Olenna peered at Sansa for a long moment, before nodding once, as if to herself. "You don't know if you can trust her."

Sansa nodded, inordinately relieved that someone else understood, and she didn't see the point in lying, where Olenna seemed able to parse out her emotions, anyway. And besides, confessing them to someone, anyone...She was so foolish, Sansa thought, and yet she couldn't help it when the word blurted past her lips. "No."

Olenna was silent for a moment, and Sansa wondered if she should have revealed such a thing to a Tyrell about her granddaughter at all, wondered what she thought she was doing. Surely Margaery would hear all of this...

And then Olenna finally spoke.

"Does it matter?"

Sansa blinked at the old woman, brow wrinkling, because that was not the response she had expected at all. "I'm sorry?"

"Does it matter?" Olenna repeated, and Sansa blinked owlishly at her, wondered if she was sicker than she thought, because she didn't seem to be following this conversation at all.

"I..." she thought so. Her mother and father had always trusted each other, even though their love for one another wasn't as passionate as...Anyway, now she wasn't sure.

"Do you love my granddaughter, girl?" Olenna demanded, and Sansa's head jerked up at the question.

Sansa knew she was gaping like a fish, but she couldn't help it, startled by the outright question. The question she had been avoiding from the moment she fell into bed with Margaery. "I...I..."

Olenna Tyrell's face softened, but only somewhat, as she let out a long, pitying sigh that Sansa didn't want to hear. "I came back to King’s Landing not because Lord Tywin had died, the old brute, but because my grandson had sent me a raven detailing that my levelheaded granddaughter had fallen into bed with the enemy’s wife.”

Sansa’s eyes widened. “I...I swear, my lady, I’m not some sort of spy for the Lannisters-“

“If you were, I’d have already handled it,” Olenna dismissed, waving a hand, and Sansa paled a little, not daring to ask what she meant by that. “But, for a while there, I thought that my granddaughter had lost her head. She’s always been most sensible, and suddenly she’s obsessed with a girl for whom it isn’t advantageous to be obsessed with.”

Sansa licked her lips. “I...”

Olenna’s expression softened. “Sending a man to his death for your own skin is a horrible thing, the first time, but you are a lady, Sansa Stark, and this will not be the last time you do so, no matter what you think now."

Sansa swallowed. "It...it wasn't the first time," she whispered hoarsely, and Olenna squinted at her, but Sansa could not bring herself to hold back the words, now. Not when someone was finally listening. "I...I was the one to tell the Queen that my lord father was planning to leave King's Landing, that horrible day when he was arrested. I was the one who got him killed because I appealed to Joffrey."

Olenna clucked her tongue, and her face was hard again, though her words were not. "That wasn't your fault, child."

And her words were so soft that Sansa felt tears filling her eyes. Olenna stared at her for a moment, and then reached out, taking Sansa’s hand and squeezing it hard.

Sansa sucked in a breath, because she couldn't abide that lie anymore than she could lie about her confusing feelings for Margaery. "It was. If I hadn't been such a stupid, naive little girl..." She shook her head. "And anyway, if it wasn't my fault, if I was just being manipulated, used, then Margaery was the one who used me," she said. "And I can't..."

She shook her head. She couldn't fathom that at all, couldn't reconcile that with the woman whom she cared for so dearly.

"Now you listen here, girl," Olenna interrupted her smoothly. "And listen well. You were a little girl at the time, and the Lannisters would always have taken your father for a traitor, in the end. This was much the same to that, and had nothing to do with right and wrong, or anyone being blameless in this situation."

Sansa swallowed hard, felt tears pricking at her eyes. "My lord Tyrion told me they weren't planning to kill Robb, at first. They wanted my brother Robb's submission. That was Joffrey. And then Lord Tywin."

Olenna shrugged. "And when your brother arrived in King's Landing and bent the knee, the Lannisters would have slaughtered him and all of his kneeling army," she told the girl bluntly. "It had nothing to do with you."

Sansa could see that arguing further wasn't going to convince either one of them, and she let out a small, ladylike sigh. "This one did, though."

And then Lady Olenna was moving, and Sansa startled a little as the old woman moved around the table they shared to stand beside Sansa, wrapping one arm around too thin shoulders and pulling her into the old woman's embrace.

Sansa started at first, for she could not remember the last time anyone but Margaery had embraced her without having to worry about a dagger in her back, but soon enough she found herself leaning into the touch, taking in the smell of rosewater and powder and finding herself horribly reminded of her old septa.

Olenna clucked her tongue when the tears pricked at Sansa's eyes again, feeble old arms pulling Sansa closer still, until Sansa could barely breathe, but the smothering feeling felt so nice for just a few moments, and she clung to the old woman, and damn decorum in this moment.

"So few people get the chance to ever find love in this life," Olenna whispered against Sansa's hair, brushing at Sansa's sleeve with her gentle fingers, "So few ever have that chance. You are fortunate, Sansa, that you've had it."

Sansa jerked up. _I love you, Sansa Stark_. “I...I don’t know...”

Olenna clucked her tongue when Sansa made to speak. "Or damned, I'm not sure of which yet." And then the old woman pulled back, giving Sansa a serious look. "And you do. Surely it isn't necessary to trust someone with everything in order to love them, child," she murmured. "Or we'd have even lesser of a chance of finding it."

Sansa thought of the months that had gone by without her ever confiding in Margaery that she planned to leave, knew that she had loved the other woman still, and wondered if perhaps Olenna was right.

Olenna lifted Sansa's chin, forced the girl to meet her eyes. "Nor is it necessary to sacrifice what we are in order to love someone else, and if you do love Margaery, or even if you don't, there's no need to push her away just because of a little thing like trust. You are a lady, Sansa, and you live in King's Landing." She paused. "Do you think Cersei trusts her brother as much as she loves him? Trusts her son?" Another pause. "A paltry example, but you must see my point."

Sansa swallowed, hiccupped, took the handkerchief Olenna Tyrell offered her to dab at her eyes.

"I admit that Margaery is doing what she thinks is best for her family whenever she does anything," Olenna said. "But the curious change in my granddaughter is what recalled me to King's Landing, not that she had found someone to fill her bed."

Sansa blinked at her.

"Don't be so quick to believe that you cannot trust her, if it hurts you so," Olenna continued. "I cannot promise you that what she does will always make her worthy of that trust, but don't be afraid of it every minute, girl. This is King's Landing."

Sansa licked her lips. "I...I want to trust her," she whispered hoarsely. "I do."

"Then you mourn what you did together," Olenna told her seriously, "And then you move on, or you'll fall without ever having lived, child. And that would be a far sadder thing, indeed."

"Did you ever find it?" Sansa whispered, glancing up at the old woman.

Olenna blinked at her, bemused. "Find what, child?"

"Love," Sansa whispered, through swollen lips.

Olenna gave her a long look, and then picked up her tea cup once more. There were thorns painted onto the delicate glass, but no flowers, not for this old woman. Sansa wondered if she had asked for that specifically.

"No, child," Olenna murmured, "Not the kind you speak of."

Sansa stared at her. “Why not?” she blurted.

Olenna blinked. “I suppose...I was too frightened to look for it.”

And that thought, Sansa realized abruptly, frightened her more than trusting Margaery again quite did. Not much more, but it was enough.


	233. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Could just as easily have called this chapter "Communication." Next one'll be "Smut."

Sansa remembered quite suddenly the reasons she had walked out of that door, when Margaery told her to leave. Remembered the warm sand of Dorne, the stories Ellaria Sand had told her of the place where she could be safe and call home, at least for a time.

She had resented that she could not have all of that, resented Margaery for being, as Margaery had accused, a "consolation prize."

And now, she thought she had been incredibly foolish.

Of course she had wanted to leave King's Landing. Of course she wished to be free of this wretched, horrid place, to feel the sun on her skin again without the scent of shit and tragedy all around her.

But Margaery had let her go, and Sansa couldn't abide that more than she could abide the resentment she had felt at not being able to go, in the end. Margaery had confessed that she knew...something, and yet, she hadn't fought for Sansa at all.

And Sansa could pretend that she could be happy in Dorne, away from this place, but all she could think about was how, for better or for worse, she couldn't imagine being with someone other than Margaery.

It scared her.

And while she didn't quite agree with what Olenna had said, she was here, wasn't she? Standing outside of Margaery's door, screwing up her courage to knock, as she had always done when she wasn't...Sansa blushed at how foolish she had been the other day, getting drunk as if she had the privilege of acting foolish around so many enemies, here in King's Landing.

She couldn't quite pinpoint why she was here, knew only that she was miserable and that the times she spent in Margaery's presence were perhaps the few times in the years she had lived in King's Landing where she did not feel miserable.

And she no longer understood why she had been avoiding the other girl.

Thinking of her made Sansa think of Oberyn, and what they had plotted against him, but everything made her think of Oberyn. His broken body may haunt her mind in the waking hours as well as sleeping, but Margaery was here, alive, and she had asked Sansa to do as she had only in the interest of saving her life, Sansa knew that.

She knocked.

There was silence on the other side of the door, and Sansa felt a brief panic, that Margaery was not even here, that she had come here all the way here for nothing and Margaery was no doubt sharing her husband's bed-

The door opened, and Margaery, clad in her nightclothes already and holding a candle, which let Sansa know she had already sent her ladies away, squinted out at her.

"Sansa," Margaery breathed in surprise, as the other girl pushed past her and burst into her room, afraid that if she did not move quickly she would not make it in here at all.

Sansa paused then, now that she was standing in the middle of Margaery's chambers, unsure of herself.

She hadn't been here, not counting the time when she was drunk not quite out of her wits, since Margaery had thrown her out, and the memory sparked heavily, made her wince.

She could see Margaery sitting on the bed, snapping at her to " _get out_ " in a tone she'd never used with Sansa, felt her shoulders tensing because of it.

Behind her, Margaery was silent, as if she felt the oppressive weight of that last meeting as well, and Sansa found herself suddenly shivering.

"Are you cold?" Margaery asked behind her, and the sound made Sansa jump, spin around to face her.

Gods, Margaery looked beautiful like this, without all of the effort that went into making her look presentable. Wearing nothing but a sheer white gown, her hair tumbling messily around her shoulders, half asleep.

This was the Margaery that Sansa had-

Sansa cleared her throat, shrugged.

Margaery hesitated, and then reached out, taking Sansa's hand in her free one, leading her over to the bed.

Sansa stared at it, thought of the last time they had slept in it together, the tension, the lack of feeling. She hadn't understood at all what she had, she realized, and then she wasn't thinking of that time at all, but all the times before it, the times when they had fallen into the bed laughing, unable to get their clothes off quickly enough.

She sank onto the bed, let Margaery press a thin blanket over her shoulders, leaned into the warm touch of Margaery's hands on her back.

But there was a tension vibrating in those hands, and Sansa glanced up at her, wondered how Margaery could think where her mind was a mess, in this moment.

Margaery's eyes were dark and unfathomable as they met Sansa's. "Did someone see you?"

And Sansa heard the question, she did; but she couldn't understand it, could only see the slow movement of Margaery's lips, the gentle curve of her bared neck, and she felt tears stinging in her eyes.

She had killed a man. A man who was supposed to save her. All she had left was the woman in front of her, and she couldn't feel any of the resentment she once had over that at all.

She moved, wrapping a hand around the back of Margaery's neck and pulling her in, kissing her with the sort of hard passion she'd forgotten on her return trip from Dorne. She heard Margaery's surprised squawk against her, a rush of air into Sansa's mouth, but then Margaery's hands were on her waist, gripping tightly, her lips parting as she pushed into the kiss, wet and anxious and desperate as Sansa felt.

They'd been desperate when they kissed in the Black Cells, too, but Sansa was beginning to realize that kiss had been nothing like this one. It was passion born out of the need to comfort each other, but this, what was happening between them right now, was nothing like this.

This was sweetwine on the lips, the scent of roses in the air, and it felt like making up for lost time.

Sansa didn't know how long the kiss lasted, knew only that when Margaery finally pulled away, her lips were swollen and her eyes dark, hands still tangling in the waist of Sansa's frayed gown. She glanced up and down Sansa appreciatively, but then, "Sansa..."

And Sansa remembered that she had asked Sansa a question, but couldn't remember at all what it was. She stared at the porcelain incline of Margaery's neck, and then she was moving forward, could hear the small chuckle on Margaery's lips as she bent down to devour it, because it was the only thing she could think to do, just now.

Margaery tilted her neck to give Sansa more access, and Sansa licked along that supple line. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend that everything of the last few weeks hadn't happened at all, that this was how things had always been, between them.

Margaery made a soft, whining noise of pleasure, and Sansa gasped into the arch of Margaery's neck, sucked lowly on it until Margaery had thrown her head back and seemed to quite forget the question she had yet to get an answer for.

"I don't know," Sansa whispered finally, shifting to kneel up on the bed, and tossing the blanket off her shoulders, because suddenly it was quite warm. She worked her way quickly down Margaery's body, lapping at her nipples through the thin threads of her gown before moving down her stomach, hands not quite gentle in their roaming.

Margaery stiffened, the heat of the moment abruptly lost with whatever thought had just hit her, though Sansa could easily guess. It was not as if they had done this in the Black Cells. "Sansa?"

"I don't care," Sansa whispered, glancing up at her through lidded eyes. "I don't care about that, and I don't care about Dorne." She did, she did very much, but it wasn't enough, anymore. Nothing was ever enough, and Dorne was so far out of her reach she could no longer feel it under her fingers, while Margaery was _here_. "Do you?"

Margaery reached behind Sansa, ran her fingers down the ties of Sansa's gown, pulling at them, and shuffled down the bed with one arm tangling in Sansa's hair as the other girl's lips sucked at her neck.

She wasn't quite an active lover as she had once been, Sansa thought, and felt a pang of guilt for that, remembered how hard Margaery had tried to make her feel something, before giving up on it, and resolved to make up for that, in this moment.

When her hands reached beneath the folds of Margaery's nightgown and tangled in her pubic hair, Margaery gasped, tossed her head back onto the Lannister golden blankets.

Sansa stared at her avidly, resolved to remember every face Margaery made in this moment, as her hands tangled in her nightgown to allow Sansa more access.

Sansa smiled, a small, victorious smile, dipping her fingers between the folds of Margaery's womanhood to rub at her clit.

Margaery gave a small, startled cry, and bit her tongue so hard Sansa hoped it wasn't bleeding, and that reaction only made Sansa want to repeat the move, pressing a little harder this time, enjoying the feel of Margaery's rapidly dampening cunny against her fingers.

She could feel herself growing wet at the sensation, and wondered how she could have ever not done so.

 _Because she could have had Dorne_ , her mind supplied, but she pushed it stubbornly aside, remembered something her old septa had told her, that there was no use crying over what could have been.

She should have been more attentive to her septa when she said the things that mattered, rather than listening only to the things that didn't, Sansa thought, and then her thumb was pressing against that spot up inside of Margaery that had her coming against Sansa's fingers, the warm juices spurting out of her so quickly that Sansa couldn't help but wonder if she hadn't touched herself since telling Sansa to leave.

Well, she shouldn't be so surprised by that. Sansa hadn't, either. Even if she'd had more of an excuse, locked away in the Black Cells.

They lay panting when it was over, Margaery in the throes of her pleasure and Sansa from watching Margaery, from knowing that she could have missed this moment, and everything in her rebelled at the thought.

Perhaps Olenna was right about one thing, she thought, and instantly didn't want to think it again, because it was far more terrifying than sharing the bed of someone she wasn't certain she could trust.

But then Margaery was sitting up, gathering her nightgown and pulling it off over her head, letting it tumble to the ground. She stood, nude, and walked over to the little desk across the room, picking up the pitcher there and pouring two glasses of water, while Sansa admired what was on display for her.

She didn't make any quips about wine, the way her grandmother had done, and Sansa was at least grateful for that, as she returned to the bed and held out one of the cups to Sansa.

Sansa took a hesitant sip, and realized how thirsty she was then. Gulped down the rest of it, to the amused look on Margaery's face.

And the amused look was what broke her, because Sansa had not actually come here to have sex with Margaery. Had come here for an entirely different reason, and she blushed now at how distracted she had gotten.

She could only hope that Margaery hadn't thought she was just using her, a moment before, once she uttered these words.

"What am I to you?" Sansa demanded quietly, setting aside the cup.

Margaery blinked at her in bemusement. "Sansa, what..."

Sansa licked her lips. "I need to know. Please. Because I..." she waved her hand around the room, "I want this, I do, but I...Am I just a distraction, from Joffrey, from your duties as queen?"

Margaery lifted a hand to cover her mouth, let her empty glass fall onto the bed. "Sansa, of course not."

"No," Sansa interrupted, voice a little colder than she would have liked, and she winced at the same time that Margaery did. "No, this isn't some obvious thing. Tell me what I am to you. I..." she bit her lip. "Some days, I feel like I know, and others, I think you are only manipulating me like you manipulate Joffrey, and I don't want to think that at all, but..."

But everyone in King's Landing had manipulated her to their own gains, and if she had just been a pawn when she gave her confession, like Olenna and Tyrion seemed to think, then Margaery had manipulated her then, too.

And she knew why Margaery had done it, but still, the thought rankled.

Margaery worried her lower lip. "I've always cared about you, Sansa," she said. "I've hated seeing how very sad you are here, and I've gone to desperate lengths to fix that, even working against my own family's desires. You must know that."

Sansa swallowed, lips suddenly very dry. "Then why didn't you come to me, after the plan for me to marry Willas Tyrell fell through? Why did you...why did you leave me so alone then, if you've held regard for me all of this time?"

Margaery looked away, and Sansa reached out, tilting her chin back to face Sansa's.

"You won't believe me," Margaery said softly, and Sansa felt her eyes harden a little.

"Try me," she said, and Margaery sighed.

"You know that my brother Loras..." she hesitated, taking in a long breath. "He..."

"I know," Sansa interrupted what was clearly going to be an awkward revelation, what with the way Sansa had once confided in Margaery her silly crush on the boy.

Margaery smiled; it looked more like a wince. "He has a...companion from Baelish's brothels whom he meets regularly," she said. "A prostitute there."

Sansa bit her lip, thought of Janek.

Margaery tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear. Sansa thought she had liked it better where it was before, hanging down. "He told him about the plan to marry you to Willas," she said softly, "And that was why it fell through. And I...I didn't know you well, back then."

"But...we were friends," Sansa said, and hated how the words came out like a question.

Margaery reached out, grasping Sansa's hands in her own. "Yes," she said fiercely, "We were, even if I don't really understand how..." she bit her lip, pausing. "Anyway, I felt guilty and terribly cruel, for giving you that hope, and then tearing it away from you. And it might have been terribly selfish of me, because I know how alone you are here, but I did not want to see that hope lost in your eyes, knowing that it was my own doing."

Sansa stared at her. She often wondered what it would have been like, to marry Willas Tyrell in Cersei's place. She knew that Cersei referred to him as a decrepit cripple, but knew that he was not so bad off as that.

She thought he might have been a kinder man to marry than her husband, but then, she didn't know him at all, knew only that he wasn't a Lannister.

But Sansa had stopped fantasizing about that, when she was thrown into the Black Cells. Had stopped fantasizing about a lot of things, then, what it would be like to live in Dorne among them.

She didn't know how to respond to what Margaery had told her. Was nervous of responding at all.

But it was Margaery who broke the silence.

"I'm sorry," Margaery said quietly, and Sansa's head snapped up. "I suppose I didn't realize, at the time, the full weight of what I was putting you through, when I asked you to testify against Oberyn. I just...I didn't know how else to save you. But I didn't do it because Joffrey wanted to stop the war with Dorne." She hesitated, and then forged ahead. "I didn't give a damn about that at all, not even when I should have."

Sansa swallowed, glancing away from her, and Margaery followed the other girl's gaze, the both of them staring at Margaery's bookshelf in silence for several moments, breathing heavily.

Sansa wanted to speak, but there was a terrible weight on her chest, pressing down, and she could barely think, let alone force sound past her lips.

"My brother is going to live," Margaery blurted, and Sansa's eyes returned to her once more, surprised at how impossibly guiltier she looked, now. "I received a raven from my mother in Highgarden. He is on the mend now. The poison has left his system." She swallowed hard, lifted a hand to forestall the words she knew Sansa would use to celebrate this. "I wanted Oberyn dead because I thought Willas was going to...that he was already...And I thought Oberyn..."

Sansa reached out a hand, squeezing her shoulder. "That is not why I killed him. I didn't...I didn't do it because you asked me to."

She had said as much to Tyrion, when he accused her of being a pawn in such a gentle voice, had thought as much when Olenna said that such things hardly mattered, and she meant it then.

She meant it now. She had just wanted to know. Wanted to know whether Margaery saw her as weak as everyone else seemed to, and that weight in her chest might have been relief.

Margaery stared at her. "I...I don't understand," she said finally.

"I did it because I saw the book he was looking for, in your chambers," Sansa whispered, and she jerked her head towards the bookshelf again. The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses, though, by the widening of Margaery's eyes, she knew exactly which book Sansa was speaking of.

"Sansa..." she breathed.

Sansa forced herself to keep talking. "I remembered that I saw it, sitting proud on a shelf, while he was asking me questions about it that were once intended to bring down a dynasty. I didn't know what he thought he could prove, but he kept asking about it, the very same book that had killed my father, and it made me nervous for him. And you were making love to me in the chambers allotted to the King's wife. And I think I knew, then, that I was going to have to make a choice. That I was going to have to choose between my freedom and lying to you. I was angry when that choice was taken away from me, but I think I knew..."

 _I'd chosen wrong_. The words would not emerge. Margaery went still, anyway.

Margaery's throat caught. "Sansa-"

"I knew that before, of course," Sansa whispered. "I knew there was a fear in me, that if I told you, I would have come to mean too much to you for you to let me go, to let me make that choice in the end, but it wasn't you who took it away from me, did you?"

Margaery went a bit pale. "Sansa, I wouldn't have-"

Sansa held up a hand, forestalling whatever she might have said. "But I also knew that if I said the words aloud, if I understood when I said them that I was going to have to choose between freedom in Dorne and you..." she smiled bitterly, a coward's smile, though Margaery wasn't staring at her as if she thought Sansa was a coward, and Sansa didn't understand the look she was giving her instead at all. "Well, there was never any choice, was there? Not truly. That's why...that's why I ran without saying a word."

"I understand that you are angry with me," Margaery said finally, carefully, "Angry that you had to choose between me and what you could have had. But. I'm angry too."

Sansa blinked at her in bemusement. She wasn't angry anymore. She thought she had made that clear, just now. That she had been, but she'd made her choice, in the Black Cells, for what was left of a choice that it was.

But then she saw the way that Margaery was vibrating, the way her hands had been when they placed the blanket on Sansa's back when she first entered the room.

She wished to have that blanket back, just now.

"You were going to leave with Prince Oberyn," Margaery said softly, and Sansa's brows furrowed. "You were going to leave, and you didn't even tell me. Sansa, did you truly think me so cruel that I would have kept you here, would have kept you from escaping this horrid place?" She shook her head, speaking again just as Sansa opened her mouth. "No, don't answer that. I suppose you just told me as much. I..." she reached up, rubbing at her forehead.

"I didn't want you to worry," Sansa started, but Margaery shook her head.

"It wouldn't have worried me," she blurted. "I would have been relieved, that you could get out of this hell," she whispered. "But I could have helped you, Sansa. I could have gotten you out of King's Landing long before this happened, could have made sure the Martells were trustworthy and weren't going to fuck you the way they did. I understand why you didn't help me, and I know you're not helpless, but Sansa..."

"You can't protect me from everything, Margaery," Sansa whispered, and Margaery lifted her head.

"I...I know that," she murmured, brushing that loose strand back behind her ears, where it had fallen again. "And...I wish that I could, but I am trying to accept that I cannot hold you in some corner, hidden away from the world, and pull you out when I want you. And...I'm sorry that I tried, and didn't realize how difficult that must have been for you, watching me be with Joffrey, too."

Sansa swallowed, licked her lips. "I don't know what to say," she said finally. "I...I want you, but..." she shook her head. "Everything we talked about...before..." and they both grimaced at the reminder of their fight, "it's all still there."

It was, but it wasn't, at the same time, and that heavy feeling on top of Sansa's chest was still there, as well. She realized now that it wasn't relief.

Margaery leaned forward, waited for Sansa to meet her gaze.

"I can't give you all of what you want, Sansa," Margaery whispered against her skin. "I know that it is not what you want to hear, but I can't give you more than stolen kisses and fleeting moments of passion."

"I know," Sansa told her, gently.

Margaery shook her head, continued, "I can't give you the promise you want me to make," she continued. "Because first and foremost, I am Joffrey's wife, Joffrey's queen. My family wants that for me, but I want it, as well."

Sansa nodded. "Margaery, I know."

"I can't give you Dorne," Margaery told her.

Sansa did pull back, then. "Margaery..."

"I know you would have been happy there," Margaery told her, "and I wish to the Seven that you could have gone. That it was not a Tyrell warship that pulled you back into this hell. And I...I care about you, Sansa, and I want you, more than I sometimes think I should, but there are things you could have had from women in Dorne that you will never have from me."

Sansa nodded, expression tight, now. "I know," she murmured. "And for a while after I returned, that was all I could think about. How I could have been with any woman I wanted in Dorne, out in the open, with no one to prevent us from being together. How I could have been with a dozen women, without having to worry about their husbands killing me for it." Her voice shook. "And, more than that, I could have been away from this place, where everything is twisted and manipulated until it barely resembles what it once was." She narrowed her eyes, leaning forward to take Margaery's hands into her own. "I could have had all of that, and been happy besides, and I hated that it was taken from me because of other men’s politics."

Margaery nodded, lowering her gaze. "Then I'm sorry," she murmured. "I'm sorry that I cannot be that for you, and I understand if you do not want..."

"But then I wouldn't have you," Sansa blurted out, and Margaery's eyes jerked up to meet hers, going so wide. "And what would the rest of it matter, without you?"

Because that was the long and short of it, Sansa had realized, alone in her cell, replaying in her mind all of the moments she had seen Margaery's beautiful smile to keep her sane, had felt her plush lips against Sansa's skin.

When Margaery had come down to visit her, Sansa had almost thought it was a dream.

Margaery stared at her, jaw going slack, until Sansa, suddenly bashful, glanced down at her hands, cheeks flaming at her confession.

They sat there in silence for a long moment on Margaery's bed, neither quite sure what to say to each other, until Margaery gave herself a small shake and leaned forward, barely noticed how Sansa lifted her gaze at the movement.

"You are too forgiving, Sansa Stark," Margaery whispered, and kissed her lips. Sansa kissed her back, and lost herself to the sensation, to the feel of Margaery's lips against her own, beautiful, soft, and very much there after so long parted from one another, albeit of their own choosing.

The kissing quickly progressed into something more heated, as Sansa felt her cunny grow wet again with uncharacteristic swiftness, as she felt Margaery's fingers brushing against her skin as if to memorize every part of her, as their tongues disappeared into each other's throats.

They both pulled back at precisely the same time, panting hard.

"We should take this slowly," Margaery gasped out, kissing her way down Sansa's neck. "We've only just found each other again, and I don't think it would be wise to rush back to where we were before, when we don't really know what we want from each other."

Sansa nodded, breathless, as she laid her neck back to give Margaery more access, squeezed at Margaery's hips. "Yes," she agreed, "we should take things slowly." Her fingers trailed down Margaery's thighs, brushed at their apex.

Margaery groaned at the sensation. "After all," she murmured, lips moving down from Sansa's pale throat to her chest. "We need to...to be on even footing with each other...oh, fuck, Sansa..."

Sansa's fingers brushed gently against her entrance as Margaery arched her back, abandoning Sansa's breasts for a moment to squeeze at the soft skin of her sides. They both pulled back then, meeting each other's gazes.

"After...after tonight," Sansa said finally, a slow smile pulling at her lips, "we should definitely take things slowly. Figure out where we stand with one another."

Margaery panted as Sansa's fingers moved in and out of her, a lethargic rhythm that slowly drove her to madness. "Yes," she agreed. "After tonight, we probably should avoid each other's beds. The..." another strangled gasp, "the temptation, and all that."

Her hands reached around Sansa, pulled the other girl closer, pushed Sansa's fingers deeper within her as she grasped at Sansa's buttocks, pressed their womanhoods together, separated only by Sansa's fingers.

"Fuck," Sansa whispered, as they pressed their foreheads together, both breathing shakily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And...Had to split this chapter up because it was getting so damn long. Hehe, sorry.


	234. MARGAERY

Margaery glanced down at Sansa through hooded eyes, watched as Sansa's throat bobbed.

The other girl lowered her head, and Margaery took that as her cue, trailing kisses down Sansa's chest as she gently pulled Sansa's gown over her head. Sansa moaned, and Margaery felt her blood warming at the sound, the sound she hadn't realized she had missed for so long.

She wasn't sure that they had worked through everything they needed to say to each other, knew that there would be troubles to come. What had happened with Oberyn was making Margaery feel guilty enough, and she couldn't begin to imagine how Sansa felt about it. And yet, in this moment, none of this mattered, because Sansa was here. They could worry about the rest of it later.

Margaery did not spare a thought to the fact that this might have been the problem, before.

Still, she was touching her lover again, and Margaery felt as if she had gone a lifetime without Margaery's touch. Felt as if she could not go a second more without it.

Something about this though, about how long it had been since they had last touched one another like this in any meaningful way, had her gasping and petting between her thighs even as she touched Sansa, and she felt her breaths quickening each time Sansa arched her back higher.

She had been surprised when Sansa walked into the room. Both this time, and when she had been drunk enough to do so before. Surprised that Sansa was willing to speak with her again, considering how she had been acting recently.

Margaery brushed her hands over Sansa's breasts, rolling her nipples into hardened nubs as Margaery's mouth snaked down her form, pressing kisses into the thin skin between her protruding ribs, and that was when she noticed how thin Sansa was.

She supposed she'd had some idea, knowing that Sansa was wasting away in the Black Cells, and of course before that, she'd known that Sansa was hardly eating her fill.

But it was quite another thing, to kiss her way down Sansa's ribs and realize how much they stuck out of her body, how small and fragile the other girl was, in this moment.

Except that Sansa had never been fragile. Vulnerable, lonely, but never that, not to Margaery. Margaery had looked on her that first day in court and wished she could smile freely, and she had known that Sansa was not broken, in that moment.

Margaery vowed that what had happened to Oberyn, what Margaery had convinced Sansa to do, wass not going to break her, either. Margaery wasn't going to allow it.

Outwardly, Margaery didn't react at all to her thinness, forced herself not to react in the same way she might when Joffrey did something horrible, because now was not the time to discuss that.

If Margaery was being truthful, she didn't know at all how to help Sansa with that problem, but she also knew that while Sansa had been willing to talk about Dorne moments ago, she wouldn't be willing to talk about this, now.

Margaery slowed down as she reached Sansa's waist, her movements worshipful in the way Sansa had always deserved, as she pressed her soft, slow kisses into the hollow of Sansa's stomach and her hands groped desperately at Sansa's skin.

It had been a long time since they had been able to do something like this, and Margaery wanted to savor every moment of it while she had the opportunity. Wanted to catalog every moan, every broken off cry, every harsh breath. Everything between them, after perhaps the first time, had been quick, heightened with the fear of being walked in on by someone who might be their undoing.

This time, Margaery was going to prove to Sansa that she was something to be treasured, in the moments they had left here, and she didn't give a damn if Cersei herself walked through the door before she finished with the other girl. After all, it was bolted.

"Margaery," Sansa whispered hoarsely, squirming a little under Margaery's ministrations, and Margaery felt a small smile parting her lips. "Please."

And Margaery could hear everything Sansa was begging for, in those words. Everything she wasn't going to grant her, just yet. This was too slow, and she needed so much more than this. She needed Margaery to fuck her, needed to know that things had gone back to the way they were-

"Margaery."

Margaery's tongue licked at her belly button, and Sansa yelped. Margaery glanced up at her with a mischievous grin, and moved away, rolling her hips as she shifted her body further down Sansa's, until her mouth was perfectly aligned with Sansa's cunny.

But she didn't move, then, and Sansa moaned a little, shifting where she lay. "Margaery..."

"Sansa," Margaery whispered, breaths rushing as she watched goose bumps break out on Sansa's skin, and Sansa closed her eyes again. "Sansa, look at me."

Sansa opened her eyes, met Margaery's, as they glanced down at her. Sansa's breath stuttered, and she reached up to rub at Margaery's chest-

Margaery reached out and took Sansa's hand in her own, "Eyes on me."

Sansa swallowed. "Please," she whispered, eyes dark with lust.

Margaery didn't let her finish whatever the request was, bent her head down to brush her lips against Sansa's cunny, and Sansa closed her eyes and nearly shouted as her back arched so much Margaery felt a bit guilty.

Perhaps Margaery wasn't the only one desperate for even this, she thought idly, and the thought only renewed her efforts.

And then Margaery's tongue slid between the sweet folds of Sansa's cunny, and Sansa shifted on the bed, biting her lip so hard when Margaery glanced up at her that she was surprised it wasn't drawing blood.

Margaery pulled back a little then, grinning up at her. "Everything all right?" she asked, tone teasing, and she smiled at the dark look Sansa shot her way.

She nodded instead, tangling her hands in the sheets as Margaery pushed them down. "Just..."

Margaery didn't tease her any longer, bent her head down again to circle her tongue slowly around Sansa's clit, and Sansa did cry out, this time, her eyes squeezing shut despite herself, hands flexing and relaxing, flexing and relaxing.

The vibration of Margaery's chuckle against Sansa's clit had Sansa's body stiffening to the point that Margaery almost wondered if she was going to come then and there, but then, Margaery was just as turned on as she was, and she doubted she would last much longer.

Best not think of that.

And then Margaery wasn't thinking of anything at all, as Sansa arched up until her legs were tangled around Margaery's head, until Margaery heard a keening sound that a moment later she realized was from herself, not Sansa, and then Sansa's legs were wrapping around Margaery's back, yanking her downward.

Margaery moved down gladly enough, bit her tongue until she tasted blood when Sansa began to spurt, hot and warm, into her mouth.

Margaery smiled, leaning up until they were both half-sitting on the bed, squeezing tightly to Sansa's hand which she was still holding as she wrapped her right leg over Sansa's left thigh, and Sansa's eyes widened a little, before she too was smirking, following suit.

Margaery could feel her cunny dripping as she moved forward and rubbed against Sansa's, and she relished in the gasp Sansa gave at the sensation, grinding up against her, desperately pulling her legs apart to grant Margaery more access.

Margaery may have been experienced in bed long before she met Sansa, but she could count on one hand the number of times she had done this with another woman. She'd done it with Elinor, of course, because Elinor was just as curious with her, but there was something about it that was quite different from simply eating out another woman.

And Margaery loved it all the more with Sansa for that, loved the feel of Sansa's wet, hot cunt against her own, the arch of Margaery's back as it strained for something to lean against, as their cunts slapped against each other, their movements growing faster in a way Margaery had intended against, and yet she couldn't bring herself to complain, now.

"We're going to fix this," Margaery murmured as she moved against Sansa, felt Sansa's womanhood push against her own, straining, desperate. "Do you want that?"

Sansa moaned, leaned up to kiss Margaery's swollen lips, didn't dare close her eyes again. "Yes," she whispered, and could feel Margaery's wicked grin against her lips.

"Good," Margaery said, and then she was moving closer to Sansa, their legs tangling in each other as Margaery felt a flare of pain at the acrobatics, and then Sansa's hot mouth was against her own, and the feeling of soreness ebbed away as quickly as it had come.

Sansa jolted against her, her hot mouth breathing air into Margaery's, and Margaery wanted nothing more than for this to last forever.

Margaery moved faster against the other woman, kissed her at the same time, and when they came, Margaery moments behind Sansa, Margaery saw sparks, couldn't breathe for a long moment.

And then Sansa slumped down onto the bed beside her, and Margaery glanced over at the other girl, and could see perfectly.

"I..." Sansa whispered, and then blushed, seeming to realize that she couldn't pass words over her lips, staring up at Margaery almost sleepily.

Margaery smiled, reaching out and tucking a stray strand of hair behind Sansa's ear as she folded down onto the bed beside the other girl. "I'm glad..." she started, and then paused, reaching out instead to kiss Sansa's lips.

They lay entwined like that for several moments more, before Margaery broke the silence.

"Gods, Sansa," Margaery whispered hoarsely, and it wasn't until she saw the alarmed look on Sansa's face that she realized she was close to tears. "I was terrified that you were going to-" she cut herself off firmly. "Are you all right?"

Sansa smiled at her, the expression so hesitant Margaery wanted to crumple because of it. "I...I'm fine," Sansa whispered hoarsely. "I just...missed you."

Margaery did crumple then, and she was pulling Sansa in close, until Sansa's head rested against her shoulder and Margaery could breathe in the scent of lemon cakes which Sansa had not carried in some time.

"Sweet girl," Margaery whispered against her neck, "I missed you, too."

Sansa let out a wet laugh. "Let's...never do that again, shall we?" she asked, and Margaery huffed fondly, as well. Then Sansa stiffened, and started to sit up, glancing toward the door.

Margaery's hand was on her arm before she was upright, because she knew this was the moment when Sansa would normally make her escape before anyone realized what they were doing in here. Knew that if she let that happen again, let things happen as they had before, this would all go as terribly wrong as it had then. Sansa glanced back at her, lifting an eyebrow.

"Stay," Margaery entreated, and Sansa bit her lip, and acquiesed without a word. She sank back down into the bed, wrapped her arms around Margaery's waist and laid her head on Margaery's neck.

Margaery let out a relieved sigh, reached out to squeeze at Sansa's hand ensnaring her, and closed her eyes.

Margaery did not know if it was the extended absence from each other's beds, or the desperation she felt at the thought of them taking things slowly tomorrow, or something else entirely which pushed her body to such neediness, which made her feel so desperate for Sansa's touch, but she gasped into Sansa's mouth, and then they were kissing again, and the feeling of Sansa's soft lips against hers was beautiful, and blocked out everything else around them.

And, for a moment, everything felt better.

And Sansa was probably just as aware as Margaery, that this couldn't last, this feeling that they could lay together forever, without a soul to interrupt them. That Joffrey or his mother or some other force would bring darkness with them tomorrow, but, as she had just said, it didn't matter. Not just now.

Because just in this moment, Margaery was willing to pretend that it could last for the rest of their lives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Weird question, but does anyone have any other words for vagina I could use? I don't feel like they'd be thinking "pussy" back in medieval times, but I'm getting a bit tired of womanhood and cunny, tbh.


	235. SANSA

When Sansa awoke the next morning, wrapped in sheets that did not belong to her own bed, she froze.

And then she remembered that she was no longer lying in the straw of the Black Cells, or in the small bed she always felt rather awkward, depriving Tyrion of, anymore than she was lying in her bed in the Tower, she remembered where she was.

She sat up abruptly, pulling the sheet up around her chest, and glanced over at the sharp indent of the bed beside her, but Margaery wasn't there, the bed cold to the touch.

Sansa closed her eyes, forced the sleep from her mind because she needed to be awake just now, because she had disobeyed her husband to come here and someone might have noticed that she was gone...

She bit back a laugh. Her husband was less likely to notice anything she was doing now than he was before he had the power to stop her, and there was a twisted sort of irony in that which had her feeling guilty, that her husband had suddenly become the enemy again, in her mind.

She almost missed the days when things were simpler, when she loathed her husband simply because he was a Lannister and had no friends to speak of, save perhaps Shae.

Sansa shook such thoughts from her head, because there was no use wishing for simpler days. She had done that long enough in the Black Cells, and emerged only to complicate things farther.

She was in Margaery's bed, just now, and Sansa turned onto her back, opening her eyes and blinking up at the ceiling.

The night before...Sansa thought back to the first time they had done anything together, and even then, she didn't think things had been quite so...intense. She thought perhaps the only other time they had been so was when she had been about to leave for Dorne...

...Which Margaery had apparently known in advance, and now that Sansa knew as much, she couldn't say she was surprised. Looking back, Margaery had been acting almost as strangely as her.

She shook her head. They'd kept so many secrets from each other, and that was the first thing which would have to change, if they wanted to continue...whatever it was they shared.

_I love you, Sansa Stark._

The words, remembered abruptly, made her shiver.

She still felt a pang of guilt, that she had enjoyed such pleasure the night before with Oberyn's death still looming over her head, dragging her down with guilt, but she didn't feel...sick.

She almost felt hungry, and that was a strange feeling indeed, these days.

The sound of someone clearing their throat had Sansa tilting her head towards the door, and she glanced up, blinked at the sight of Margaery, standing in the doorway, watching her with barely concealed lust.

Sansa fidgeted, abruptly aware that underneath the thin sheet she wore, she was entirely naked.

Not that that had mattered last night, of course.

"I don't suppose you would like to join me in going to visit the poor?" Margaery asked, and Sansa blinked owlishly at her.

Evidently, they were not going to discuss last night at all.

There was a glow to the other woman that Sansa was certain was not present in herself, and yet was infectious enough, from the moment she laid eyes on it in Margaery, and she was standing a moment later.

Margaery smiled at her bewilderment. "It's almost to the noon hour," Margaery told her, smiling gently, and Sansa flushed, at the realization, sitting up.

"It is?" she asked, and Margaery's smile widened, a little.

Sansa groaned, flopping back down onto the bed, and, after a moment's deliberation, Margaery moved forward and sat on the edge of the bed across from Sansa. Sansa noticed, a little belligerently, that she was already dressed.

"Is it safe?" she asked, remembering how recently the smallfolk had hated the Crown for the law about homosexuals. And, before that, the Sparrows which the nobles only whispered about, not wishing to upset the King.

Margaery smiled. "Loras and two other Kingsguard will be with us," she assured Sansa. "And green cloaks, I imagine. The Queen can never be anywhere she is not under guard." And then she grimaced. "That was careless of me," she apologized.

It took Sansa a moment to realize what she was apologizing about, and then she shrugged, as if it had meant nothing to her.

"When do we leave?" she asked instead.

Margaery eyed her for a moment, then, "As soon as you're ready. Alla will be accompanying us, she's just gone to grab a cloak."

Sansa eyed her, and then glanced down to the floor, where she'd discarded her gown the night before.

Margaery's eyes were sparkling, when she glanced back up. "You can borrow one of mine," she said, and something in Sansa shivered again at those words, though she knew she was acting silly.

She half remembered a sunny morning before a tourney, and felt her thighs clench.

"I...yes, that would be fine," she stammered out, when she realized Margaery was still waiting for a response.

"Wonderful," Margaery said, and without warning bent forward, pressed a kiss to Sansa's cheek.

Sansa smiled at her, watched as Margaery pattered about the room, finding her another gown from out of her own wardrobe.

"It might be a tight fit," she said, not sounding terribly apologetic about that. "You could wear one of my shawls over it."

Sansa frowned down at the dress a little, and then shrugged, pulling herself off the bed and picking it up.

Tight was not...how she would probably describe it. "Perhaps I should go back to my rooms," she said, glancing sideways at Margaery. "I thought the point was that we were trying to avoid suspicion."

Margaery raised a brow, and then she was moving closer, pressing herself against Sansa. Sansa could feel the heat radiating off her. "What is it, Sansa?" she asked a teasing note to her voice. "Do you think Cersei will take one look at you and know you're wearing one of my gowns and not your own?"

Sansa bit her lip, because there was something in her that did want to wear it, rather than trudging back to the Tower of the Hand to find one of her own faded gowns.

But there were certainly a great number of holes in it, in places where none of Sansa's shabby gowns had them.

She smiled, glanced at Margaery once more, and Margaery seemed to take that as her cue, backing out of the room with a, "I think I'll go find one of those shawls."

Sansa managed to dress quickly enough after that, glancing at her reflection when she walked back into the main room of Margaery's chambers, at the small mirror there.

She looked...Sansa's breath caught in her throat, and then Margaery was walking up behind her, running her hands liberally over Sansa's shoulders as she settled the shawl there.

"Do you like it?" Margaery asked, and Sansa swallowed thickly.

"I..."

Margaery's lips ran a thin, wet trail down her neck, down to the plunging neckline of the gown she'd put Sansa in. "You don't have to wear it if you don't want to," she said, and Sansa couldn't help herself, stretching her neck out to give the other woman more access to her bare skin, closing her eyes at the delicious sensation that she'd been craving for far too long.

"I think I'll manage," Sansa said, a teasing lilt in her voice, and Margaery pulled back, smiling at her.

"Wonderful," she said. "Then, much as I'd like to, ah, appreciate that gown on you a bit more, I think we'd better be going." And she held out her hand.

Sansa bit her lip to keep from smiling like a fool once more, and grasped the other woman's hand, let Margaery lead her out of her chambers into the Maidenvault, where Ser Loras and Lady Alla were waiting with varying degrees of impatience.

Oddly enough, Loras seemed to be more the impatient of the two, though not a word was spoken from either of them about the undoubtedly flaring and very visible marks on Sansa's neck, nor about the fact that she had just emerged from Margaery's chambers.

He led them out into the city, and Sansa made up her mind not to think of anything else, to simply follow along and try to find some of the enjoyment she'd experienced the night before, where nothing else but the two of them had mattered.

It was not as difficult as Sansa had expected it to be, and she wondered if she should feel guilt at that.

"I think it's important to encourage the smallfolk in their business," Margaery said, motioning for Alla to hand a silver coin to a gown merchant as she purchased their wares, a dark red fabric that was sheer as anything a Braavosi might wear. Sansa blushed as she thought of the gown she was wearing, underneath that shawl. "To let them know that the nobles care about them, still."

Sansa hesitated, nodded. "I suppose that makes sense," she agreed, though she didn't think Margaery really needed another gown.

And then the merchant was handing the Dornish red fabric to Margaery, and she was handing it off to Sansa with a wide smile. "For you," she said, and Sansa blinked in surprise.

"For me?" she repeated.

Margaery gave her a small smile. "Don't you want it?" she asked, smile dimming. "I know that the color is not one you find very favorable, but you also have a right to wear it."

The colors of House Lannister. Sansa closed her eyes, and then reached out, taking the fabric into her arms. "Thank you," she said, because she could always use a new gown, after all.

Margaery gave her another smile, and then they were moving on, buying some veal and sauces from another merchant, wine from the next. They ate while they walked, which wasn't very dignified and which Sansa could never imagine Cersei doing, but still, she smiled at the spot of grease on the side of Margaery's face, thought about licking it off her.

The smallfolk were enchanted.

"Good Queen Margaery!" they called, and their children ran out to greet her as if they were old friends. Margaery, for her part, stopped to speak to each one that came close enough, and that seemed to enchant the adults far more than it did the children.

And Margaery seemed happy enough to do it.

Sansa watched her, and thought she might be glowing. She looked, in this moment, framed by children and by sunlight, beautiful.

Sansa remembered thinking, when she was still to be Joffrey's wife, that she would want the people to love her as they had never loved the Lannisters.

Margaery seemed to have turned love into an art, and Sansa's thighs ached as she thought of that art, the night before.

"Your fortune, kind lady!" a woman called, moving forward until she stood just before the Kingsguard surrounding them, and Margaery looked up from the child she had been speaking to. "I would tell it to you, Your Grace, for no price at all."

The woman looked terribly unkempt, despite her exotic beauty, and Loras' nose upturned at the sight of her, at the ragged red dress she wore, the lack of shoes. They said the Sparrows no longer wore shoes, to show their devotion to the cause. Her feet were covered in dust.

But she did not look like a sparrow, with the busty gown she wore, nor did she sound like one, offering up a fortune. Her hair fell down her back in long, black waves, her brown eyes watching Margaery with a strange intensity. She looked Braavosi, and not like the smallfolk of King's Landing so much at all.

Sansa felt a shiver run through her, at that look on the woman's face, as if she knew at once everything and nothing about Margaery.

Margaery blinked at her, and then grinned. "My fortune?" she repeated idly, sharing an amused glance with her brother. "And for no coin?"

The fortune teller gave her a shark's grin. "I see you are a woman of some skepticism. I suspect your coin would be lost the moment it touched my fingers."

Margaery's lips pulled into a small smile. And I suppose I am destined to be the greatest queen Westeros has known, equal to the Maiden herself?"

The fortune teller blinked at her, reaching out a bejeweled hand. "Your Grace will only know if Your Grace wishes to come with me, and have your fortune told."

"Margaery," Loras said lowly, no longer looking amused.

Margaery cocked her head. "I suppose you know that there is some vested interest in my future, all around," she said. "If you give me a false one, I shall see you whipped."

The fortune teller smirked at her, holding out a hand. "Then I shall be sure to find the right threads in your lines, Your Grace. But I cannot promise that you will like to hear what these lines say anymore than you might to hear that you will be perfect."

Margaery smiled, this time. "All right," she agreed. "I suppose you've interested me enough to gain my attentions. Shall we do it out in the open?"

"Margaery," Loras repeated.

The fortune teller smiled. "I think not. It would not do for all of King's Landing to know the Queen's future. Come."

She guided them along the narrow streets of King's Landing, and Sansa followed with some trepidation, for, unlike Margaery, she hardly found the situation amusing.

Her septa had ever warned her about the witch women who thought to tell fortunes, after all, and to stay away from them at all costs.

"What is your name?" Margaery asked as they walked, ignoring the frowns of the smallfolk in black robes watching after them.

The fortune teller smiled. "You Westerosi could not pronounce it," she said, instead of answering.

Alla blinked at her, walking a little faster, at that. "You are not Westerosi?" she asked.

The fortune teller shook her head. "Braavosi," she said, and Sansa perked up a little, where she walked alongside Margaery.

And then they came to a pause, in front of a little tent that was hardly less enclosed then standing in the middle of the street, four sticks holding up a piece of tarp, and Margaery eyed it dubiously as the fortune teller guided her beneath it.

Loras eyed it distastefully as he followed, cutting in front of Alla and Sansa rather rudely, one hand on his sword. Sansa didn't mind, though, shoving her hands into the thin pockets of her gown and glancing around nervously.

The tent, with its small table and the cot lying behind that, indicating that the woman must at least sleep here, if not live here at nights, hardly looked like the den of a witch.

And she wondered, abruptly, what she was doing here. She had gone to Margaery's bedchambers the night before out of desperation, spurred on by Olenna Tyrell, but here she was, by Margaery's side as if nothing had happened at all.

She had still killed a man, and Sansa didn't know how she could feel so...empty, just now. As if that, along with everything else save for the woman standing alongside the fortune teller, mattered at all.

"Come on, Sansa, it'll be fun," Margaery called from inside the tent, her voice dragging Sansa along.

Sansa rolled her eyes, but went along willingly enough, ducking into the tent after Loras and Alla.

She blinked at the sight that greeted her. The tent had not looked like much, from the outside, but somehow, Sansa had expected more of the inside. Expected some proof of a fortune teller, a terrifying and true witch.

Sansa knew, suddenly, what so concerned Margaery about helping the smallfolk. Sansa never cared to do so because she saw her own situation as desperate as theirs, but here she was, lamenting her lack of gowns while this woman had only the dress she wore and an obviously stolen coat.

She swallowed hard.

The only indication that the woman was in fact the fortune teller she claimed to be seemed to be the little statues hanging in an even circle along the walls, statues that seemed foreign and not to represent the Seven at all and Alla coughed a little, at the sight.

"So," the fortune teller spoke up then, when it seemed no one else was going to, shrugging off her cloak, so that her shoulders were bare. "Would Your Grace like to go first, or would your ladies prefer not to know at all? The future can be...a dangerous thing to have knowledge of."

Alla laughed. "Are you a witch?" she asked.

The fortune teller smiled. "I am," she agreed idly.

Alla glanced at Margaery, then back at the woman. "Then tell me my future first," she said, and the fortune teller raised a brow.

"Would your queen not rather hear hers?" she asked, but Alla shook her head, insistent.

Margaery shrugged one shoulder, smiling now. "We had a witch woman in Highgarden," she said. "She traveled the Reach often, and would tell our fortunes for a bit of bread and wine." Her eyes narrowed. "As I said, you don't think I will be the fairest maiden and kindest queen of them all, do you?"

The woman stared at her, and then reached out her hand. When Alla didn't move, she shook it impatiently. "Give me your hand," she said.

Alla looked almost nervous now, glancing back at Margaery once before surrendering her hand to the fortune teller.

The woman traced the lines of Alla's palms for several long moments, closing her eyes and breathing in deep the steamed air of the hut.

"Well?" Alla demanded, looking more exasperated than anything, now.

The woman's eyes flew open then; grey-white and pupilless rather than the brown they had been moments before, and Sansa sucked in an involuntary breath at the sight.

They shouldn't have come here, she realized abruptly. Should never have taken the woman's invitation, because there was a sudden fear creeping up her spine, the thought that they might never be allowed to leave.

Then the fortune teller smiled. "Ask your questions, three," she told Alla. "Any question your heart desires to know."

Alla grinned, then, no less off put by those white eyes, it seemed.

"Who will my dearest love be?" she asked.

Sansa tried not to roll her eyes, reaching up instead to wrap her arms around her chest and rub at her arms. It had grown strangely cold in here, for a hut so near to Flea Bottom.

The fortune teller chuckled. "You will have but one, though not the one you desire," she said.

Alla sucked in a breath. "Why not?" she asked, and the fortune teller blinked at her, one eye brown, the other white.

"Are you certain you wish that to be your second question?" she asked, a coldness seeping into her voice that matched the sudden cool of the room, though, glancing at Margaery and Alla, Sansa noticed that neither of them seemed cold.

Alla bit her lower lip, chewed on it for a long moment. "I...No," she said finally, a strange note in her voice. "No, answer me this instead. Will I marry someone handsome and rich?"

The fortune teller squinted at her. Margaery did actually roll her eyes, and Sansa was reminded of how young Alla was.

"You will serve in the halls of the Maiden for many years," she said. "And you will find a taste for something there you crave there, but you will never marry, for a lady always you will be.”

Alla's eyebrows shot up. Sansa bit the inside of her cheek.

The fortune teller's eyes were both white again. "And?"

"Huh?"

"The last question," the fortune teller continued. "What would you hear?"

Alla licked her lips. "I'll make it an easier one," she said, seeming to have settled on amused, now. "When will I return to my mother? To Highgarden? Will it be for the Spring feasting?"

"You will never return to your mother. You will return to Highgarden only once more, my lady," the fortune teller said. "But after, you will never leave King's Landing again."

Sansa stiffened at the ominous tone of her words, exchanging a glance with Margaery, but still, Margaery seemed not to believe it.

Alla licked her lips, laughed a little nervously. "Well, I suppose it is fortunate I serve the Queen, then," she said, but the fortune teller was frowning, now. "But...what do you mean, I will never return to my mother?"

The fortune teller shook her head, dropping Alla's hands as if they had scalded her. "You can have only three questions," she reminded the girl.

Alla took a step forward. "But what did you mean, that I will never return to my mother?"

"Some fortune teller you are," Loras said, attempting to lighten the mood, then. "Don't these things normally end in you promising a handsome prince, a mansion, and all the happiness in the world?"

Margaery rolled her eyes again. "Please, Loras, we shouldn't be such impertinent guests," she began, but Sansa didn't hear the rest of what she said, nor what Loras responded, because suddenly the fortune teller was staring directly at her, those brown eyes searching over her with a look she couldn't understand, but which made her squirm.

It felt cold again, and Sansa rubbed her arms a little harder. Margaery raised a brow in her direction.

"And what would you know of me, Your Grace?" the fortune teller asked.

Margaery smirked at her, clearly humoring the woman. "What will be the happiest day of my life?" she asked the other woman.

The fortune teller smiled. "That is an easy one, Your Grace," she said, as her eyes began to turn grey once more. Margaery blinked at her. "The day you set yes on forest green."

Margaery cleared her throat. "What does that mean?" she asked, suspicion dripping into her tone, but the fortune teller only smiled.

"Perhaps your next question? Or is that it?"

Margaery shook her head. "Very well," she said, rolling her eyes now. "When will the first of my ladies wed?"

The fortune teller smiled again. "When the boat sinks into the sea, Your Grace," she said. "She will wed soon after."

"What does that mean?" Alla spoke up then, but the fortune teller was not looking at her, was focusing only on Margaery, now, her eyes dark with intent.

Margaery, for her part, seemed to be taking the woman a little more seriously now, but Sansa could see that she was still skeptical. And that she wasn't cold, as Sansa was.

Margaery chewed on her lower lip. "When will my hair start to grey?"

This, the fortune teller paused at, sniffing in smoke and tracing her fingers along the lines of Margaery's hands, closing her eyes. Margaery shifted on her feet. "Well?"

"The day the golden statue is covered in blood, Your Grace,"

"You are allowed three questions, my lady," the fortune teller said, dipping into a little curtsey, which, Sansa couldn't help but notice, she hadn't done for Alla.

Sansa blinked at her. "Ah..." and, by the gods, her mind had gone blank, with that ultimatum.

Margaery nudged her. "Can I ask them?" she asked, a small smirk in her voice.

The fortune teller shook her head. "No," she said, looking almost regretful, but not tearing her eyes away from Sansa's own. "No, the lady must ask them herself, or be damned."

Sansa swallowed, mouth suddenly dry. "Tell me, then," she said, and tried and failed to sound casual. "What sort of future is in store for me?”

The fortune teller smiled at her, rubbing her fingers along Sansa’s palms. “Such a vague question demands a vague answer. You will find what you seek, in the future laid before you today. Tomorrow’s future may change, but if you continue like this, you will find what you seek.”

Sansa stared at her. “I...Am I to be damned, for what I did?"

Oberyn's face, mashed beneath the hands of the Mountain, still haunted her dreams. She could hardly think, during the days.

Except, she realized, she had awoken only once last night, to find Margaery's gentle arms around her shoulders, and she had fallen asleep again in an instant.

The fortune teller stared at her. "What you did," she said dryly, clearing leading.

Margaery shook her head, taking a step forward. "If you were a true fortune teller, surely you would not need the answer to that question," she said, raising a brow, glancing in concern at Sansa, probably for asking such a question.

The fortune teller sighed. "I am a fortune teller, not a mind reader. But I..." she took Sansa's hands into her own, turned them over so that their palms faced up. Those brown eyes grew impossibly wider, as she kept staring into Sansa's eyes, and Sansa shifted uncomfortably under the woman's gaze.

"You will not suffer so much as you wish to, my lady," the fortune teller told her, as her eyes went grey white rather than brown.

Sansa stared at her, feeling a shiver running down her spine at those words. They should never have come here, she thought. She should never have walked into this room, not when she feared the words of fortune tellers, rather than believing it a pretty distraction, the way Margaery did.

Margaery had thought it nothing more than an idle distraction, a joke, and yet, Sansa thought, it didn't seem that at all. There was something very real about this, and Sansa felt...so very cold, just now.

The fortune teller had a sorrowful look in her eyes as she squeezed Sansa's hands until she cried out. Margaery took a step forward.

"Oh," the woman breathed, the word leaving in one soft breath.

Sansa tried to yank her hand back, but the woman's grip was like iron. She wasn't finding this quite so amusing, anymore, not that she had found it much so in the first place. Margaery might find these things to be amusing little distractions, but Sansa had heard of witch women, in the North.

She knew that the mad ones, who traveled the countryside without shelter or family to speak of, consorted with the blood of animals, or of small children, making sacrifices to the gods for knowledge of the future, which they were always willing to sell for a price.

She also knew that most of the time, they were pretenders, looking for a few gold coins, but still, the knowledge that there were some whose prophecies influenced kings made Sansa antsy of this whole affair.

And especially because this woman was willing to do so without a price.

She tried to stand still, but rather thought she was probably fidgeting, as she stared at the little statue of a faux golden man, behind the fortune teller's head, nailed into the wall of her small chambers.

It stared at her with all seeing eyes, and Sansa shifted on her feet.

The fortune teller's eyes were white once more, the pupils disappeared behind a thin film of grey, and Sansa stared into those eyes, licking her lips.

"I am so sorry, my child," the woman said abruptly, still staring into Sansa's eyes. "For all that you have suffered, and will."

Sansa did yank her hand back then, glancing with a startled expression back at Margaery. "What does that mean?" she demanded. "Do you have an answer for me, or not?"

The room had grown freezing now, and as Sansa rubbed at her shoulders again, she thought she felt a cool, wetness upon them, but when she looked down, she saw that there was nothing there.

The fortune teller pursed her lips. "I have seen what you seek, and will have. The snowy halls you will have again, and you will make it back to the cold courtyards of Winterfell once more, and travel again to the crypt where a body lies in wait to be discovered, my child," she said, and Sansa froze. "But it will be a long, terrible journey, my dear. Full of..." her eyes started to dim to brown. "Sansa Stark will never return to Winterfell, not the girl who was. But you will."

Sansa froze. Beside her, Margaery stiffened as well.

"How do you know who she is?" she demanded, when Sansa could not force words past her lips.

The fortune teller glanced up. "I see it in her eyes, Your Grace," she said, her voice full of terrible gentleness. “She asked me what her future would bring. Blood on the snow.”

"I...I will?" Sansa whispered, not remembering, for the moment, that she had never given the woman her name, because she had almost given up hope of that, and even if this woman was only a sham, she was giving Sansa that.

The fortune teller nodded, closing her eyes and extending her hands, reaching for Margaery's. Margaery handed them to her, still looking skeptical, but shaken now.

Still, Sansa thought, perhaps all of this could be explained away. Sansa was a fairly recognizable figure, and fortune tellers often told what they thought was wanted to hear.

Still, Sansa stared down at the way the fortune teller traced the lines of Margaery's hands, her eyes going grey white rather than brown, and licked her lips.

_You will. You will make it back to the cool courtyards of Winterfell, once more._

And the crypt where her dead aunt lay. How had this woman known that?

Sansa shuddered, shook off the feeling that she should be fleeing this place, rather than remaining, focused on Margaery once more.

Margaery shivered, then, as if she suddenly felt the cold pervading Sansa. “Come,” she said rather loudly, “Let us go. We have other errands to attend to, I’m certain.”

The fortune teller looked startled by that, nodding to Sansa. "The lady has another question," she said, but Margaery shook her head.

"That's quite enough, thank you," and then she was practically dragging Alla and Sansa out of the tent, clearly unnerved.

Loras followed behind them, at a slower pace, but he did not make it far.

The fortune teller reached out with snake like reflexes, grabbing Ser Loras by the arm at the same time that he drew his sword. The crowd which had gathered outside the fortune teller's tent, pushed back by the other Kingsguard, collectively gasped at the sight of Loras’ sword against the woman’s neck.

“Let me go, or that will be the last fortune you ever tell,” Loras hissed at her, eyes hardening.

The woman smiled, but it was a sad smile, as she let go of him. “Would you like your fortune, Ser?”

Loras stared at her. “No thanks. I see that you only use the sham of telling fortunes to bring fear to little girls.”

Margaery rolled her eyes, picking at her nails now, giving off the appearance of being totally bored, Sansa thought, even when she was tight as a bowstring.

The fortune teller frowned at him. “You do not have to be afraid,” she said, and then she was leaning forward, and if Sansa were not standing so close, she would not have heard what the woman next said. “He was not afraid, in the end. Beware the sea, my dear,” she said, voice whisper soft.

Loras stiffened, going very pale and shrugging her off and lifting his sword once more. “What the fuck did you mean?” he demanded.

The woman only smiled, dipping into a shallow bow. “I see that I have only brought you words you do not wish to hear,” she said. “I am sorry for that. I ask no price of you.”

And then she turned, and disapeared into the crowd, leaving them standing in her little gazebo in stunned silence.

Loras sheathed his sword once more. “Crazy bitch,” he muttered under his breath, and Alla winced at the words.

Margaery took her brother’s arm. “Come, Loras, I think it’s quite time we return to the Keep,” she said.

He eyed her. “Yes, I think so, too.” Then, he turned back to Alla. “I hope you didn’t believe the madwoman,” he told her. “She’s just trying to get a few pennies and her jollies off, scaring royalty. They do that, the peasants.”

Margaery slapped his arm. “Loras, be kind."

It was his turn to roll his eyes, this time. “My dear sister,” he said, “You have far too high an opinion of the poor. Just because they enjoy our food doesn’t mean they wouldn’t wish us all dead if they could,” he said, staring straight into the hardened eyes of a peasant as they passed.

Margaery rebuked him again, but Sansa wasn’t listening to her words anymore. She would go home, the woman had said, and she had spoken of Winterfell, of a crypt she likely couldn’t have known about.

Sansa shook her head. They should never have come here, but now, at least, it appeared that Margaery was ready to go back to the Keep.

They did not make it far, walking along the road back to the Keep for a scant few minutes before their path was blocked.

Loras moved from his position behind the girls to in front of them, where the black clad sparrow was standing.

He was alone, for now, but Sansa blinked out at the crowd and could see that he was not the only sparrow among them, biding their time with dark looks as they focused their attention on the Queen.

"Out of the way," Loras growled, reaching once more for his sword.

The sparrow lifted his chin, and stood his ground.

"Out of the way," Loras repeated, "Or I will cut you down with the same mercy I had for that boy."

The sparrow's eyes narrowed into slits.

"You spoke to a fortune teller," the sparrow accused, glancing around Loras to meet Margaery's eyes. "Surely you did not think such an action was blameless, or loved by the gods?"

Margaery lifted her chin. "I'm sorry," she said coldly, "Are you accusing me, your queen, of something?"

The sparrow eyed her steadily, and said nothing. One of the Kingsguard, Ser Boros, stepped in front of Margaery, pushing the sparrow back.

"Get the Queen back to the Keep!" Loras shouted, and then the Kingsguard were surrounding them, boxing the three girls in on all sides as they marched them forward, hemmed in themselves by the sparrows.

The sparrows may have greater numbers, Sansa tried to reassure herself, but they were weaponless.

So had the rioters been, she reminded herself uneasily.

"The King and his queen ought to be confessing to their own sins before throwing about laws you have no understanding of," one of the sparrows called, and that caught Sansa's attention as well as Margaery's, for their heads snapped up at the same time, both of them glancing in the direction of that voice abruptly.

And sure enough, Lancel Lannister stood in the sea of black robes and mutilated foreheads, staring out at them with sharp green eyes as he hurled those words.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat.

"What...?"

Loras' eyes followed Margaery's, and he moved away from the sparrow he was holding back, moved to stand abruptly in front of Margaery, pulling her along without much ceremony.

Margaery went along easily enough, stumbling at first and then walking along, and the moment Sansa blinked; Lancel Lannister disappeared into the crowd.

The sparrows, however, were blocking their continued progress, and Loras paused after not too many more steps, hand on his sword in clear warning.

The sparrows didn't have weapons. They would be wise to let them pass, and Sansa's heart leapt up into her throat as she realized how close they were, just now, to another riot like the one which had happened in Flea Bottom.

She glanced at Margaery, and saw that the other woman seemed to be vibrating with pent up energy, but she stood tall and proud behind her brother.

"You will let us pass," she told one of the sparrows, but she was looking at Lancel once more, and Sansa couldn't help but follow her gaze.

What in the seven hells was Lancel Lannister doing with a bunch of fanatics, wearing their colors and spouting their lies, especially when he was a member of the Kingsguard?

She shook her head, for she had almost convinced herself at first that it was nothing but a strange vision.

He was still glaring back at her when she blinked, however.

"The Queen-"

"Perhaps if you concerned yourself more with your own duties than the King and Queen's, you wouldn't be standing barefoot in the middle of the street," Loras snapped rather loudly, glaring at Lancel as he did so, but Lancel met his eyes steadily where Sansa couldn't help but think he never would have, before.

She shuddered.

"The Queen was just seen in the company of a known witch woman, who scorns the laws of the Seven," one of the other sparrows spoke up, then. "We would ask her why."

Margaery lifted her chin to speak, but again, Loras beat her to it.

"The Queen is not accountable to a bunch of fanatics," he told her, and a hush fell over the gathered crowd of smallfolk and sparrows alike, at those words. Beside Sansa, Margaery stiffened.

Alla swallowed loudly enough that Sansa heard it, where she stood a little apart from the other girl.

And then Margaery stepped forward, until she was pressed against her brother's armor.

"Food for the poor," Margaery whispered to Loras, and then he was walking out in front of Margaery and Sansa, offering it to the poor and explaining that the Keep would be providing it for the rest of the day, the moment the Queen returned.

"Good Queen Margaery!" one of the smallfolk shouted as they passed, and then the rest of them were taking up the cry, and it was loud as it swept through the crowd.

Sansa glanced over at Margaery, startled.

The smallfolk began to cheer, and the sea of black robes exchanged glances before they disappeared into the crowd as if they had never been there.

But Margaery recovered herself quickly, raising her hand to wave at them languidly, a wide smile on her face as she walked forward, close to them.

Sansa stepped along hesitantly behind her.

Sansa didn't even realize she'd been holding her breath until she let it out in a quiet woosh. She hurried her pace as did Margaery and Alla, as the Kingsguard focused on returning them to the Keep as quickly as possible, no doubt before more trouble broke out.

"Do you know Lord Tywin died a week before he planned to implement measures to be rid of the Sparrows and their fanatical followers forever?" Margaery asked under her breath as they walked, and Sansa almost had to strain to hear her.

She shivered, though, at the thought of what Margaery was suggesting.

"He was going to have them all slaughtered if they did anything more out of turn," she went on, not waiting for Sansa to respond. "And now his nephew..." she licked her lips, breaking off abruptly.

"I'm glad," Margaery confessed, and Sansa raised her eyebrows. "I mean...What Lord Tywin planned to do with them was basically to slaughter them all," she went on, and Sansa blanched. "And I think it possible they can still be reasoned with. They are very pious, even if they are fanatics, and have only the interest of the smallfolk, and no power behind their actions save what the smallfolk give them."

Sansa blinked at her. "Does Joffrey?" she asked, careful not to put any inflection into her voice.

Margaery snorted. "Do you think Joffrey ever wishes to reason with his enemies, Sansa?" she asked, and Sansa couldn't help but give Margaery a wry smile, as well.

Still, she couldn't get the thought of those men, standing in black robes and glaring at them, those marks cut into their foreheads like brands, out of her head as they made their way back to the Keep.

She was shivering, she realized, though it was quite warm. And she was wondering, with those cold looks the sparrows had given them, if perhaps Tywin Lannister and Joffrey didn't have the right idea, after all.

She wondered what that said about her.

"Did you know that Lancel Lannister had joined the Sparrows?" she asked, worry causing her voice to come out quieter than she'd meant it to, but Margaery seemed to hear her, nonetheless.

"No," she said back, equally as soft. "He has not been on my rotation in some time, but I thought it was merely because he did not care for me. I..."


	236. TYRION

"What is the meaning of this?" Tyrion asked, allowing annoyance to bleed into his tone as he took his seat at the head of the Small Council table.

It was nearing nightfall, and he wanted nothing more than to curl up with a fine glass of Dornish Red and Shae at his side, and deliberate on what to do about the Martells and Myrcella, and here he was instead, called to an emergency meeting of the Small Council by his little shit of a nephew.

Quite possibly the last thing that he wanted to do just now, besides deal with the mounting threat of Stannis Baratheon, and while the news they had recently gotten of him was not encouraging, it also did not demand this level of emergency.

He glanced up. The little queen was present at this meeting, sitting at her husband's right hand, and the only thing good about that was that at least it meant Cersei was back to her normal seat beside Pycelle, fuming.

Tyrion had to take pleasure in the little things, these days, even if he could not birng himself to think well of Margaery Tyrell, at the moment.

But Joffrey was glaring at him, too, and Tyrion thought back, tried to think of what could have set him off this time.

Beside him, Margaery looked pale and wan, her eyes on Joffrey rather than on anyone else in the room, and that more than anything let Tyrion know that she was plotting something.

Of course, that was a generally safe assumption, these days.

"The meaning of this, Uncle, is that you seem to have misplaced a cousin," Joffrey drawled, and reached out, clasping his wife's hand.

Her face had gone white, but this time, Tyrion did not think it was from the pain of having her husband squeeze the blood from her hand.

His brows furrowed, but he waited, determined not to show his hand as the last person at the table without pertinent information. Even Lord Mace looked unsurprised, and appeared to be fuming, underneath the genteel politeness he kept around Cersei and his daughter.

Tyrion had been late, dragged from the Tower of the Hand after every other member of the Small Council still in King's Landing was sent for, drafting up the orders for what their army was to do now that Stannis Baratheon had turned his eyes once more upon Winterfell.

Gods, the man was becoming an ever larger thorn in his side, and Tyrion wondered if the rumors from their spies that Stannis' army was diminishing were complete lies, at this point.

Varys was the one to fill him in, per usual. "It would seem that Ser Lancel Lannister has abandoned his duties to the Kingsguard and defected," he said, and Tyrion's jaw twitched. "To the Sparrows, in the city."

Tyrion's mouth fell open for several scant seconds, before he closed it abruptly. "What?" he asked, and tried to remember the last time he had seen the boy.

Margaery cleared her throat, pointedly not meeting Tyrion's gaze. "I saw him myself," she told Tyrion. "While I was in the city today, accompanied by one of my ladies and the Lady Sansa."

And oh, that burned.

He knew now that there was no point in forbidding Sansa to speak with Margaery, had seen the strength of her conviction to spend time with the other woman, even when he had threatened her, and Tyrion eyed Margaery now, wondered what the hell sort of hold she had over Sansa.

He understood that his young wife had few friends in King's Landing, but the way she had spoken...

That was not the Sansa Stark he knew.

He shook his head to clear it, because as annoyed as he currently was with both his lady wife and Queen Margaery, they had other things to worry about, just now.

Starting with the fact that Lancel had defected...to join a bunch of fanatics in the city who could not even be bothered to wear shoes, and who had made no secret of their disdain for their rulers.

What...the fuck was the boy thinking? He'd never shown religious inclinations before, save for after the Battle of Blackwater, when he had been injured and seen to by the High Septon.

Still, every young man believing they were about to die suddenly found a bout of religious zeal. It did not turn them into raging zealots determined to see the end of their own wicked family.

Margaery forged on, "We were accosted by the Sparrows on our return to the Keep, and Ser Lancel was among them. I was shocked to see him there, almost didn't believe it was him. He even..." she chewed on her lower lip, glancing at Joffrey.

Joffrey hastened to reassure her, in a way that Tyrion had only ever seen him do with Margaery, "Don't be afraid, my lady. The traitor will pay for his defection."

Lord Mace puffed out his chest. "You may be sure about that," he promised Margaery, having eyes for none but his daughter in that moment and Cersei shifted in her seat, ill at ease, it seemed, with the thought of Mace Tyrell making such threats against her own family, even if it was Lancel Lannister.

Tyrion stared at his sister, wondered abruptly if she had actually developed any level of affection for him, while their cousin had been sharing her bed.

He had been assuming, this whole time, that it was nothing more than an idle fuck, while Jaime was gone away, because the boy did, in some oblique ways, at least resemble their brother.

But she'd kept fucking him, even after Jaime had returned, still banished from her bed save for on the rare occasions when he proved particularly stubborn.

All of which Tyrion really wished he didn't know, because this was providing quite the headache, on top of hi knowledge of the Queen's own adultery with his wife.

Margaery nodded, swallowed, managed to look concerned for her own well being, as if Lancel Lannister could ever provide a true threat to her. "He claimed that myself and the King were more concerned with hurting the smallfolk than fulfilling our duties. My...Loras barely managed to get us out of the situation," she said, with a straight face, and Tyrion stared at her a moment longer.

Gods, he felt like he was drunk, even though he hadn't had a decent drink in days.

"Thank the gods he did," Mace intoned, and Pycelle nodded his agreement.

Cersei ground her teeth loudly enough that Tyrion could hear it, but Joffrey paid attention to none of this, his eyes on Tyrion once more.

"Why in the seven hells didn't you know where he was before he was threatening my queen?" Joffrey demanded, and there he was, squeezing Margaery's hand again.

She smiled wanly and bore it, like Tyrion now imagined she did with all of Joffrey's most annoying traits, and he supposed there was still that to respect about her.

And that she managed to do all of that, with an impressive amount of manipulation, and still hide the fact that she was fucking her husband's aunt by marriage.

He wondered, suddenly, as he looked at the impressive display of emotion from a woman whom, until recently, he wasn't sure had any true emotions at all, if his alliance with Margaery had in fact offered him nothing at all, if he knew no more about her now than he had before.

Tyrion cleared his throat uncomfortably, because he supposed he should have known, in a roundabout way. Lancel was, after all, his top informant on Cersei, and if he hadn't been so distracted with Sansa of late, he might have realized the boy was missing. Should have realized that he was missing. "Your Grace..."

Cersei scoffed, clearly expecting him to come up with another excuse. "Of course the Hand of the King is not responsible for it," she snapped, gaze hot and furious as she turned her scathing look on him. "Are you not responsible for everything which goes in this Keep?"

Ah, that was it, the last time he had seen the boy. When he'd been threatening Lancel to tell him everything he knew about Cersei's plot to destroy Margaery Tyrell, and the boy had sighted fear that Cersei would figure out who had betrayed her.

In that light, he almost couldn't blame him for running off, but...to the fanatics? Seriously?

Tyrion stared at her, cleared his throat. "I would think that Your Grace would know more about the whereabouts of Lancel Lannister at any given time than I would. You've grown...close." He watched as she ground her teeth again, the sound oddly gratifying. "But no, not even the Hand of the King is omniscient enough to know everything which goes on in the Keep."

As had become abundantly clear to him, of late.

Lord Mace's head bobbed between them as though he were watching a particularly riveting fight - Oberyn, head crushed beneath the hands of the Mountain.

Cersei's eyes darkened, and she opened her mouth to speak, but Tyrion beat her to it.

"But we should have known when he abandoned his duties to the Kingsguard. Why did the other knights not report it when he did not show up for his roster times?" he asked, turning to the one Kingsguard still standing in the room, Ser Boros.

Boros did not meet his gaze. He was almost beginning to regret sending away Janos Slynt, at this point. At least he'd been capable of thought.

Cersei's eyes were glittering now, and she leaned forward in her chair. "It is not their responsibility to know where every member of the Kingsguard is at any given time. If Jaime were here, as Lord Commander, he would have known."

Ah, yes. Of course Cersei had found a way to make this about Jaime, about the ineptitude of everyone else in King's Landing when her deal brother was gone.

Tyrion had spent enough nights sitting with a progressively drunker brother as he sobbed out his frustration at Cersei's denial from the moment he had returned to King's Landing without a hand to know that wasn't really the case. In the privacy of her own mind, Jaime was just as inept as the rest of them, save for when he was not present.

But Joffrey leapt at the idea. "Is Jaime the only one who keeps the roster, Mother?" he asked her.

Cersei dipped her head in a shallow nod. "While he was...kept as a captive by the Starks, the duty fell to Ser Meryn Trant. Now that he has returned, however, the duty was not passed on when he left for Dragonstone." Her gaze found Tyrion's. "An oversight that the Hand of the King should have handled personally the moment Jaime left."

Tyrion dug his fingers into his sides. "Jaime is serving the realm," he reminded Cersei. "And there were precious few others who could lead a successful siege on Dragonstone. Remind me, Cersei, has he won it, yet?"

Cersei looked away, because the simple truth was that he had, and with precious little bloodshed, as well, the skeleton army which Stannis had left behind defeated within days. Whether he could defend it now from the Iron Islanders, however, was a different situation altogether.

Still, Tyrion had more faith in his brother than he did in Loras Tyrell, and indeed in Lancel now, apparently.

"Enough of this," Joffrey ground out. "Someone find out how the hell Lancel Lannister is now serving that damned group of fanatics, and slaughter them all!"

He sounded almost like Cersei, there, rather than the crazed nephew Tyrion had grown to hate so well.

At his side, Margaery stiffened, glancing wildly at Cersei before she managed to push the fear in her eyes down.

Then she glanced at Tyrion, and he found himself second guessing even that, wondering if it had not been a show merely for his benefit, that he would think she feared Cersei's reaction to the possible death of her cousin at all.

"Ah, and Lancel, Your Grace?" Tyrion could not help but ask snidely, but he was looking at Margaery as he phrased the question.

Joffrey waved a hand. "Him, spare," he said, and he was squeezing Margaery's hand again. "I want to know, in exquisite detail, why he thought he could threaten the life of my queen. Bring him in."

Tyrion cleared his throat, knowing the backlash his next words would bring even before he said them. And a part of him almost didn't want to besides.

"Ah, Your Grace, Lancel is a Lannister, and the son of your great uncle Kevan, who is currently in charge of the Lannister forces at Casterly Rock. It may not be wise to-"

"Lancel," Joffrey snapped, half standing, and then Margaery was pulling him back down again. He gritted his teeth, but affected a less enraged look. "Lancel Lannister is a traitor to his king and queen, who has thrown his lot in with those who have no name to speak of. He has turned his back on his family, and if Uncle Kevan has something to say about that, perhaps Uncle Kevan should not be leading the Lady of Casterly Rock's forces."

Cersei sat a little straighter in her chair, and Tyrion turned to her incredulously. "Are you determined to burn every bridge we have left, sister?" he demanded.

Cersei glared at him, and he knew, then. Knew that she hadn't told Joffrey, not about Myrcella, but that if he put his head just a little bit farther into her mouth, she would bite it off.

He was almost shocked that she had trusted him with this, even if he knew it was only because he was blackmailing her about Jaime.

"Lancel is no longer a Lannister," Cersei gritted out. She smiled, thinly. "I agree with Joffrey's decision. Let his name burn with the rest of them."

Tyrion grimaced, met her eyes, and saw the dark green Lannister fire reflected in them. "Very well," he said. "I guess I can't object to that."

And, a part of him realized, perhaps his sister was far more ruthless than he had ever thought. He was walking a thin line, threatening Jaime and asking her to trust him about Myrcella.

If he wasn't careful, he might be the next Lannister to lose his name.


	237. SANSA

King's Landing was in a flurry of activity that Sansa had not seen since the royal wedding, and she attempted to hide away in her chambers as much as she could, in order to avoid it.

Of course, it was far more difficult to do so now that her husband was the Hand of the King, where before her chambers had rarely been disturbed by visitors.

But everyone, every noble and every general, it seemed, wished to speak to the Hand of the King.

Of course they did. It had been this way, Sansa thought, when Stannis had marched on King's Landing, though she had not been married to Tyrion at the time and had managed easily to avoid the barrage.

And now Stannis was marching on Winterfell, with his ragtag army and the red witch who claimed to win his battles for him.

Sansa...didn't know what to think of that. It was hardly the first time he had done so; she knew he had marched on Winterfell before, then changed his mind to go further North, to the Wall, some said. Then, he'd come back, only to turn his eyes on Casterly Rock, believing it to be the easier target.

The Boltons had helped the Lannisters to achieve a great victory over Stannis at the Rock, once their bastard had married 'Arya.'

Sansa didn't know what to think of that anymore than she did what to think of Stannis marching on her home.

But think about it she did, every time Shae opened the door for another noble who wished to speak with her husband in his office, every time she and Tyrion were summoned to sup with the rest of the Lannisters, only to listen for long hours to Joffrey's boasts that Stannis was losing men to desertion and death by the day, and that this attempt to take Winterfell was a last stand that he couldn't win, with his red witch by his side or not.

Joffrey was jubilant as he proclaimed such things. It made Sansa want to cheer Stannis on, if only in the quiet of her own mind, but she couldn't.

She knew that if he and the witch woman could manage it, taking Winterfell would give Stannis a foothold in the North, and the North would be happy enough to be ruled by someone whose name was other than Lannister.

The North would remember what had happened to the Starks, at the hands of the Lannisters.

But that was just the thing.

Stannis Baratheon was not a Stark, and the thought of someone so obviously not a Stark, of someone whose attack on the city had nearly seen her raped and killed, someone who showed no care for her or her family so far, taking her home from her was almost more than Sansa could bear.

Which was silly. Winterfell was not hers; it was merely claimed by the Lannisters through her name, and now through the Boltons through her sister's, fake as it was. It didn't belong to her anymore than anything else in the North did, and she shouldn't care at all, that it might soon belong to someone else entirely.

But Sansa couldn't stop thinking about it, as she watched Cersei fight her brother, demand that Jaime Lannister return from Dragonstone and protect the city, where he could do much good compared to an easy fight against the Iron Islanders.

Tyrion would not allow it, and more often than not, supper these days seemed to end with Cersei getting up and marching out, while Joffrey got progressively more intoxicated with each passing evening.

And of course, the lighter problem they had to deal with was Lancel Lannister's defection to the Sparrows and his abandonment of his duties to the Kingsguard.

Joffrey had been furious, when they returned to the Keep and reported as much to him. He'd called an emergency meeting of the Small Council, demanding to know how they had not realized they'd even lost Loras, and of course, according to Margaery, Cersei had tried to smooth things over by claiming that because Jaime Lannister, the Lord Commander, was not present, the Kingsguard could not be held responsible for not realizing before now that Lancel was indeed missing.

She'd looked pointedly at Tyrion while she said it, apparently, and Margaery seemed to think there was some reason for it, for her anger at Jaime's leaving to lead the army.

Of course, she was just as furious as Joffrey that Lancel had defected, had betrayed the Lannister family in such a way. And because she'd blamed Tyrion openly, it had become Tyrion's duty to see that something was done about that, as well as Stannis' march on Winterfell once more.

Sansa hated them all.

It was what finally gave her the courage to go and find Margaery, despite her husband's orders against it.

That, and, well, she was having nightmares about Oberyn now, every night that she was not in Margaery’s bed.

She didn't know, rightly, what had been holding her back before, because it hadn't been her husband's orders then, either, but when Sansa stood outside the doors of the Maidenvault, she hesitated.

Margaery and she had been keeping secrets from each other, before. It was, or at least Sansa thought it was, the reason everything had fallen so ill between them.

But she couldn't tell Margaery those secrets if she refused to resolve them in her own mind as worthy of mention, and Sansa was beginning to wonder if it had been a mistake at all to come here.

She glanced over at Margaery, where she lay on the bed beside Sansa, wrapped in golden blankets and staring back at Sansa with an expression she couldn't read.

Sansa had always been able to read Margaery, in the privacy of a bed, before.

They were both naked, but they hadn't done anything, Sansa thought, with only a small amount of regret. She had come here to do something, to let off steam in the way her brothers often thought of it, back in Winterfell, but it hadn't ended up like that.

Margaery kissed her, and all Sansa could see was Oberyn's skull, smashed in on the sand of the arena.

So they lay in the dark, not quite touching, and Sansa yearned, and wished that this was enough at the same time.

Margaery seemed to understand her need for silence, merely lifting a hand to run it through Sansa's hair over and again. Her eyes were gentle, glowing in the dark, and Sansa leaned closer to her and closed her own.

She could almost breathe again, laying so close to the other girl.

"What would happen if Stannis did take Winterfell?" Sansa asked quietly against Margaery's naked skin as they lay in the dark, none of Margaery's ladies to be found.

It was not often that they were able to do such; usually, their movements were hurried and Sansa was always worried that someone would walk in on them, would see them as they were and damn them to Joffrey, and so afterwards, Margaery would hurry away and Sansa would pretend that she did not want more than anything in the world for Margaery to stay just a bit longer.

But they hadn't done anything like that in some time, and Sansa honestly couldn't say which she preferred.

She wondered if this was what it had been life, for Ser Jaime Lannister and the Queen Mother, when they had snuck about giving birth to three horrible Lannister children, even if Tommen was not so bad as all that.

Of course, with her and Margaery, there was no need to worry about such things. She still was unsure how she felt about Margaery, knew that she cared for the other girl more than she did for anyone now living, but she had never heard of two women engaging in the sort of...activities that she and Margaery were engaging in now, and she knew, on some level, that they would have been disapproved of for more than just that Sansa and Margaery were both married if anyone ever found out.

But she did not think that she would ever be able to let Margaery go, all the same.

She knew that Margaery was frightened, that she was happy enough to lay here in the dark beside Sansa for another reason. Joffrey boasted often enough that Stannis would never take Winterfell, as he had never taken Casterly Rock, but the Rock had not been without its losses, for the Boltons and the Lannisters.

But if he did, there would be nothing to stop him from marching on King's Landing once more, and Margaery had not lived through the Battle of Blackwater, had only come here at the end of it, once her family's army had helped to save them all.

Margaery lifted her head, stared at Sansa with catlike eyes in the dark. "I would have thought I had gotten your mind off of darker things, with all of that," she said, with a hint of humor in her voice, one hand reaching out to brush against Sansa's cheek.

Sansa flushed, though, in the dark, she knew Margaery would not be able to see it. "You could. I just..."

Her father had advocated for Stannis Baratheon's right to rule the Seven Kingdoms, after Robert Baratheon's death, Sansa knew. It was what had caused Joffrey to cut off his traitor's head, and she should not be thinking of it.

But still, she had thought when Stannis Baratheon fought in the Battle of Blackwater, that if he won and she found herself a prisoner of the old king's brother, rather than the Lannisters, he might be kinder to her. Might give her some of the freedoms that the Lannisters would not, might let her marry whom she would out of a sense of duty to her father for standing with him.

If he took Winterfell now, would he do it in her name, or for himself? Would he hand it over to her, once he liberated her from the Lannisters? Would she live through another attack on the city for him to do so? Would Margaery?

Margaery tilted her head, eyes nearly glowing in the dark before she sat up and put her fingers underneath Sansa's chin, caught her eyes in her own.

Sometimes, Sansa wondered if Margaery were some sort of witch, such were her powers of seduction.

"Stannis is not a kind man, Sansa," she said quietly. "He killed Renly while we were still wed, rather than risk fighting him in a battle he knew he could not win. I fear that he would take Winterfell and send you to brother Jon at the Wall, if you lived long enough for him to do so, and I am not saying that to frighten you."

Sansa knew that she shouldn't shiver at that thought, that joining her last remaining relative even in exile should have been preferable to remaining a prisoner of the Lannisters, but she couldn't help herself.

"And then he would have the North, and want to take King's Landing," Sansa said softly, continuing the narrative in her words if nothing else. "He would kill the Lannisters, destroy their army. He might even kill Joffrey."

Margaery dipped her head. "Probably. Not Tommen or Myrcella, though. He is...too honorable of a man, for that, for all that he once called them abominations."

Sansa sucked in a breath, as she thought about what was truly bothering her about all of this. How, even if Stannis did this for her, and liberated King's Landing from the Lannisters, Margaery was the wife of a king he had once called an abomination.

"Are we on opposite sides, Margaery?" she asked quietly. "You have thrown your lot in with the Lannisters, and I would like for nothing more than for all the Lannisters to die."

Margaery kissed her sweet lips, though Margaery's tasted bitter, now, Sansa couldn't help but think. "Valar mourgulis," she reminded Sansa. "I have thrown my lot in with no one, Sansa Stark. It would do you well to remember that."

And then she was standing, and Sansa felt her heart clog in her throat as she heard Margaery groping about in the dark for her clothes.

"Margaery..." she called after the other girl, but only after the door had swung shut after Margaery's exit.

Sansa bit down hard on her lower lip. "Stupid, stupid girl," she muttered to herself.

The bed felt even colder without Margaery in it, and Sansa found herself curling in tightly around herself when she went back to her own, and dreamt that night of Stannis Baratheon and blood on the snow.

She woke up screaming, Shae rushing into her chambers to wake and hold her until the early hours of the morning.


	238. MARGAERY

"This is nice," Sansa said softly into the silence, tone wistful, and Margaery blinked up from the book in her hands that she was having a difficult time concentrating on, smiling at the other girl.

"I was worried you'd be bored," she said, and then breathed through her mouth, shaking her head and sniffling a little.

It was, after all, past noon, and they'd done little more than read together and, in Margaery's case, sleep. She didn't think Sansa had done as much, while she was out, though she couldn't imagine it had been very amusing for the girl, watching Margaery in her almost feverish sleep.

Sansa laughed, leaning her head down on Margaery's shoulder where she sat beside the other girl on the bed. "I don't mind," Sansa told her. "I...Honestly, I can't think of a time when it was like this. Just the two of us, lazing about."

Margaery laughed. "Well, don't get used to it," she told Sansa. "The only reason I'm not still up and about is because my cowardly husband is afraid of catching what I have."

He'd insisted that Margaery take as much time as he needed to recover, because of course she was the queen and needed to be in top shape, flinching away from her when she reached out to squeeze his hand in thanks.

Margaery wondered how many times Joffrey had been sick in his life, or had his mother's padded parenting saved him from that, too.

Sansa snorted, though Margaery noticed the nervous way she glanced toward the door. Margaery resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

She understood the worry, of course she did. And, before...all of this, she'd shared it. Had constantly been looking over her shoulder, constantly in fear that they would be caught.

But Margaery couldn't even bring herself to think of that, now. Sansa was back, and everything, for the moment, was at a manageable level. Somewhere just under not quite insane, and Margaery could handle that.

Getting a cold wasn't going to impede her for more than just this second day, after all. She would be fine tomorrow, with the concoctions that Elinor swore by, and was brewing alongside the finest maesters in Westeros.

And Margaery, just now, had Sansa to keep her company. Even if her head ached and she couldn't breathe properly through her nose, Margaery couldn't bring herself to regret the lost time in court.

"I can enjoy it, though," Sansa said, smiling softly, and Margaery affected an exaggerated huff.

"Ah, well, I'm glad you're enjoying my suffering," she teased, and watched the tension build in Sansa's shoulders before she forced it away with a smile.

"Perhaps I can make your recovery a little more...enjoyable," Sansa said, leaning forward, puckering her lips, and Margaery groaned and pulled away.

"Don't even try it," she told Sansa, and Sansa pouted, pulling back herself and crossing her arms.

"Why not?" she asked. "Your maesters aren't supposed to come back for your treatment for another hour, and Elinor already-"

Margaery turned a soft glare on her. "Because don't you think it would look suspicious, if suddenly you had a cold, too?"

Sansa shrugged. "No one's been paying much attention to me," she said, glancing down at her hands, where they fiddled with Margaery's sheets.

Margaery sat up a little straighter, because she was sure that not being noticed, in Sansa's case, was something she should have been happy about. "What do you mean?"

Sansa swallowed hard, still no longer looking at Margaery. "I see the way they look at me, the other courtiers, now," she said hoarsely. "As if..." and then she looked up, meeting Margaery's eyes. "As if they all know what I did. They all know what I'm guilty of."

Margaery scoffed. "The last time I checked, you didn't kill Tywin Lannister, or is there something you forgot to tell me?"

Sansa flinched, and Margaery instantly regretted the words.

But she didn't know how to make things right, anymore. Before, she felt as if she did know. As if, by virtue of knowing Sansa more than most in King's Landing, she also knew how to comfort her.

But no matter how many times Margaery told Sansa that she was not to blame for Oberyn's death, the other girl didn't hear her. And she had changed in the Black Cells, not just because of what Margaery had asked her to do.

She was quieter now, thinner of course, and she didn't meet Margaery's eyes for very long, anymore.

But Margaery had noticed that she wasn't running off to throw up very much, lately. And that might have just been Margaery, hoping that she was doing better, because the gods knew she didn't spend every waking second with Sansa, but it had been noticeable before, when she was paying attention.

Margaery half turned in bed, waiting until Sansa met her eyes before reaching out and taking the other girl's hands in her own. "You didn't kill him," Margaery repeated. "You didn't kill Tywin Lannister, and you didn't kill Oberyn Martell. Say it."

Sansa cleared her throat. "Margaery..."

"Say it," Margaery repeated, more insistently, now.

"I..." Sansa licked her lips, starting to turn away from Margaery, but Margaery held her fast. "Margaery..."

"Say it," Margaery repeated. She swallowed. "Please."

Sansa met her eyes, then. "I didn't kill Tywin," she said dully. Then, "I didn't kill...I didn't kill Oberyn." Then, slightly higher, "I didn't kill Oberyn. I..."

"Sansa," Margaery leaned forward, squeezed Sansa's hand. Sniffled.

"I didn't kill Oberyn," Sansa repeated, and this time, Margaery thought she might actually believe it. "I didn't kill Oberyn. I didn't kill him."

Margaery smiled, started to speak, but Sansa kept going.

"I didn't kill Oberyn. I didn't..."

"There," Margaery said, reaching out and swiping at the single tear spilling down Sansa's cheek.

Sansa stared at her for a moment, and then moved forward, pressing her lips to Margaery's.

Elinor came in several minutes later, holding a pot of soup for Margaery and some concoction she swore her mother had taught her when she was younger, to cure all ills.

Sansa had a cold within two days. No one noticed except Shae, who only stared at her in vague disapproval before bringing her some soup.


	239. MARGAERY

Cold finally over, Margaery found herself thrown back into the swing of things immediately. Her idiot husband was ready to send more troops to fight Stannis, and the Lord Hand wasn't doing much to stop him. Perhaps he truly believed more troops would solve the problem.

Margaery was beginning to think that more troops never solved anything, but Stannis Baratheon was refusing to treat with them, despite the letter Tyrion Lannister had sent out requesting as much.

She wasn't certain what she would do in the man's stead, knew only that it wasn't working, what he was doing.

It wasn't enough.

And here she was, not wanting to think about that at all, because Sansa had finally come back to her, and she wanted nothing more than to hold the other girl in her arms and think of nothing at all.

"My lady?" a voice asked, and Margaery lifted her head, blinked at Joffrey's impatient expression.

They were sitting at a meeting of the Small Council, and Margaery had stupidly let her mind wander. She would not soon forgive herself for that.

Neither would her grandmother.

Margaery licked her lips. "I'm sorry, my love," she said, meeting no one's eyes but his. "I'm afraid the thought that the greatest army in Westeros is unable to defeat one madman with a half starved, frozen group of soldiers in his wake was too much for my feeble mind to comprehend." She sent a smart look Tyrion Lannister's way, because if he thought she was blind to the irritated, angry glances he kept sending her way, he had another thing coming.

She was sick of his self-righteous anger over what she had asked Sansa to do. Sick of the passive aggressive way he was handling it, not confronting her about it one moment, and doing as she had requested as if to point out she owed him some favor in the next.

He was almost as bad as Cersei, that way.

Joffrey smirked, spinning back toward Tyrion. "She's right, Uncle," he said. "What are you doing, if it isn't leading my armies to victory?"

Tyrion ground his teeth loudly enough that Margaery could hear the sound on the other side of the table. "Your Grace," he said, with surprising patience for a man with his family name, "Perhaps if we had armies to fight Stannis, things would be different. As it is, the Lannister army is still stretched thin-"

"Send my family's armies," Margaery spoke up then, leaning back in her chair, and all eyes turned her way. She shrugged. "Forgive me. The...politics of war are sometimes lost on me, but it is my understanding that House Tyrell and House Lannister are loyal friends in this war, and, more than that, family." She turned toward Joffrey. "It is our duty, is it not, to assist when House Lannister's army is in need of us?"

Cersei's eyes darkened. "I am certain that won't be necessary-"

Joffrey raised a hand, shooting her an annoyed look. "If Lord Mace is willing," he said, glancing sideways at Margaery's father, and of course the man simpered and smiled and blustered and agreed, as Margaery had suspected he would.

She did not feel Tyrion's gaze leave her face once, and she knew he was wondering now, what she was playing at.

Let him wonder, Margaery thought, standing from the table as her husband did.

Let him wonder what she hoped to achieve, in showing up his family's army, or sacrificing her own to the bitter cold of the North.

She wasn't playing at anything. She was just sick of this damned war. Sick to death of it, and her damn husband.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "Well," he said. "Now that has been handled, we need to talk about Lancel."

Joffrey ground his teeth, leaning forward in his chair. "Have you found him yet?" he demanded.

Tyrion shook his head. "Unfortunately, he seems to have disappeared. Lord Varys?" he looked relieved to pass the chance over to Varys to speak about it, and Margaery couldn't say she blamed him.

She would never forget the look of hatred Lancel Lannister had sent her way, while he stood in the crowd of sparrows, but she couldn't understand why he would betray his family and stand there in the first place.

Well, she supposed, if her family was the Lannister family, she supposed she could understand a little, but still. It made little sense to a woman whose whole life had been filled with the knowledge of the loyalty she needed to display to her House.

She shook her head, watched as Varys glanced at all of them before speaking. "My little sparrows have informed me that he lives in the city with other sparrows, walking barefoot and most often guarding the High Sparrow. The Old Man has taken him as a confidant."

Joffrey ground his teeth. "Then why the fuck haven't we brought him in for questioning yet?"

Varys sighed. "Begging Your Grace's pardon, but we have been unable to get the man alone without the rest of the sparrows-"

"Then arrest them all!" Joffrey screeched. "I don't care, just bring my fucking cousin here so that I can chop off his head for treason the way I chopped off Ned Stark's!"

Tyrion glanced down at his hands, clasped together on the table. "Because we know that worked so well then. Your Grace, Uncle Kevan-"

"Should stay loyal to this family even then, if he values his own head!" Joffrey snapped at him, reaching out and squeezing Margaery's hand again. "Now find him!"

Tyrion sighed. "Of course, Your Grace, but even then-"

"I want to know why he defected from the Kingsguard," Cersei spoke up then, and Margaery glanced at the woman, at the liquid fire her green eyes were sending Tyrion's way, and Margaery cocked her head.

Something was going on there, and she hated not knowing what it was. Tyrion hadn't suggested figuring out why Lancel had defected, and Cersei seemed to blame him for it in the first place.

Perhaps Tyrion had hoped no one would notice, but Margaery had noticed that while both Joffrey and Cersei had expressed a desire in interrogating him, Tyrion himself had yet to voice interest in knowing exactly why Lancel had defected.

He knew something, and it irked Margaery that her ladies had not been able to find out what that was.

She shook her head to clear it as Tyrion promised to find a nonviolent way of bringing Lancel in, because, "You understand, Your Grace, the smallfolk would not be pleased if we slaughtered the fanatics, as much trouble as they've been causing."

Joffrey snorted. "Do you think I give a fuck about that? Find him, Uncle, and if you can't bring him here without killing a few madmen, then do it."

Tyrion swallowed. "Yes, Your Grace," he murmured, and Margaery squinted at him.

They left soon after, and Joffrey took Margaery's hand, practically dragging her along after him as he suggested going to the Sept to talk about a few more dead Targaryens.

Margaery couldn't say she was surprised, considering the subject matter the Small Council had been discussing.

"Your Grace," Margaery suggested quietly as she reached for the one shawl she had left in her husband's chambers of late. She didn't think he would want to wait for her to find another pair of clothes. "Are you certain this is safe? Considering the Sparrows ambushed my ladies and I while we were out-"

"Why was Sansa Stark with you?" Joffrey interrupted, turning to her, and Margaery blinked, stomach lurching.

"Your Grace?"

"When you were out and the Sparrows ambushed you," Joffrey said, voice cold now, as he reached for a thin jacket laid out for him by one of the servants. "Why was she with you?"

Margaery swallowed, and focused on keeping her expression neutral. It would not do to show a hint of guilt, just now. "I...don't know, Your Grace," she said. "I thought perhaps to be kind to her, in order to..."

Joffrey waited, turning and staring at her expectantly, and Margaery made a split second decision, thinking of the way Tyrion had not expressed an interest in interrogating Lancel, and didn't seem to be in much of a hurry to get the boy back.

"The Lord Hand is hiding something," Margaery rushed out. "About Lancel Lannister. You could see it, couldn't you, today in the Small Council? He hasn't made an effort to get the traitor back, and he doesn't seem interested in passing a harsh punishment, either?"

Joffrey's expression darkened. "Are you accusing my uncle of conspiring with the defector?" he demanded, and Margaery forced herself to smile.

"Of course not, my love," she said quickly, reaching out and touching his chest. "I would never imagine that the Hand of the King was capable of such a thing. But there is certainly something suspicious about it, and I've been thinking that keeping his little wife close might help us to determine what that is. He might confide in her."

Joffrey studied her for a moment, and Margaery forced herself to meet his gaze, even as her heart hammered in her chest.

"I suppose that is a sound strategy," he said finally, pulling away from her, and Margaery remembered to breathe again. "Let me know what you find out."

Margaery smiled, pulling the shawl around her shoulders. "Of course, my love," she said, and Joffrey squinted at her for another moment, before shrugging and walking towards the door.


	240. MARGAERY

"I need you to give me something," Margaery said, after they'd made sweet love and lay tangled in Margaery's sheets that night.

She could feel Sansa's gaze on her. "What do you mean?" she asked, and for a moment, Margaery imagined that her eyes had gone hard.

And she hated this, she did. Hated that she was asking Sansa for yet another thing, when she had already asked so much of her, with Oberyn.

Margaery cleared her throat, sitting up, and she could see the expression on Sansa's face harden as she too sat up, seeming to understand the seriousness of the situation.

Margaery swallowed. "Joffrey asked why I took you into the city the other day," she said, and Sansa froze.

"Wh...what?"

Margaery reached out, wrapping her hand around Sansa's wrist when she saw how frightened the other girl looked. She hadn't meant to scare her like that, she only meant...

"It's fine," she promised, and kept on when Sansa didn't look convinced. "I managed to throw him off our scent," she said, and she felt her lips twitching at the pun, as the musty air of sex still filled the air of her chambers.

Sansa smiled, too, and it relieved her more than she could say.

"But I only managed it because I convinced him that I was pumping you for information," Margaery continued, and Sansa cocked her head, lips twitching, now.

And then she turned serious. "About what?" she asked. "I don't know anything."

Margaery shrugged, still squeezing Sansa's wrist. "Sansa, you're married to the Hand of the King. A Hand who doesn't seem very concerned about arresting Lancel Lannister. Now, that might be understandable, considering the developments with Stannis, but of course Lancel is all Joffrey is thinking about."

Sansa licked her lips, pulling her hand away. "No," she breathed, and Margaery blinked at her.

"Sansa?"

Sansa tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "No," she repeated. "I can't...I won't do that," she said, and Margaery blinked at her.

"Sansa, I'm not trying..."

"Sansa, I'm not asking you to speak against your husband," Margaery said. "Or..." she shook her head, "or spy on him. I just wanted to make you aware of why Joffrey thinks we're spending so much time together."

Sansa stared at her. "But don't you see?" she asked quietly. "That's exactly what you're asking. What happens when it comes out that my husband is in league with Lancel Lannister, or...or, I don't know what, but..." she bit her lip. "Joffrey will think such information came from me, and I can't do what I did to Oberyn again. I can't."

Margaery swallowed. "I'm not asking you to testify against him, Sansa. I'm not even asking..." she shook her head. "Look, I don't think he's doing anything treasonous. I just wanted to make you aware of what I told Joffrey. So that..."

"And did you make him aware that the time you're spending with me is mainly in your bedroom?" Sansa interrupted her, and Margaery flinched.

"Of course not, Sansa."

Sansa shook her head, climbing naked off the bed and bending down to pick up her clothes where they lay in a crumpled pile on the floor. She pulled on her tunic, turning her back on Margaery, and Margaery could feel her heart thudding in her chest.

She knew she had done something wrong, just here, but she didn't know what it was, didn't know why Sansa's shoulders were so stiff, why she wasn't meeting Margaery's eyes, now.

"I can't do this," Sansa announced abruptly, staring at the far wall instead of Margaery, and that had Margaery on her feet, getting off the bed and coming around to face Sansa.

"What?"

Sansa shook her head, and Margaery crossed her arms over her chest. "I can't keep plotting alongside you, can't keep playing your game where people don't matter unless they matter to you."

Margaery stared at her, feeling sick. "I don't think that, Sansa," she said softly.

Sansa smiled, sadly. "But you do, don't you? You were willing to see Oberyn die because it meant saving me, and you're willing to drag down Tyrion, too, because he knows about us and you're scared that he'll do something about it."

Margaery reached out, grasping Sansa's arms. "No, that's not what this is," she said.

Sansa pulled away. "I don't believe you," she said, and Margaery felt as if the breath had been knocked out of her. She took a startled step back, because what was the point of all of this?

She'd thought things were back to where they should be, between the two of them. Had she been a silly, naive girl, to think they could work things out with a bit of talking and some sex?

And now here she was, with Sansa definitely not holding back the way she had been the other night.

"Is that what you really think of me?" Margaery asked softly, and Sansa glanced down. The pit in Margaery's stomach grew. "Sansa..."

"Margaery," Sansa interrupted her. "I want this,” she gestured to the room around them. “You, but this part of you. I do. But..." she waved a hand around the room. "I don't want the rest of it. I can't want the rest of it. For me."

Margaery stared at her, mouth parted. She should be saying something. Salvaging this, somehow, but the words wouldn't come at all.

"I...I'm not ready to go back to the way things were," Sansa said softly, reaching out and brushing the pad of her thumb over Margaery's palm. "And...I don't know when I will be, but...I do care about you, and..." She shook her head. "I still want you. Is that all right with you? That I can't offer you more just yet?"

“I...”

No. No, it wasn’t all right, because if she couldn’t plot alongside Sansa in King’s Landing, she couldn’t protect her, and that would mean breaking Margaery’s heart all over again, irreparably, this time.

But Margaery was scared.

It wasn't a feeling she was particularly accustomed to, before coming to King's Landing. Of course there was the vague fear, when her brother introduced her once more to Renly Baratheon on the eve of their wedding that this soft, sweet man was going to drag her down with him.

But nothing like this.

And yet here she was, scared all the time and unable to voice those fears aloud.

Afraid that one day, Joffrey would go too far and she would not be able to stop her brother from killing him.

Afraid that Joffrey would hurt her too badly to recover from, because while she pretended well with Loras and Sansa, that fear had not left her mind since the day he asked her if she would enjoy killing something, and his eyes had been manic with dark desire.

Afraid that her grandmother would decide Margaery wasn't smart enough to see the game through.

Afraid that someone would see her in bed with another woman and report that to her husband and Cersei.

And yet, somewhere along the line, the fear that she would lose Sansa Stark forever had become the greatest of these, pushing the others down until they almost didn't seem important at all, anymore.

And Margaery...didn't know when that had happened, but here she was, staring into Sansa's eyes and unable to come up with a response to the other girl's question.

She shook her head, forced herself to smile despite the sudden clogging in her throat, because Sansa needed an answer, and now, and if Margaery told her the truth she would scare the other girl off forever.

_I love you, Sansa Stark._

"It's all right, Sansa," Margaery lied, bending forward and giving Sansa a small kiss on the cheek. "Of course. If that's what you want, I swear I won't ask more of you, and it was wrong of me to ask anything of you in the first place. I just...Whatever we can do together, whatever you can do with me. Yes?"

Sansa's breathing was ragged, but relief flooded her feature. "I...yes," she whispered hoarsely, and Margaery smiled at her, and pretended her heart wasn't still thudding in her chest.

The problem was, she could figure out a way to spin her story to Joffrey. She could tell him that Sansa didn't have any information, that of course Tyrion didn't trust his little Stark wife.

But she didn't want to. She didn't want this to just be sex, between the two of them, and she understood why Sansa might find it comforting to believe that was all they had to worry about, but...

But Margaery hadn't wanted that from Sansa in such a long time, she didn't know where to go from here at all.

She only knew that if they kept on the way things were, sooner or later they would be dragged back into it again, no matter how much Sansa didn’t want that. That Sansa was naive to think they could have something less than to watch the whole world burn around them, and Margaery didn’t know how to fix this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, I'm evil. Bring on the angst.


	241. MARGAERY

"I ought to go and visit my brother, while he recovers," Margaery told her husband sweetly as they ate their morning break of fast.

Once the words were out of her, she couldn’t take them back, Margaery thought, and tried not to be relieved by the lack of responsibility the thought gave her.

It was a thought that had been bothering her for some time, how to get away from this wretched place in order to visit her sick brother, and now, her mind was finally giving her an excuse.

She resolutely didn't think about red hair between her teeth as she glanced Joffrey's way, searching for his reaction.

She wasn't running away, Margaery told herself. That wasn't what this was, at all.

Joffrey looked up at her. "Why?" he asked, sounding truly bemused, and she blinked at him, tried to remember her part, which had seemed so fuzzy lately.

She wondered what it felt like, to not care enough about one's family unless they did something for you that you could not even be bothered to concern when they were ill.

"Because it will be expected of me," she said finally, with a small, sad looking smile. "He is my brother, after all, and he is still recovering."

Joffrey nodded, accepting this answer easily enough. "My lady is too kind," he said finally, tipping his drink to her, and she smiled prettily.

"I will try not to be gone from your side too long," she promised him. "Only...only long enough to ensure that he is properly recovered."

"I suppose this means my mother will have to go, as well," he said finally, voice petulant even as he nodded absently at her words.

Margaery forced herself not to frown at that. "She is his wife still, Your Grace."

He waved a hand. "Yes, yes. Only...Perhaps the High Septon can be persuaded to annul the marriage, in light of everything that has happened. She ought to be here, with her family, after my grandfather's death, and she has led me to believe that the marriage was never consummated."

Margaery felt her cheeks flush at the thought of Cersei's cunt anywhere near her sweet brother in that way, and took another sip of summer wine to hide it. Still, she had a duty to her family, much as she hated the thought of what she was about to say.

"I am not sure if that is wise," she said gently, and Joffrey lifted a brow at her. "Only...I am only your wife, and do not understand all of these...such matters, but the people should not be put through too much instability, surely? There are those at court who argue that the Sparrows have only risen to such prominence amongst the smallfolk because they are frightened about the war."

She knew it would look like something more than an annulment between two people who disliked each other rather strongly, if Joffrey were to annul the marriage. Tywin had only just died, and they needed to present a united front to Westeros, as much as she would like to save her brother from a lifetime with Cersei Lannister.

Perhaps there could be an annulment later, when things had calmed down, but she did not tell Joffrey this.

Because she would much rather there not be an annulment at all, but rather, simply no longer be a wife. Both were mere dreams.

He nodded. "I suppose not," he said finally, but with a glint in his eye that she didn't like at all.

Still, Margaery played her part. "And I am sure that my brother would not begrudge his wife her wish to remain in King's Landing with her child," she continued, hating how quickly the words erupted from her. "After all, she has just lost her father, and he is on the mend."

Joffrey nodded absently. "Yes, yes. But for how long? Especially if the marriage is not consummated. I am sure there are those of the Reach who expect its Lady to provide its heirs."

Margaery shrugged, for his face had gone pinched at the idea of his mother birthing other heirs. Margaery was just as disgusted at the thought. This wasn't what she had wanted to talk about, when she had suggested the idea of going to visit Willas.

She didn't want Cersei anywhere near her brother.

"I am sure that is not quite the first thing on their minds, just now, my love. The Martells have infuriated the rest of Westeros, and I understand that many of the Reach lords are speaking of battling those who live along the Dornish Marshes."

He nodded. "I have heard the same. The situation is troubling, considering my sister is still in Dorne."

She hummed. "I am sure a solution can be found, my love, but, as I have said, I must play my part."

He reached out, brushed his fingers along her cheek. "I shall miss you," he told her, and Margaery hid a shudder.

"And I you, my love," she murmured, leaning forward and kissing his full, pouting lips.

She didn't tell him that she had another motive for getting out of King's Landing, for going to see her brother.

The knowledge that she would be getting away from Sansa, from whom she wanted so much but also didn't want to push as hard as she had before, as well.

And they had only been together again for so small an amount of time, yet she couldn't help fearing that if she stayed here any longer, she would only push Sansa away again.

"I've had a new ship made recently," Joffrey told her excitedly, seemingly at ease now with her decision to leave. "I was going to give it to my mother for her next nameday, or have it turned into a warship to defeat those fucking Martells, but I think it will be much more useful for you."

And _that_ thought had Margaery beaming. She wondered if she would be present when Cersei found out, how she might react to the news that the ship meant for her was now going to Margaery.

And then she thought about it, because taking a ship home to Highgarden was a far greater hassle, and ridiculously longer journey, than traveling along the Kingsroad. She hated ships, and loved riding. And, of course, traveling by ship would even force her to travel past Dorne, and for all that they had won a sort of peace with the Dornish now, she doubted it would last.

Still, she didn't want to appear ungrateful.

This trip had suddenly grown more interesting. Perhaps gifting the ship to Margaery had been Cersei's idea after all, the shrew.

"You spoil me. Has it a name yet, my love?" she asked, remembering how Joffrey so liked to christen the things that belonged to him. It was a wonder he hadn't tried to change Margaery's name to something altogether more Targaryen.

Joffrey grinned. "One I think you'll like, my lady," he said with a lascivious grin, and Margaery knew she would hate it at those words.

Still, stepping a bit closer, she whispered in his ear, "Tell me, then. And then I am sure I can find some way to...thank you for it."


	242. MARGAERY

It was a beautiful ship, the _Maiden Slayer_ , outfitted with all of the luxuries and newest technologies that the king's own flagship demanded; for all that Joffrey had never used the massive beast awaiting him in the harbor.

Margaery thought of her own mother, superstitious to the core, as she heard the name repeated by Meredyth Crane.

They were standing on a balcony of the Keep, overlooking the distant harbor, and Margaery could see the ship, idling in the water, fully outfitted and waiting only for the Captain to hire the entirety of the crew and pack away all of the things required of a Queen when she traveled somewhere.

It was, she could admit, a beautiful ship; even if she hated the name, and hated that she was being forced to ride in it rather than to take a horse back to her home.

"What a...lovely name," Meredyth said, drawing out the word lovely rather long, and Margaery sent her an unamused glance. "I wonder if King Joffrey named it himself."

The words were obviously meant to amuse, but Margaery couldn't bring herself to laugh, for she had no doubt Joffrey had named the ship.

Perhaps he'd meant to give it to Sansa.

"Is it?" she asked idly.

Meredyth was the only lady she was bringing on her journey with her, because a ship did not leave occasion for dressing all in finery, and most of her ladies were not bred for the heat of Sunspear, much as they had tried to argue otherwise.

Besides, she was going here to visit her brother, to make sure he really was all right. Short and simple. There was no reason to bring a gaggle of ladies for that. Meredyth, out of all of them, might have ill humored japes, but at least she was sensible enough to keep them only to herself and those close enough to whisper them to, and old enough to know when not to.

She would be good to bring, on such a quiet, somber trip.

Meredyth nodded. "Almost as lovely as the King of Westeros sending his wife leagues out of the way, through a hostile territory's seas, to go and visit her brother when she could just as well take a horse."

"Meredyth!" Margaery pretended to sound scandalized. In all honesty, she'd had the same thought, though she'd been careful not to let on about it. The very fact that Joffrey was allowing his wife to go on such a diplomatic mission for him just went to show how he trusted her, and Margaery had every intention of assuring that trust allowed her other diplomatic journeys, in the future.

Anything for an excuse to get out of King's Landing, even if she felt terrible about leaving Sansa there all alone, but if she proved herself enough, Margaery thought, there was a chance she might be able to take Sansa with her next time.

That had been the only thought that kept her from breaking down when Joffrey refused her idle request to take Sansa with her, citing that it would likely prove too much of a temptation for the Martells when they passed Dorne, for all that the Queen in a fully armored warship would not.

Joffrey wondered if her husband understood anything about politics.

"Anyway," Margaery said placidly, folding her hands in her lap. "It will be nice; to get away from King's Landing for a little while."

Meredyth snorted. "Do you think-"

"My lady!" a voice called, and Margaery turned around, to find Megga running forward onto the balcony, red faced and out of breath.

Margaery's face instantly transformed in concern. "Megga," she called, moving forward to greet the other girl. "Is something wrong?"

Megga grinned as she grew closer. "There's someone waiting in your chambers," she said, grin widening, and Margaery pointedly didn't look at Meredyth, though she could feel the other girl starting to grin, as well, beside her.

"Is there?" Margaery asked coolly.

Megga's grin morphed into a smirk. "Oh yes, Your Grace," she said. "And I understand it's a matter of some...urgency."

Margaery rolled her eyes, glancing around. "You're horrible," she said, "All of you. Meredyth, make sure all of your things are packed. My husband informs me that the ship will be seaworthy tomorrow, and I don't want to waste anymore time."

Meredyth bobbed her head, though Megga's smile faded entirely.

While Margaery had resolved only to take one of her ladies, she knew they were all growing homesick for Highgarden. It had been a long time since any of them had gone home, and if Margaery thought she could get away with it, she would have kidnapped them all, and Sansa, and taken them back to the Reach.

Of course, Oberyn Martell had just tried that, and they all knew how that had turned out.

Margaery sighed. "I'll just be going, then," she said, and ignored the look Megga and Meredyth sent each other. Or, didn't. "Don't you have duties to attend to?"

They giggled.

Margaery rolled her eyes, hurrying down the hall without trying to make it look like she was hurrying.

She made it back to her chambers without drawing any attention, and that at least was a relief, as she opened the door and blinked at the sight of Sansa, sitting half naked on her bed, arms crossed.

She sent Margaery a look that Margaery supposed was meant to be sexy, and Margaery's lips twitched as she attempted to hide a smile. She quickly shut the door, moving forward and looking Sansa up and down.

"I don't suppose you're going to take off the rest of it," she said, and Sansa grinned, sitting up off the bed and pulling down the rest of her skirts.

"Megga assured me she would latch the door," she said, smirking. "I figured I ought to make the best of it."

Margaery moved forward, grasping Sansa's bare shoulders and bending down to kiss her. "Well, I definitely approve," she said, "Even if you should have checked that the door was actually latched."

Sansa paled, but Margaery didn't let her think about that, didn't think about the fact that she was leaving in the morning, just kissed her again, and again.

The feel of Sansa's bare skin against her own filled Margaery with warmth she wished was real, wasn't just them in the privacy of these chambers, a feeling that wouldn't leave them, as Sansa wished it to.

And Margaery...wanted to respect that, she did. It was probably even very smart.

There was a reason she was leaving for Highgarden, after all.

Sansa kissed her again, and she could feel Sansa's hands scrambling for the sleeves of her gown, yanking them down around her waist so that her breasts bounced upwards, and Margaery smirked, trailed her kisses down Sansa's neck as Sansa lowered her head to suck one of Margaery's tight nipples in between her teeth.

Margaery groaned, abandoning Sansa's neck to throw her head back and catch her breath at the sensation, and all she could think about was that she was going to Highgarden after this, that she wouldn't be seeing Sansa for weeks and Sansa knew that, but she seemed all right.

Margaery didn't feel all right.

Sansa hadn't been pleased, when she found out.

_"Is this a punishment?" she'd asked, glaring and crossing her arms over her naked chest after Margaery told her. "Is this...because I told you I don't want to hatch schemes with you anymore?"_

_Margaery groaned, the arousal she'd been feeling draining away completely, with that accusation. "Of course not."_

_"Really?" Sansa asked. "Because where I'm standing..."_

_Margaery reached out, clasping Sansa's shoulders. "Sansa, my brother almost died, and I couldn't leave the capitol because of the fucking trial." She winced at the expression on her face. "I couldn't leave you. But not everything is about you."_

_Sansa pulled away, annoyance flashing over her features._

_"I didn't mean that!" Margaery shook her head. “Sansa, I meant what I said, in the Black Cells.”_

_Sansa froze._

_“I meant it,” Margaery went on, “And what you offered me...I want it to be enough, I do, but if I’m stuck here, with you all the time...I don’t think it will be. I just...” she looked away. “I just need some time to figure that out. For me. All right? Because I think that if I stay, we’ll only be repeating what we had before.”_

_Sansa closed her eyes._

_“And...” Margaery swallowed, because she forever found it difficult to give voice to these sorts of things. Ironic, wasn’t it, that she could voice a thousand manipulations to her husband, and she could not even tell her lover how she felt about her._

_“If that...if the distance between what I do and what we are is really what you want, Sansa, then I need to go and figure out if I’m all right with that.”_

_Sansa opened her mouth, but Margaery reached out, placing a finger to her lips. “No,” she said gently, “Don’t say anything just now. Please.”_

But she was fine, now, licking a stripe along the underside of Margaery's breast, and Margaery swallowed hard, mouth drying at the sensation, as she moved forward and licked at the shell of Sansa's ear.

She wanted to memorize every moment of this. She wouldn't be able to do this for weeks, and she wasn't going to Highgarden without the most exquisite-

"Sansa!" she cried, as Sansa's fingers dipped down to press between the folds of her wet cunny without warning, and she glanced up to meet the girl's impish smile.

Sansa reached out her wet hand, and Margaery took it, allowed the other girl to lead her towards the bed, pushed Sansa backwards down onto it.

Sansa giggled as she dropped back against Margaery's pillows, spreading her legs invitingly, but Margaery shook her head, dipping down to press another wet, hungry kiss to Sansa's lips, which quickly opened for her.

She could feel Sansa's searching fingers, pushing up inside of her once more, and Margaery moaned, bucking her hips up against Sansa's fingers, closing her eyes and breathing in the taste of Sansa's lips against hers.

_I love you, Sansa Stark._

She hadn't said it since Sansa was released from the Black Cells. She didn't think the other girl wanted to hear it, just now, either.

But the words had branded themselves inside of Margaery's head the way she was certain they had done to Sansa, and she almost couldn't hold them back, just now, as the world went white and hot around her, as she pressed her thighs down against Sansa, spread the other girl's legs again, and made sure that Sansa would have something to think about from tonight while Margaery was gone, too.

And after, as they lay tangled in each other atop Margaery's sheets, that was when Sansa finally spoke, the way Margaery had been expecting her to since they silently agreed not to speak of Margaery's leaving again.

"Let me go with you," Sansa whispered, tracing a pattern into Margaery's thigh.

Margaery glanced up at her. She was leaving tomorrow. They'd just barely gotten away with this, fortunate that Lord Tyrion was Hand of the King once more and therefore even busier than before.

But the knight that wasn't quite a knight who followed Sansa around these days under Lord Tyrion's command, Ser Bronn, was hardly so, for his express duty was to keep an eye on Lord Tyrion's wife, and he seemed to take it very seriously, for all that he seemed to find his young charge uninteresting.

And Joffrey was hardly so, and had far too much freedom now that his grandfather was no longer there to hold him at bay. Lord Tyrion may have seen to some of that, but he was not quite so menacing a figure as Joffrey had found his grandfather.

"You asked that after I fucked you on purpose, didn't you?"

Sansa shook her head, expression distant. "I can't stand it here," she whispered. "I thought it would become bearable, after a while, but every day, it gets worse. And the only person who makes it bearable is you."

Margaery swallowed. "Sansa..."

"I know," Sansa interrupted her, voice hollow. "I know. You can't take me with you. The bloody Lannisters would never allow it."

Margaery lapped at her nipple, and Sansa sucked in a breath at the sensation. "Such language."

Sansa shook her head. "If you leave me here, Joffrey will rape me."

Margaery swallowed. "He won't, Sansa," she promised, and Sansa blinked at her.

"I..." she shook her head again, more frantically this time. "You can't know that."

Margaery reached out, took Sansa's hand and gave it a small squeeze. "Tyrion is Hand of the King now. He will not allow Joffrey to touch you."

Sansa blinked at her. "You think Lord Tywin himself would have been able to keep Joffrey from doing as he pleased for long?"

"I think the idea was that Joffrey would soon tire of you," Margaery said carefully, thought of the way Joffrey had fucked her earlier, and wished it were so.

Sansa shook her head. "He won't. Not as long as I still have Stark blood to be drawn that he might scent." She swallowed. "I heard what he did to that boy who entered the Kingswood, how he..."

She didn't seem able to finish the thought. Margaery didn't blame her.

It had been a horrific thing to bear witness to, for Margaery had indeed witnessed it, along with the rest of Joffrey's hunting party.

The boy had been dragged before the Iron Throne for stealing fruit from the King's Wood, for somehow sneaking in there past the guards of the Red Keep, and taking a bushel full for two days before he'd been caught.

And Joffrey, uninhibited by a Hand who was busy dealing with what was rapidly being called the Dornish Crisis as tempers on each side escalated, had gleefully sentenced the boy to the Kingswood he had found so accommodating, before.

Had sentenced him, more specifically, to be chased through it by Joffrey's hunting party, armed with only a sharp stick and enough water for the day, before he was brought down by Joffrey's crossbow and ripped apart by Joffrey's hounds.

And Margaery had watched the whole spectacle, and smiled beside her husband and agreed that it was a fitting punishment, and would deter anyone else from stealing from their king.

"Tyrion would never allow that to happen to you," Margaery promised her, but Sansa shook her head.

"Tyrion allowed it to happen to that boy," she said stubbornly. "Lord Tywin was the only one who controlled Joffrey, and Lord Tywin is dead."

Margaery leaned forward, suddenly insistent. "I can control Joffrey," she said, the words a fierce promise, "And I will not allow anything to happen to you by his hand again, Sansa."

She wouldn't, even if she did not yet know how.

Sansa turned on her side to face Margaery. "Then take me to Highgarden," she insisted.

Margaery smiled, brushed at the smile threatening the corners of Sansa's lips. "I will be back soon enough," she promised. "You'll see."

Sansa groaned, and Margaery sat up, curled herself onto Sansa's lap.

"And, in the mean time, I am sure Joffrey will be quite distracted with the threat of Stannis Baratheon."

"You're leaving," Sansa said, voice dead. "You're really going to do it."

Margaery swallowed. "Sansa...please don't make this harder than it has to be."

"Don't make it harder than it has to be?" Sansa repeated, incredulous. "You are the only soul in King's Landing who I...and now you're leaving me alone with Joffrey and the rest of my _beloved_ family."

Margaery smiled sadly. "Your lord husband is not so bad."

"And Joffrey is the King!" Sansa shook her head, leaning back and biting her lip. "I'm sorry, it's just..."

Margaery reached out, clasping Sansa's chin and forcing the other woman to meet her eyes. "What is it?"

Sansa met her eyes. "Do you remember that night, the one when he forced me to-"

"I could never forget it, Sansa," Margaery interrupted her, because she didn't want to think of it at all. Didn't want to think of what she had done to Sansa's back, in order to save her from a rape. Didn't want to think about Ser Osmund, and the reason she had done so in the first place-

"I'm terrified," Sansa confessed, the words rushing out of her. "I'm terrified that the moment you're gone, he's going to do something horrible. Margaery-"

Margaery pulled away from her, climbing out of the bed and walking over to her dresser. She could feel Sansa's eyes on her, not lusting, just watching, could feel the fear, anyway.

She opened the top drawer of the dresser, rummaged around for what she was looking for, and turned back to Sansa.

Sansa blinked at the knife she was clasping in her hands.

"Come here," Margaery said, and Sansa hesitated for only a moment before climbing out of bed and walking over to her. Margaery maneuvered the other girl until Sansa was standing in front of her, placed the knife in Sansa's hand and clasped her own around Sansa's, until Sansa's hand tightened into a fist around the cool metal.

"My brother gave this to me when he learned I was going to marry Joffrey," Margaery whispered against Sansa's hair. "We'd heard the rumors, of course, but we didn't know how bad he was. Loras wanted to make sure I always had the chance to...do what needed to be done, if Joffrey ever went too far."

Sansa blinked, glancing back at her, their faces close. "Margaery..."

"Keep it," Margaery interrupted her, because Sansa had been the one to resolve not to do this sort of thing, not to plot together against people, but Margaery needed to know, if she really was going to leave, that Sansa would be all right. "But only use it you have to Sansa, promise me. Please."

Sansa met her eyes. "There is only one person whom I would use it on," she whispered, and Margaery sighed, and then just nodded. She didn't attempt to tell Sansa differently, didn't attempt to reason with her, just pressed Sansa's fingers over the hilt and moved forward, gently pressed her lips to Sansa's.

"Do you know how to use one?"

She had been thinking about this for a while now, and now she had an excuse to make sure Sansa had this knife, for Margaery knew the other girl needed it far more than she.

"I...My brothers taught me a little, in Winterfell," Sansa admitted. "I always hated it, but they wanted to make sure I knew something, if I really was to claim the Stark name."

Margaery leaned forward, kissing her neck. "Well, do you need a refresher anyway?" she asked, and could feel her smile pressing into Sansa's skin.

Sansa's skin heated under her lips. "I suppose it couldn't hurt," she said, and Margaery's smile widened.

She knew that, one day, she would not be able to protect Sansa from Joffrey. He had come very close to harming her in the past, to doing the one thing to her that Margaery could not see done, and it had terrified Margaery, how little control she'd had over him, in that moment.

But she could give Sansa this.


	243. MARGAERY

All she could think about was Sansa, and that was part of the reason Margaery knew she needed to leave. Needed to leave so that she didn't express her feelings to Sansa the way she knew the other girl didn't want her to, with the declaration she had made the other day.

So when her grandmother demanded that she meet her for tea the morning of her departure, Margaery barely knew she had agreed before she found herself in the gardens, listening to one of her minstrels play loudly so that they could speak without fear of Varys' little birds overhearing them.

She didn't know why her grandmother was making such an effort to speak with her now, when they could just speak aboard the ship. It would be far easier, and there would be far less worry about them being overheard when they should not be.

Still, she supposed she owed her grandmother something for the foolish way she had acted, before.

Her grandmother did not often encounter difficulty from her own grandchildren.

"Is the Crown doing anything about that foolish Lannister boy who threatened you?" Olenna demanded, first thing.

Margaery shrugged, grimacing as she watched one of Olenna's ladies step forward to pour their tea, the woman trying to look inconspicuous. She waited until the woman was gone out from under the pavilion before answering.

"They're doing everything they can to track him down and punish him for it," Margaery said quietly, stirring some sugar into her tea and watching as Olenna poured a rather liberal amount into her own. "Or rather, Joffrey and Cersei are. Lord Tyrion doesn't seem too interested."

Olenna harrumphed. "He ought to be. It's his damn family causing all of the trouble in King's Landing. If I'd known they'd be so terrible at keeping the throne, perhaps I would have convinced Mace to throw in with Stannis."

Margaery stared hard at her. "My father would never have agreed to that," she gritted out, "And neither would Stannis. Grandmother, he killed Renly."

"Brienne of Tarth was the one accused of killing Renly," Olenna said dismissively. "I don't believe half of this nonsense about shadow creatures stabbing him in the isolation of his tent, and neither should you."

"I...think Loras does," Margaery said carefully. "He insisted on speaking with Brienne, when Jaime returned her here."

Olenna waved a hand. "And that merely establishes what I've always thought of your brother: he only ever thinks with his little head, rather than his big one."

"Grandmother!" Margaery admonished, and then sighed. "So you do understand, then, how difficult it could be for me to control him."

"I've never asked you to control your brother, Margaery, that was always your mistake," Olenna said, taking another sip of her tea.

Margaery groaned, tempted to bury her face in her hands.

"Now. When you reach Highgarden, tell your mother to do something productive with herself for once and reach out to the other Reach lords about Stannis," Olenna pronounced, taking another sip of her tea and leaning back in the garden chair.

"Aren't you coming with us?" Margaery asked in surprise, lifting her head.

Olenna gave her granddaughter a cool smile. "Oh, I think these old bones would crumble aboard another ship, my dear. No, I think I shall stay in this shit stinking city for a little while longer." She reached out, cupping Margaery's cheek in her hand. "Don't begrudge me that."

Margaery swallowed. "I...Of course," she said, and reflected that she was being rather silly. Her grandmother had been to see Willas when he wasn't recovering, was on the brink of dying, and Margaery had not been able to manage even that.

She shouldn't begrudge the other woman for remaining in King's Landing while Margaery went alone, and yet somehow, Margaery did.

She hadn't forgotten her grandmother's words to her, her admonition that Margaery was not as capable of putting her own feelings aside for the sake of the Family, not for her family, and they haunted her now especially.

But she thought that if she could not get away from Sansa, and the declarations she wanted to make which she knew would only push the other girl away, a part of her would just keep dying.

And she needed to see her brother. And she needed to get Loras away from the capitol.

Gods, Margaery's head hurt.

"But..." she could feel her grandmother's eyes on her. "I wish that you were going, anyway," she said finally. "I think I could use your guidance."

Olenna gave her a long look, unimpressed with the subtle plea, and Margaery knew what she was thinking. That Margaery had not asked for nor needed her guidance when she had tried to get Sansa out of the Black Cells, so why should she need it now.

"You will be fine," she said finally, and Margaery swallowed thickly, reaching for her cup of tea once more.

"It's not me I'm worried about," she said.

Olenna sighed. "Keep your brother out of trouble, Margaery. You've been doing it your entire life. I should hardly think you would encounter difficulties, now."

Margaery's tea was tasteless. She set it back down on the table, glancing out over the garden. "I can barely keep myself out of trouble, these days," she said, not looking at Olenna.

She could hear the smile in her grandmother's voice when she responded. "I will keep an eye on her, for you. Though my other eye will be required by your brother's wife."

Margaery licked her lips; fighting down the blush she could feel staining her cheeks. She couldn't think about Sansa. Not now. "Then there's something you should know, Grandmother. Joffrey...asked my advice about granting his mother and Willas an annulment. On the grounds that they have not yet consummated the marriage."

Olenna stiffened. "And what did you say?" she asked.

Margaery met her eyes. "I cautioned him on the wisdom of granting such an annulment," she said softly, "When the smallfolk already see such discord within the royal family. They need to see us strong."

Olenna stared at her for several long moments, before nodding. "Indeed they do," she agreed. "That was a good thing to suggest." She straightened a little. "If that old bitch thinks she can cast aside my son, she has another thing coming for her."

Margaery licked her lips. "But...when things settle down, wouldn't it perhaps be for the best?" she asked. "I hate the thought of her remaining married to my brother."

Olenna leaned forward. "Her being married to your brother is the only thing giving us an excuse to get her out of King's Landing," she reminded Margaery.

Margaery shook her head. "And when she poisons him again?"

"The poison that nearly killed your brother did not come from the Westerlands or King's Landing, my dear," she said, though there was ice in her eyes. "Nothing tying your brother's poisoner to-"

"And you would be willing to gamble his life to that assumption again, Grandmother?" Margaery demanded, getting to her feet. "I won't let her kill my brother this time just because the poison she used last time came from Littlefinger in the Vale."

Olenna reached out, latching a bony hand around her wrist. "Sit down," she snapped, and Margaery sagged back into her chair. "Have you ever stopped to think, dear girl, that Lord Baelish is the sort of man who does not make such uncalculated errors? If the poison was from him, it did not kill your brother for a reason."

Margaery snorted, leaning back in her chair. "I can't speak of this," she said finally, and Olenna sighed, giving her a long, searching look.

"Go and visit Willas, my dear, and try to enjoy it," she said. "When you get back, I will have found a way to deal with Cersei, I promise you that."

Margaery's head shot up. "Deal with her?" she repeated incredulously, but Olenna merely smiled, and refused to answer any more questions about the matter.


	244. LORAS

"Do you really have to go?" Olyvar asked, half-sitting up in the bed and holding the sheets around his waist.

He looked beautiful like that, lounging in Loras' bed, like some sort of god, though Loras knew it was blasphemy to think such things about the whore from Littlefinger's brothels.

Not that he much cared one way or the other.

Loras' eyes trailed down his sweat glistening form, and he licked his lips. "You could always come with me," he said, a light teasing tone, and Olyvar smirked, leaning forward and pecking at Loras' neck.

"I believe I just did," he said, and Loras rolled his eyes.

"That was terrible, even for you," he said, moving back to the bed and pressing a chaste kiss to Olyvar's lips. The other man deepened it, and Loras groaned, pulling away. "No," he said, climbing out of bed and turning away from the other man. "No, I really do need to go."

He did, and Margaery was going to kill him if she discovered what he was doing just now, as the royal family saw them off for this terribly long boat ride to go and see their brother.

At least they would be going to see Willas and Highgarden again, Loras thought, with a sigh.

Olyvar sighed too, reaching out and placing a hand on Loras' chest when Loras turned back to him, throwing on the brown button down shirt he'd left crumpled over one of the chairs in the room. "Why would you say that?" he asked, cocking his head.

Loras blinked at him. "Because that was a terrible-"

"No," Olyvar laughed a little, shook his head. "I wasn't talking about that."

Loras' gaze softened, and he half turned away from Olyvar once, reaching for his sheathed sword where it lay on the bedside table.

_Come with me._

Gods, he was such an idiot, sitting here and asking a whore who had no interest in him beyond his body to travel home with him, to meet his family.

If Margaery were here, she would be laughing at him. Or she would be angry, knowing how she felt about the girl whose marriage to his brother Loras had ruined by confiding in the young man in front of him.

And yet, he couldn't regret the invitation, for all he knew Olyvar would never take him up on it.

"I know," Loras said, once he no longer had to meet Olyvar's eyes. He could feel the anticipation behind him, could feel the question on the tip of Olyvar's tongue.

He stepped into his trousers without answering it just yet, strapped his sword to them, because anything was better than answering that question.

Still, when he turned around, Olyvar was waiting expectantly, sheet thrown haphazardly off him now, and Loras couldn't tell if the curiosity in his eyes was genuine or yet another manipulation.

Gods, he hated sometimes that his sister was so good at that game. He couldn't even trust anymore in the power of someone's acting.

"I haven't...When I met Renly, I was still quite young," Loras said, no longer looking at Olyvar, staring instead at the exquisitely crafted sword pommel his lover Renly had had made as a token of his affection for his squire.

Renly had always been doing that sort of thing, treating Loras to the same courtly love with which he treated Margaery, once they were wed, though the gifts to Loras were genuine while Margaery's had not been.

Renly loved grand gestures. And Loras would always wonder, would always blame himself if it were true, if entering the war under his own claim had been yet another grand gesture to his lover, because Loras had asked him to do it-

"So?" Olyvar asked, and there was callousness to his voice that Loras needed to hear, that reminded him that what he and Olyvar shared was leagues away from anything he'd had with Renly.

It was hard to make the distinction, sometimes, when he closed his eyes and felt whisper soft kisses pressed against his skin so lovingly.

When he closed his eyes, he could forget that he was paying for it. Most of the time, at least.

But when he opened his eyes again, saw the calculating look in Olyvar's eyes, heard the callousness of his tone, sometimes, it helped.

Helped him to miss Renly a little less.

"He..." Loras sighed. "I knew, even that young, though. I knew he was the only one for me."

Loras could feel Olyvar's eyes on him now, though he didn't dare to meet them, wondered what the other man saw; whether he was just a way of making money which Olyvar seemed to enjoy enough to seek out on his own, or if there was anything more to the way Olyvar sometimes looked at him.

And Loras hated that. His grandmother was right; he had no head for politics, never had; he preferred to negotiate on the edge of a sword instead, for it was always cleaner.

But King's Landing was nothing if not the hub of all politics in Westeros, and it seemed that Loras was surrounded by it on all sides, even by the men he invited into his bed.

Well, man. He hadn't invited anyone else into his bed for far too long, now. If Margaery knew that, perhaps she wouldn't be quite so angry about his philandering ways.

He turned then, and Olyvar was squinting at him, clearly bemused. Loras ran a hand through his hair.

He was always terrible at these sorts of things.

"Anyway, I don't think I can ever have that sort of love with another," Loras said, and tried not to think of how vulnerable he was, in this moment. Baring his soul to a man who might just use it against him, who had done so, in the past.

And yet. Loras was nothing if not a creature of habit.

"But...I enjoy being with you," Loras said. "And if Baelish didn't make so much off your arse alone, I might just..."

Olyvar sat up, very straight and very still, at those words. "You might...what?" he asked, and there was a hesitant breathlessness to the tone that might have been the first real show of emotion Loras had ever seen from the other man.

Loras shook his head. It was no use offering hope where there was none, after all. Baelish was never going to sell his most expensive whore, and Loras was never going to love another the way he had Renly.

He moved forward, walked around the bed until he was facing Olyvar, close enough to touch him, and Olyvar stared up at him with wide eyes that for once did not hide an iota of calculation in them, merely shock.

He looked far more beautiful, that way.

"Come with me," Loras repeated, aware of how impetuous, how foolish, the invitation was. He moved toward the bed again, stood between Olyvar's parted legs, stared down at him. Olyvar's mouth went slack at the words, and he stared up at Loras, and Loras wondered if the surprise there was real. "I can pay for you for the month, if it'll make Baelish feel better. I can..." He swallowed, watched as Olyvar dragged his tongue across his lips. "You told me you'd always wanted to see Dorne. I can do you one better, with the Reach."

Olyvar's eyes dragged up to meet his. "You can, can you?" he asked, and there was idle amusement back in his tone, now, replacing the shock of a moment ago.

This, Loras could appreciate. This was the reason he was even extending such an invitation.

Margaery thought Olyvar a dangerous liability, thought that made him worthy of cutting out of Loras' life, when in fact, it was the thing Loras liked the most about him.

The fact that none of it, none of them, was real.

He suspected that Margaery's reasons for engaging with Sansa Stark were much different, but he didn't understand that relationship anymore than she did his, and he wished that she would leave it at that.

"Oh," Loras reached out, dragging his fingers along Olyvar's bare chest, "I believe I've proved that fairly well, in recent months."

Olyvar snorted. "You have, my lord," he said, "Only; I don't think Baelish would agree to it. I am a rather well paying investment, and it's got more to do with my clientele then the number a night or a month with me is set at."

Loras slumped, though he was not surprised. "Right," he murmured, turning away from Olyvar once more.

If he was late when the Little Beast came to see them off, Margaery would be admonishing him for it the entire journey to Highgarden.

And Loras could think of nothing worse than taking the long way home on a rocking ship gifted them by the Little Beast, stinking of sailors and salt water, than doing so with an angry Margaery.

Olyvar scrambled out of the bed, dropping the sheet and stepping nude in front of the door.

"Olyvar..." Loras sighed fondly.

Olyvar lifted his chin, bent forward and kissed Loras gently on the mouth. "I'll be here when you get back, my lord," he promised, and there was a sad glint to his eyes that Loras didn't believe was genuine at all.

Loras stared at him for a long moment, and thought the look was guilt, wondered if it was because he had genuinely wanted to go, or because he was worried he had just lost Loras as a client.

And, even though nothing at all between them was genuine and Loras loved that about their relationship, he couldn't stop himself from speaking up, a moment later.

"You're going to have to choose sometime, dear," Loras pointed out, voice light, and Olyvar glanced up at him.

"Choose?"

Loras gave him a sad little half-smile. "Between what Littlefinger wants and what you want, Olyvar."

"I am Littlefinger's to command," Olyvar said quietly, lowering his head, and this time, Loras thought, the sadness on his features, in his voice, was as genuine as he had ever seen Olyvar. "I cannot make that choice."

Loras moved forward, tilting his head up. "Littlefinger is still in the Vale. He'd never know."

"He tasked me with running the brothel," Olyvar argued. "There is no one else. If I fail him..." he trailed off, still not meeting Loras' eyes, and Loras gently let go of him.

Loras sighed. "I'll think about you then, in Highgarden, Olyvar."

Olyvar grinned, reaching down between Loras' legs. "I hope you do more than think about me, my lord," he said teasingly, and Loras groaned.

"I have to go," he said, panting a little. "Packing, and all that."

"Don't tell me you don't have servants for that, my lord," Olyvar said, grasping at him, now. "I was your squire for a while there, after all."

Loras shot him an unimpressed look. "Don't remind me," he muttered, and flipped on top of Olyvar, pressing him down into the sheets. "Well," he said, "I suppose one more time couldn't hurt. If my sister walks in on us again, though, this was your fault."

Olyvar parted his lips teasingly. "I'm ready to take, ah, fully whatever punishment you deem necessary, your lordship."


	245. SANSA

"Perhaps we could send the guard for your brother, if he takes too much longer," Joffrey suggested, ever helpful with that sort of thing.

Sansa struggled not to roll her eyes, standing beside her husband where he could see it. Still, even her husband, ever so serious these days, looked amused. He glanced sideways at Shae, who smirked, before facing forward once more.

She tried not to think too hard about that, that her husband hardly ever looked amused these days, that she was keeping enough of an accounting of her husband to notice this.

They had been standing on the docks before the Maiden Slayer for some time now, everyone gathered save for Loras, who, according to Margaery, hadn't bothered to pack before now. At least, that was her excuse, as she stood awkwardly beside her husband, waiting with an ever more impatient look on her face.

Olenna was not present, but Mace was, and he was looking disapprovingly toward the Keep, though he had offered nothing as an excuse for his son's absence, so far. Joffrey had already suggested that perhaps Margaery could go with one of the other Kingsguard present, but Margaery had insisted that they wait for her brother, that her brother would want to see their family once more, if the King was willing.

Cersei ground her teeth, when she heard that.

Sansa was rather certain Loras' time, at the moment, was spent doing something far different than packing, though she didn't think she had noticed his particular interest in anyone else, recently. Loras seemed devoted to his sister and his sister alone, and Sansa was almost surprised that he would embarrass her by holding up the Queen's party for so long.

"I'm sure my brother is on his way," Margaery protested, touching her husband's arm, and Sansa saw the way Cersei looked at her, then.

She pretended not to, however, the same way Sansa pretended not to.

And Sansa could not even bring herself to be annoyed, the way Cersei so obviouly was, as she stood here with her hands clasped in front of her, the wind whipping at her skirts, waiting.

Because every moment they spent waiting was another moment she got to spend in Margaery's presence, before the woman left her for Highgarden.

And another moment where Sansa wanted to fall to her knees and beg the other woman not to leave her at all.

She wasn't a fool. Margaery had tried to keep quiet about the whole thing, to distract her with sex, but Sansa knew why the other girl was leaving, and it had nothing to do with Willas, and everything to do with Sansa's plea that Margaery not involve her in her plots any longer.

Margaery had said it wasn't a punishment, however, and Sansa believed her, which meant that whatever this was, Sansa did not want to fight it too hard.

Because Margaery looked like she was dying everytime she opened her mouth and then closed it without a word, and Sansa...didn't know what to do about that.

She'd made her feelings very clear, and she stood by them, but here Margaery was, wanting so much more from her, and Sansa didn't know how to give it to her without falling back into the mess they'd found themselves in before.

I love you, Sansa Stark.

Sansa closed her eyes, opened them when she heard the thudding footfalls of someone approaching the harbor.

The Kingsguard turned to face Loras as he appeared, a pack slung over his shoulder and a rueful grin on his face, pushing down wet curls.

Sansa's brows furrowed, and she glanced Margaery's way, saw the way the other woman rolled her eyes at the sight. Cersei's eyes narrowed.

"Ah, there you are," Joffrey drawled, as Loras slipped past the Kingsguard to join his sister. He was wearing the Kingsguard uniform, though it looked to fit him haphazardly.

"My deepest apologies, Your Grace," Loras said, dipping his head into a short bow. "I...overslept. My servant's been flogged for not waking me sooner."

Cersei raised a brow, then. "It's afternoon," she drawled, sounding very much like her son, in that moment.

Loras shifted from one foot to another. "I rather prefer remaining in King's Landing to returning to Highgarden," he said, and even Sansa could tell that was an obvious lie, though Margaery spoke often of her brother's hatred for this place. Margaery rolled her eyes again, reaching out and taking her brother's arm.

"It's what I've commanded of you," she told her brother, voice calm, and he sent her a small smile Sansa couldn't interpret.

"Right," he said, "Of course. My apologies, once more."

"Well," Joffrey said, moving forward and clapping him on the back. "I'm sure that when you return, you'll be glad of it. Perhaps I'll even let you slaughter a few Sparrows."

Loras' gaze darkened. "I think I will take you up on that offer, Your Grace."

Joffrey grinned. "I'll make sure to leave a few for you, then. I'm sure my uncle will have taken care of everything by the time you're back."

Loras dipped his head into another nod, and then Margaery was letting go of him, turning to her husband and curtseying, before pulling him in for a deep, possessive kiss that had Cersei's fists clenching at her sides.

Margaery pulled away, turning and curtseying immediately to Cersei, and Sansa had a feeling there was some possessive message in that move, even if she couldn't be certain what it was.

Cersei said something about hoping Margaery's trip was uneventful, which was almost kind for her, Sansa supposed, before Margaery turned to Sansa, Tyrion, and Shae.

She didn't curtsey.

Tyrion said something about wishing her brother well, but Sansa couldn't focus on the words, because Margaery was meeting her eyes and the lustful intent in them had her shifting uncomfortably on her feet.

Margaery smirked, as if she knew exactly what Sansa was thinking.

And then Margaery moved forward, pulling Sansa into a hug, and Sansa blinked in surprise at the open display of affection.

Beside her, she could feel Tyrion stiffening, but Sansa ignored him completely, in that moment, wrapping her arms back around Margaery and clinging to the other girl.

The gods knew how long it would be before she saw Margaery again, and something inside of her was begging Sansa to hold onto the girl and never let go.

She didn't dare to acknowledge the sensation, closing her eyes and breathing in the smell of roses.

"I'll think of you each time I touch myself," Margaery whispered in her ear, and Sansa shuddered, for she hadn't expected that at all, not with Joffrey and his mother both watching them.

"I...I..."

She knew Margaery was getting away with this, hugging her so openly, because she had convinced Joffrey that she was using Sansa to spy on Tyrion.

Still, she didn't want to let go, ever again.

Let go she did, however, the moment Margaery did, a few moments later, and Sansa found her hands hanging awkwardly at her sides, unsure what to do with them.

And then Margaery and her brother and the servant going with her were piling onto the ship without much more ceremony, beyond the smallfolk gathered in the harbor, wishing their beloved queen well on her journey.

Margaery stopped once she stood on the deck of the Maiden Slayer, turning and waving back at the people, and Loras stood awkwardly beside her, looking only somewhat annoyed by all the display.

Sansa wondered if she had more in common with Loras Tyrell than she'd thought.

Joffrey gave some order to the captain, who came down to bow before the King, about making sure to protect the Queen with his life, if necessary, when they passed the Dornish Straits.

The man glanced sideways at Cersei, and then swore to do so. Sansa swallowed hard.

And then the captain too was getting on the ship, and Sansa glanced once more up at Margaery, meeting the woman's eyes.

Don't go, she wanted to say, a horrible dread suddenly filling her. Don't go, and I'll change my mind, she thought, even if she knew she wouldn't.

The boat lifted anchor, and Sansa turned away, found herself standing directly next to Cersei, not having noticed the woman approaching her. Or perhaps it was that Sansa had moved forward without realizing she had done so.

She saw, out of the corner of her eye, Shae stiffening at the proximity, and she wanted to smile, at the protective look on the woman's face. Still, she didn't come close, preferring to stay by Tyrion's side lest Cersei take notice of her once more.

"I've lost my son," Cersei said, her voice dead.

Sansa blinked at her. "Your Grace?"

"That Highgarden bitch, the Queen; she's stolen him from me," Cersei murmured, her voice almost absent, and Sansa wondered if she even knew she was speaking aloud.

She stepped away, quickly, and pretended not to notice as Cersei took another gulp of her wine, which was red as Margaery's blood.

" _When the boat sinks into the sea_ ," the fortune teller's voice whispered at the back of her mind, and Sansa stiffened, " _She will be soon after_."

She opened her mouth, to say what, she didn't know, but by then, Margaery was already gone. Below the deck, gone away, and Sansa had a horrible feeling that this was the last time she would ever see the other woman.

Her stomach clenched; Margaery had claimed that she didn't believe the fortune teller, had made that clear enough when she had listened to the woman's fortunes, laughing along with them before she realized how nervous Sansa was. Even if she had been able to give Margaery some sign, she doubted the other woman would take the warning seriously.

And Sansa tried to tell herself that she was being silly, that thinking like this belonged only to superstitious people who believed in every prophecy a soothsayer sent her way, but she couldn't hold back the fears, now that they were here.


	246. MARGAERY

"Shouldn't you be staying here, trying to get a child off your husband?" Loras hissed in her ear, as they went below deck, after Margaery thanked the captain for taking them, as well as the crew.

They stepped into Margaery's cabin, and Loras reached out, grabbing her arm as he asked the question. She wanted to reprimand him for voicing that in front of Meredyth or anyone in the hall who could have heard, but she found herself more annoyed with her brother by something else.

"Meredyth," she said, meeting her brother's eyes as she spoke, "Give us a moment. You can unpack later."

Meredyth dipped her head, curtseying and dropping hers and Margaery's things on the floor of the suite Margaery had been given. As she understood it, these were the Captain's quarters, but Joffrey would have nothing but the best for his wife.

Margaery waited for the door to close after Meredyth before speaking.

She jerked away from her brother, annoyed. "Shouldn't you be more concerned about not angering the King than fucking your prostitute?" she asked, and Loras flinched. "Anyway," she muttered, "You sound like Father. I had no idea you were so worried about my ability to make a child."

Loras raised a brow. "And while our father is many things, he's rather correct, in that one regard. It takes the two of you to have a child, after all."

"Loras, it's not like I can just will myself to have a child," she snapped at him. "Joffrey and I have been trying for a child for almost our entire marriage."

There had been that time in the beginning, when Margaery had thought that a child was not what interested Joffrey about his new bride after all, but that time had faded when she had brought forth all of her wicked charm.

And now...yes, of course she was worried about having the child, but there was Willas to consider. She couldn't think about having a child when she knew that Willas had almost been killed, that Sansa had...

Loras sighed. "I know that," he muttered, though Margaery found herself rather doubting the words. "I just...I don't see how running back home is going to help matters here."

Margaery let out a breath, slowly. "I know. I just...I can't do it any longer. I need...I needed to get away, for a little bit. Every time I kiss him I'm reminded that Willas' blood was almost on my hands, and I-"

Loras pulled her into a gentle hug, and Margaery found herself leaning into the touch, closing her eyes and allowing herself to be held. She could not remember the last time Loras had hugged her.

"And besides," she said quietly. "I saw you the other day, and other days. What you almost did, just because he was gripping my arm too tight. You're coming with me because I don't think for a moment I can trust you alone with him. Why do you think I always insist that you guard me instead of him?"

Loras lifted his head. "Margaery, I-"

"If you killed him," Margaery interrupted her brother, gripping his arms until he flinched, "if you butchered him in front of all of King's Landing, do you honestly think I would make it out of this wretched city alive, before being trampled by gold cloaks?"

Loras swallowed. "The last Kingslayer did."

"Because his father owned those gold cloaks," Margaery pointed out, voice soft against her brother’s curls. "And now Cersei does, and Joffrey is her darling boy. We would be slaughtered before Joffrey’s corpse had begun to cool. There would be blood in the streets." She shook her head. "I need you to be able to think of these things on your own, Loras."

He took a deep breath; let it out slowly through his nose. "There isn't much thinking involved, really," he said quietly. "When I saw his hands on you, punishing, bruising, when I see red behind my eyes and the only thing I want to do is rip him apart. But that isn't why I want to kill him. It was because of the way he talks about you, talking like he wanted to rape you in front of everyone-"

Margaery reached up, hushing him as she tangled her fingers in his hair. "And that is why we are going home," she reminded him, and Loras sighed, nodded, pulling back from her, and for a moment Margaery mourned the loss.

"I can't believe the little shit is actually letting us go home," Loras admitted, walking over to the divan in the middle of the cabin and sinking down into it. He still looked worn, but Margaery tried to herself that it didn’t matter. That her brother would be fine.

He had suffered so much loss, and was fine. She would make sure that he remained so.

Margaery gave her brother a reproachful look, not that he was looking in her direction. "Willas is ill, Loras, this isn't a pleasure trip."

He rolled his eyes. "I know that," he said, as Margaery moved over to the bags Meredyth had dropped and picked one up, sorting through it. "I just didn't think your dear husband would give a fuck."

Margaery glanced up and around them despite being sure in the knowledge that they were surrounded by loyal Tyrell green cloaks on this ship, frowning. "You shouldn't say such things. Anyone could hear."

Loras shrugged, leaning back on the divan and closing his eyes. "You shouldn't look over your shoulder so much, Margy," he said, crossing his arms behind his head. "You might miss half your life, that way, worrying."

She glared at him, and walked forward to sit beside him. "And you're not concerned enough."

Loras raised a brow. "I thought you told me that I was too concerned, before."

Margaery closed her eyes. "Loras..." she whispered, and he sighed, not flinching away when she moved over to him, reached out and touched his cheek.

"I'm sorry," he said, after long moments of silence. "I just...I'm glad to be getting away from this shithole."

Margaery sent her brother a small smile, and tried not to think of the fact that Sansa was stuck in that shithole, and how long it would be, just because she had thought a little distance could do her some good. Damn Joffrey. "As am I."

He glanced up at her. "You hide it so well," he muttered, and Margaery smiled at him, leaning over the back of the divan and running her fingers through her hair.

"Do I?"

He nodded, reaching up and squeezing her hand. "I don't know how you do it, honestly."

Margaery snorted. "We have Grandmother to thank for most of it," she admitted. "The moment she heard I was marrying Joffrey, and what he was, it was all..." a shrug. "All how to handle him."

Loras' shoulders stiffened, and Margaery immediately regretted mentioning that at all. And, she supposed, those words alone explained well enough why Loras was so confused about Margaery's ability to pretend she enjoyed being Joffrey's wife.

Margaery sighed, leaning a little harder on the divan. That was the one thing she hated about her brother, if she was being honest. That he couldn't pretend so well as the rest of them.

"He doesn't," she said suddenly, and Loras blinked up at her.

"Doesn't what?" he asked, brows furrowing.

"He doesn't care about Willas," Margaery said, shrugging. "I wanted to get away, so I convinced him this was a duty I had to do. If I..." a pause and she glanced sideways at Loras. "If I hinted otherwise, perhaps he wouldn't think I was still like him."

Loras snorted. "You mean insane."

Margaery swallowed. "I told you," she repeated, "Don't talk like that. The soldiers on this ship are Tyrells; the captain and his crew are not."

Loras raised a brow. "The captain and his crew are hired peasants," he reminded her. "I doubt they give any more of a fuck about Joffrey than you do."

Margaery bit her lip, biting down a laugh. "I hate you," she said pleasantly, and Loras squeezed her hand again.

"Yes, well, better than apathy, isn't it?" he asked her, winking, and Margaery rolled her eyes again, to cover the clog suddenly in her throat.

Sometimes her brother was far too apt without realizing what it was he had said.

"Send Meredyth back in," Loras told her. "I'm starving, and they're not going to let the Queen serve herself dinner."

Margaery blinked at him. "I just ate, Loras," she said dryly. "Just because some of us were busy being late because they were engaging in...other activities, that's not my problem. Nor should it be the ship's cook."

Loras groaned, head flopping back onto the divan once more. "Oh, come on," he said, squinting at her. "Tell me you didn't have goodbye sex with Sansa Stark."

Margaery ground her teeth. "Well, I certainly didn't have it when I was supposed to be at the docks."

Loras' grin faded. "I...I asked him to come with us," he admitted, and Margaery froze, blinking down at him.

"What?" she asked, shock rippling through her. “...Why?”

She knew this boy, Olyvar, was the only one Loras had been sleeping with since they'd arrived in King's Landing, and knew he was unreasonable about him, but this...

Loras shrugged. "I...It was a bad idea, I know," he said softly, and Margaery walked slowly around the divan, sinking onto the couch beside her brother.

"Are you in love with him?" she asked softly, and Loras turned, staring wide eyed at her.

"What?" he blustered. "No, of course not. He's just...he's a good distraction. You know that."

Margaery smiled thinly. "That's what I thought about Sansa when we first started sleeping together, you know," she admitted. "That she was a distraction from Joffrey, and that I felt bad for her, after Joffrey had been so cruel to her. But," a shrug, "Things don't stay the way we want them to be, do they?"

Loras got to his feet abruptly, and Margaery wanted to roll her eyes, but she didn't. She knew her brother was terrible about talking about his feelings, close as they were, especially ones that concerned matters of the heart and therefore reminded him of Renly.

"I'll go check on that food," he said, and Margaery bit her lip.

"Of course," she said, and ignored the knowing look Loras sent her way, before he disappeared out the door of her cabin, leaving her alone.


	247. TYRION

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: for brief, racist language.

The door to Tyrion's office in the Tower of the Hand burst open moments after he had come back from a trip to the chamber pot, and Tyrion groaned, rubbing his eyes and not looking up.

"Go away unless it's about the war," he snapped irritably, and wished Shae hadn't confiscated his liquor. She was worried Sansa was going to find some more of it, and while he certainly understood the concern, it was hardly conducive to him running this damn country for the rest of them.

Gods, what had Sansa even been doing, raiding the liquor cabinet?

He thought of Oberyn's broken, bleeding body, and grimaced.

"The war," a familiar, if unwelcome, voice repeated, and Tyrion groaned again as he glanced up to the sight of Cersei, shutting the door to the office behind her, and shutting out the Kingsguard standing beyond it.

"The war," she said again. "That's all you ever think about."

Tyrion raised his eyebrows, leaning back in his chair. "Are you drunk?" he asked her, nodding to the wine glass in her hands, lips parched.

Cersei whirled on him. "You promised me you would find a way to save Myrcella," she snapped at him. "Swore it, if I didn't go to Joffrey. And yet all you're doing is thinking about the war with Stannis."

Tyrion stood up from his chair. "If I can't win the war with Stannis, it won't matter what happens to Myrcella!" he snapped at her. "Do you think Stannis is planning to let your children live when he takes the throne? He's called them abominations, Cersei."

"Do you think I don't know who is a threat to my children?" she snapped, shaking her head and taking another sip. "Father always said it was important to keep your enemies close. I can't imagine he thought it would be a good idea to keep them as close as they are to my children, these days."

Tyrion shook his head, running a hand through his hair. "Do you think I am a threat to your children just because I've given Myrcella to the Dornish?"

Cersei shook her head, stalking forward and leaning over the desk. "I think you have always been a threat to this family," she said. "And I don't know if it is because Father never loved you as a child, or if you truly are the monster I have always taken you for, but I have thought about it for so long, and I cannot understand why you thought sending my baby to Dorne wouldn't hurt her. She..."

"Cersei-"

"Let me finish!" Cersei snapped at him, and he fell silent. "You know what the Martells are. You know they're willing to kill all of us, the moment they get their proof that we killed Elia and her children. Do you honestly think Myrcella won't be next? Didn't you see what happened to Oberyn?"

Tyrion swallowed, rubbing at his throat, now. "I saw it, Cersei," he said quietly.

"And yet Myrcella has been threatened, and what have you done about it?" Cersei demanded, slamming her fist down on the table. "Nothing. You promised me-"

"I will write again to Doran," Tyrion said calmly. "I did write to him. I warned him of the threat to Myrcella's life, and that House Lannister and the King would not abide by it. He does not want another war, Cersei. But he doesn't know who issued that threat, and-"

"No," Cersei interrupted. "No, I have given you ample time to do something about the Martells, and you have wasted weeks attempting to write letters I doubt they do anything but burn, when they arrive in Sunspear. And all the while, my daughter shares the bed of some boy whom I have never met, so stop wasting time!"

Tyrion grimaced. "I am doing what I can," he told her. "But you need to trust me. Jumping into a war with Dorne once more is only going to make things-"

"Recall Jaime from Dragonstone," Cersei said calmly, lifting her chin. "Bring him back to King's Landing, and order him to go to Sunspear and retrieve our daughter from those fucking traitors. Then you'll have convinced me that you actually mean to save my daughter. These letters," she gestured blindly to Tyrion's desk, "the Martells, they don't understand scholarly words and pleading letters. They only understand one thing; the edge of a sword, and Jaime can give them that. Would give them that, if you hadn't sent him away the moment one of his children needed him!"

Tyrion stared at her. "They've never been Jaime's children, Cersei," he said, reaching out and grabbing her by the arm as she marched toward the door. She whirled on him, shook off his touch, and he let her go, frowning.

"Bring him back to me," she hissed out. "You made your point, and you showed your power over me, by sending him away. But my witnesses are dead; you said so yourself. Lancel has joined the fanatics, and knows enough to burn us all if he ever speaks. All proof of my attempts against Queen Margaery are dead, as well. There is nothing for you to take to the King, and I will not ask for your permission to save my daughter from the scaffold!"

"Cersei, be serious," Tyrion snapped. "The threat was not to Myrcella, it was to us. Doran would never allow her to be harmed, not while he wants to keep one of his sons in line for the throne."

Cersei froze, turned to stare at him with widened eyes. "In line for the throne," she repeated slowly.

Tyrion dipped his head. "The Dornish recognize females and males equally in inheritance, sister," he said. "Else they never would have agreed to take Myrcella as their princess in the first place. Why do you think they were so eager to end the war against us, even after the humiliating way Joffrey dealt with Oberyn's death?"

Cersei stepped forward, staring down at him. "Do you know something?" she demanded.

Tyrion bit his lip. "No," he admitted. "It's all just conjecture, at this point. But you know as well as I that it might as well be fact."

Cersei ground her teeth. "I swear by the gods, if anything happens to Joffrey..."

Tyrion reached out to her once more, but she flinched away. "It won't, Cersei."

She stared at him. "Won't it?" she snapped, and then she was marching toward the door, and Tyrion felt a shiver run down his spine, at the determination in that stride.

"Where are you going?" he called at her back.

"To ask my son, the King, to recall Jaime from Dragonstone and send him to bring Myrcella home, on the grounds that he is the only man I trust to do the job without seeing her killed," Cersei shot over her shoulder.

"I forbid you to do this, Cersei," Tyrion said, desperation flicking into his tone. "Jaime is holding off the Iron Islanders for now, but-"

"If you were so concerned," Cersei snapped, spinning back around, "Then you shouldn't have sent our Lord Commander where he was not most needed, brother. You should have let me send Loras Tyrell." She sniffed. "And I wasn't asking your permission."

Tyrion stared at her. "Cersei," he asked slowly, as something dawned on him which he hadn't realized quickly enough. He glanced around Cersei's bare, unused chambers, cast about for the thing that was missing in them. "I will tell him."

Cersei glared. "Go ahead!" she snapped. "The Highgarden whore has fucked off to the Reach once more; your witnesses are dead, and Jaime won't believe you."

Tyrion ground his teeth. "That was not what I meant. Why did Lancel join the Sparrows?"

Cersei arched a brow. "And why should I know that?" she challenged.

"I would think Jaime would like to know the answer to that question as well, when you drag him back here," Tyrion warned her. "Because I have a theory that that poor, foolish boy was so wracked with guilt for the sin of sleeping with his cousin that he embraced the one group which would attempt to absolve him of his sins, rather than ignoring them."

Cersei rolled her eyes, and started toward the door again. And then she paused, turning back and marching up into Tyrion's personal space. She sneered down at him. "You said all the witnesses were dead, brother," she reminded him. "If you don't have the courage to follow through with your convictions, your threats are worth nothing."

Tyrion felt his jaw go slack as he watched her turn and march out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

It was not often he thought this, but Tyrion had underestimated his sister's ruthlessness. Had underestimated her ability to play the game. Perhaps he had been underestimating her from the beginning.

He sighed, getting to his feet and following her as quickly as he could out of the Tower of the Hand. And of course he was waylaid by a messenger, letting him know that a raven had come from Winterfell.

And of course the information was useless, just that the Boltons had yet to engage Stannis in battle, and were waiting out the siege with ample supplies behind their walls.

"Don't stop me again unless someone is dead!" Tyrion snapped at the messenger, who dipped down into a bow and disappeared. Tyrion felt a small moment of triumph at that, but he knew he was too late by the time he reached the Small Council chambers, he would be too late, but that did not stop Tyrion from running the rest of the way there, before Cersei did something monumentally stupid.

"Your Grace!" Tyrion burst into the Small Council chambers, but he could see by the apoplectic expression on Joffrey's face that she had already told him, like a child running to-

No, too disturbing a thought.

But there she was, sitting at the head of the Small Council table with only Varys and the Grandmaester present, telling a standing, purple faced Joffrey all about what she had promised to keep silent.

And she had out-maneuvered Tyrion, because by killing the witnesses and Lancel conveniently joining those fanatics, he would have no one to corroborate his story about what Cersei had been planning to do to Margaery.

And the girl wasn't even here to be angry about it.

"We've just received word of it," Cersei lied, eyes slitting at the sight of Tyrion entering the room. "Those Martells have married your sweet sister to one of their princes in the dead of night, and openly threaten her life now that we are not threatening them with war."

Joffrey's jaw twitched. Tyrion wondered if the boy even realized this was all his fault, that he had provoked the Martells by refusing to return Oberyn's remains, and here they were, using Myrcella to protect themselves, either way.

Perhaps, he thought, as Cersei laid all of this out, he had been wrong about Doran not knowing about the threat. Perhaps he had allowed both the letter and the threat to be sent, knowing that the Lannisters could do little about it and wanting to make the Dornish position clear.

Fuck.

Still, it had been a good idea, he thought, rather grudgingly, for Cersei to present the information as if they had just learned it. Joffrey would not be happy if he knew they had been keeping this from him.

Tyrion blinked as he remembered what Cersei had told him, about how to handle Joffrey, for her daughter's sake. He swallowed.

"You must retaliate," Cersei told her son, leaning forward in her chair as if to reach out for Joffrey before thinking better of it. "The Martells cannot be allowed to get away with this indignity, nor with threatening your sister's life. They seek to humiliate you with this, to humiliate and ruin your sister."

"Your Grace," Tyrion cleared his throat, warily taking his seat at the Small Council, "We have just ended a costly war with the Martells. Entering into another one-"

"Is worth it, if it means the Princess of Westeros will live to see her home again!" Cersei snapped at him, and Tyrion fell silent, jaw clicking shut.

Joffrey glanced between, still apoplectic, but, Tyrion realized, looking rather young for his beastly self.

He didn't know what to do. He wanted a war, Tyrion had seen well enough how embarrassed he'd been to end it, how much he'd wanted to continue it, but he was smart enough to realize they couldn't afford to lose it, if the Martells managed to hold out as well as they had been.

"Your Grace," Varys said, tone almost idle, "Perhaps if we sent someone to negotiate with the Martells. I understand the Queen's ship should be nearing Sunspear even now. If we were to send a raven to her-"

"This is my daughter's life!" Cersei snapped, and Tyrion could see her desperation as she turned, glaring at the man. "And you propose that we send a Queen untrained in the art of diplomacy to negotiate for her safety?"

"I would hardly say she's not had experience in it, Cersei," Tyrion quipped, and even the Grandmaester looked at him disapprovingly for that. He sighed. "I have just sent a letter to Doran," he lied, "reminding him of his continued loyalty to the Crown. He will not harm Myrcella, Your Grace; this is merely the Dornish attempting to save face and remind us of their power."

"Remind us of what power?" Joffrey demanded voice low and furious, Tyrion saw, as he felt his gut clench. "We defeated them once, when the Mountain ripped apart their bitch princess and her children. They must know that threatening the life of my sister will lead to war!"

"Joffrey..." Cersei stared, but he ignored her.

Perhaps she had wanted him to merely make the threat of war, beyond sending Jaime to steal her daughter back, as Tyrion knew she truly wanted.

But she wasn't stupid. Cersei knew as well as Tyrion that they could not afford to return to the place they had been in, and a war wasn't going to keep Myrcella safe.

"They've wedded my sister to some Dornish barbarian," Joffrey ground out, "Without my permission, and let her be raped, no doubt, without us ever knowing about it. We will burn their city to the ground for this!" Joffrey screeched, slamming his fist down on the table, and Tyrion almost missed the sight of Margaery's calming presence, at her husband's side. "We will sink their city with our ships for their treachery! Dorne will fall, and I will watch it burn myself, if that is what it takes to get rid of their irritating scourge on my kingdom!"

"Myrcella is in Dorne!" Cersei cried, and Joffrey fell silent, staring at her.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "Not to mention," he pointed out mildly, "Your queen will be near to it, now."

Joffrey glared, not appreciating either reminder. "My queen has proven more than once that she is quite capable of taking care of herself," he snapped. "And she is not in Dorne."

"But Myrcella is," Cersei ground out. "I will not have you endangering her life-"

"You will not have me?" Joffrey interrupted, and Cersei fell silent, paling. "You forget your place, Mother."

"Joffrey-"

"I am your king, not your son, and you will address me as such," Joffrey snapped at her. "And when I say that we will go to war with these cowardly sand rats, that is exactly what we will do."

Cersei cleared her throat. "Your Grace," she said, in a careful, measured tone, "There is another way that you might consider first. If it pleases you."

Tyrion closed his eyes. "Your Grace, let me just say I think this is a foolish idea-"

"What is it?" Joffrey demanded.

"Jaime," Cersei said, and she breathed the word as if it were water in her parched throat. Tyrion rolled his eyes, tapping his fingers against the table. Varys glanced his way, and looked almost amused. "My brother is hardly needed in Dragonstone. Already he has won out against Stannis' men there, and wins daily against the Greyjoys. Send another in his place to fight there, and Jaime can be snuck into Dorne to free Myrcella without a drop of blood being shed."

"Your Grace-" Tyrion started, but Joffrey cut him off, raising a hand.

"I don't want to keep a drop of blood from being shed, Mother," Joffrey gritted out. "I want them all to pay."

Cersei lifted her head, gaze intense as she met Joffrey's eyes, now. "And they will, my love," she promised him. "The moment Myrcella is free of the fire."

Joffrey considered her for a long moment.

Tyrion remained silent, because he could see now that Joffrey was never going to accept a peaceful solution, and at least this one would allow him to save face, so long as Jaime succeeded.

And Jaime would succeed. For all that Tyrion had said otherwise, Myrcella was his child, and he would do whatever Cersei asked of him, these days.

Tyrion only wished he had been able to spare his brother from his sister's influence for a little while longer, long enough to clear his head.

"This is a foolish idea," he ground out. "How is Jaime to succeed against every soldier in Dorne?"

Cersei lifted her chin. "He succeeded against the Mad King, and he had all of Dorne at his backing," she said. "He will succeed in this. For Myrcella's sake."

And there was an icy coldness to her promise that had Tyrion wondering what would happen if his brother failed.

"Send for Jaime," Joffrey gritted out, finally. "Bring him back here, and get my sister away from those barbarians. When Ser Loras returns, he can finish the fight against the Iron Islanders, but for now, we will send Ser Boros."

Tyrion ground his teeth. "Your Grace, Ser Loras is hardly capable of-"

"Ser Loras is a fine soldier, and a fine commander," Joffrey interrupted him. "My lady wife informs me that he planned most of the pretender Renly's battles."

Damn. And here Tyrion was, without a witness to his name to bring against Cersei, because he had preemptively killed them all.

Damn.

Cersei sent Tyrion a wicked smirk, before turning to her son and reaching out to squeeze his hands. "Oh, my son," she said, eyes slanting to Tyrion, "I'm so glad you agree."


	248. MARGAERY

"I hate ships," Loras complained, leaning against Margaery's bedpost and groaning as he watched her take another bite of her poached eggs, closely following it down with Dornish cocoa.

Margaery smirked, glancing over her shoulder at Meredyth, who also grinned. "Be nice. Joffrey went to such trouble."

"And we could have gone by horse and made the journey in half the time," Loras muttered sourly. "How can you stand it?"

Margaery laughed. "Perhaps you should not have come then, brother," she teased, taking another bite and watching him turn rather green. "Just think. You could be safe and warm in King's Landing right now. In a certain someone's bed."

Her brother straightened, theatrics partially forgotten. "As if I would leave you alone on a ship made by a Lannister, or anywhere," he snapped, and her expression softened.

"I would be quite safe in Highgarden," she reassured him. "It is our home. And," she reached out, taking Meredyth's hand and squeezing it, "I'm not entirely alone."

Loras rolled his eyes. "Right," he said, "Because Meredyth knows how to use a sword."

Meredyth draped herself down over the side of Margaery's chair. "Who says I don't?" she asked, and Loras lifted a brow.

"Care to take me up on it, then?" he asked. "We could go up on deck right now. I'm sure one of the sailors has another sword for you to use."

Margaery snorted. "I don't think you're up to it, Brother," she teased.

In truth, she had not meant to upset him. She knew how deeply the breaking of his relationship with that blond boy had cut him, and did not want his mind to focus on anything but light things.

It seemed that Loras had different thoughts, brooding beneath his skull, however.

"And why not?" he asked. "If I stay down here, all I do is think, and you know how I get when I'm thinking too long."

"Perhaps it would be good for you," Margaery muttered under her breath, and Loras sat up, glaring at her.

"Just because Willas and...Prince Oberyn," Loras stumbled over the name, "wrote letters to one another about horses, does not mean that House Tyrell and House Martell are anything of the sort. Father blames them for what happened to Willas, even if he does not. They hate the Lannisters, and you're married to one, and we're passing around their peninsula right now. That hardly sounds safe to me."

"Last I heard, his name was Joffrey Baratheon," Margaery mused quietly, wrapping her fingers around the cup of coffee as they began to shake. Her eyebrow lifted.

Loras snorted. "Of course, sister."

Meredyth rolled her eyes, pulling away from Margaery to take a sip of her cocoa. Margaery yanked it out of reach and sighed.

"I am glad that you came with me," she admitted then, voice gentler as she pretended Meredyth was not there. Meredyth glanced between them and then picked up Margaery's half empty plate, walking towards the door.

Margaery raised a brow as she left with it, and then glanced at Loras, who just shrugged.

"Because you thought I was going to kill someone if we stayed in that wretched shithole a day longer?"

Margaery didn't smile as she stood up and walked over to where her brother sat on the couch, taking the seat beside him. "Because I am glad to have my brother with me now."

Loras sighed, lowering his cup to the table in front of the couch. "We could always make a detour for Braavos after this. Run off and meet some attractive people in the island of Lorath, or wherever it is that all the beautiful people are supposed to live."

That startled a laugh out of his sister. "I hardly think we wouldn't be found out by her from the moment we left Highgarden."

Loras raised a brow. "Maybe we could make a detour and steal the _Baratheon_ princess, while we're at it," he suggested, and Margaery snorted.

"Then we'd really be in trouble," she muttered.

He didn't look quite so amused, anymore. "Do you honestly think she wants to go back home, after being free for so long in Dorne? I wouldn't."

Margaery took another sip of her cocoa. "You're not an impressionable young girl sent by yourself to Dorne," she pointed out. "I'm sure she'd prefer to be with her mother." Loras raised a skeptical brow at that, and Margaery rolled her eyes. "With Tommen and his kittens, at least. Getting married is a...difficult thing, for a girl so young."

Loras shrugged; he wouldn't know, after all. Couldn't know, with the sex he had been born into, and for a moment Margaery begrudged him for that, and his position in the Kingsguard, unable to ever get married, as she was sure he was rather happy about.

"I wonder what sort of girl she is," Loras mused. "The sister of Joffrey the Madman, and Tommen the Cat-Lover."

Margaery snorted. "We're not going to Dorne or Lorath, Brother Dearest, no matter how much you would like to meet some pretty boy there."

Loras' lower lip jutted out into a pout. "I'm sure you'd like to go," he pointed out. "Get your mind off a certain someone?" he nudged her with his elbow, and Margaery was hard pressed not to shove him off.

"I'm taking this trip to assure myself that Willas is all right," she reminded him. "Nothing more." And then she was standing, walking back over to her cup of cocoa and taking another sip. It was cold now, but she couldn't bring herself to care about that.

She could feel Loras' eyes on her. "Sure you are, Sister," he said, voice almost gentle, before he stood to his feet and walked towards the door.

"Where are you going?" she called at his back, feeling oddly betrayed.

He threw a glance over his shoulder. "To see if Meredyth was serious about that offer," he said, and then he was out the door, leaving Margaery alone in an empty and far too large door, and she had to resist the urge to throw her still full cup of cocoa at it.


	249. SANSA

Sansa awoke in a cold sweat, a scream forcing its way past her lips. She struggled to breathe, reaching out instinctively for the warm body on the bed beside her, only to discover that her bed was as cold as her heart must have been, to allow such a thing to happen to Oberyn Martell.

She'd killed him, Sansa thought. She'd let him die in the most horrific, gruesome way imaginable, and she'd done it without a second thought.

What sort of monster was she?

"Sansa," a gentle voice said, and Sansa leaned into the touch it offered before flinching away with the abrupt realization that the woman before her was not at all Margaery. "Sansa, you need to breathe."

No, that was what Margaery had told her in the Black Cells, Sansa remembered.

She opened her eyes, and was more disappointed than she should have been at the sight of a worried Shae, leaning over her.

"Are you all right?" the other woman asked, and Sansa shivered, hugging herself and pulling the sheets up around her neck a moment later.

"I..." she rubbed at her eyes. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't...I didn't mean to wake you."

Shae pursed her lips. "Are you all right?" she asked again, and Sansa shook her head, breathing out shakily.

"I...I'm fine," she said. "I just...Bad dreams."

Shae cocked her head. "Do you want to talk about it?" she asked, and Sansa looked away, shaking her head.

_Not with you._

"I'm fine," she repeated, and Shae hesitated, and then nodded.

"Right," she said. "I'll just...be going, then."

Sansa nodded, still not meeting the other woman's gaze. She waited until Shae was gone, had returned to her husband’s bed, but the sleep would not come even after the other woman had left, and Sansa found herself sitting despondently up in her bed, the dreams flashing before her eyes as if she did still sleep.

She got up, pulling a loose shawl around her shoulders and wandering out of her chambers as quietly as she could, because Shae was as observant as a cat and would hear her if she did anything to give herself away, Sansa knew.

She also knew that Shae would make the argument that it was not safe for Sansa to be wandering around the Keep by herself at this hour of the night, but Sansa didn’t want to hear that just now, however much it was true.

Even wandering around a place as dangerous as the Keep was preferable to reliving those nightmares in her stuffy if large now bedroom.

She found herself wandering past the Maidenvault, empty now of Margaery, and she nearly wandered into the other girl’s empty chambers before she remembered that if she did that, she would only find herself rudely awoken by some guard in the morning, demanding to know why she was sleeping in the King’s bed.

She owed it to Margaery not to bring such suspicion down on her, and Sansa kept walking.

Kept walking until she made her way to an empty room and sank down on the floor against the wall there, leaning her head back and just breathing.

A soft meow had Sansa blinking in surprise, and she stared down at the sight of the kitten straddling her lap, staring up at her wide green eyes.

He reminded her, almost for a moment, of Tommen.

"Are you all right?" a tiny voice asked as if summoned, a mimicry of Shae's earlier words, and Sansa lifted her head, blinked in surprise to see young Tommen standing timidly behind her, wringing his hands as if he were nervous to approach her.

Sansa forced herself to smile at him, wiping her eyes and standing to her feet, giving the young prince a curtsey. "Of course, Your Grace," she murmured, not meeting his eyes. "I only...I am better, now.” She shook her head.

Tommen's face broke out into a smile. "I'm glad," he murmured hoarsely. "I...Was it my brother?"

Sansa swallowed, reminded herself that, for all of his faults, Joffrey was still an older brother to a rather impressionable little boy, even if his question had made that seem more and more unlikely.

"No," she told him. "It is just...I am just missing Queen Margaery, is all. She is my closest friend in all of King's Landing, and I don't know how long it will be before she comes back."

She thought to compare their friendship to one of Tommen's friendships, to help him understand the reason for her tears when she shouldn't be crying at all, but then realized she couldn't name a single friend that the young prince had, other than his kittens.

She shook her head. She supposed she shouldn't have said those things, regardless. She knew that Tommen was a rather lonely boy, and if such words got back to Cersei...

Well, she wouldn't believe that Margaery was only using Sansa for the information she could gain about Tyrion, in any case.

Tommen nodded, anyway. "I'm sure she'll be back soon though, Lady Aunt," he told her, and Sansa blinked, confused for a moment, before she remembered that she was in fact Tommen's aunt by marriage, now. "You needn't cry."

Sansa was abruptly reminded of her thoughts during her betrothal to Joffrey, after she had learned the truth of what he was, of how much easier her life might be if she were engaged to young Prince Tommen, instead. Now, she thought of Margaery's marriage, of how much happier the other woman might be, as well.

Sansa let out a stuttering laugh. "Of course," she agreed. "You're right. What are you doing here, Prince Tommen? At this time of night?

The boy looked up at her, nodding shyly. "I was going to find Uncle Tyrion,” he said. “I...Couldn’t sleep either,” he shrugged. “And he promised to read with me, tonight, if I couldn’t sleep again," he told her, voice gaining a little strength as he continued. "He sent for a book for me, from Essos. About dragons." His eyes lit a little as he said that last word, and Sansa couldn't help but smile.

"Did he?" she asked, voice dripping into a teasing note. "I know that my husband is very obsessed with them." It seemed to be a failing of more than one Lannister, she thought idly, shivering as she remembered the time that Joffrey had dragged her to the cellars of the Keep to show her the dragon skulls there, chattering on obnoxiously as Sansa had found herself ill at the sight of them.

Tommen's lips pulled into a wide smile, and he bobbed his head. "They're...interesting," he told her seriously, brows furrowing. "Though I know that they never existed to the extent that they do in lore."

Sansa smiled. "Well, perhaps they did," she told him. "We just don't know."

Tommen shrugged. "Joffrey says that the girl across the sea, the Targaryen Princess, has dragons that are rumored to be larger than a man, but the ones in the crypts are only the size of dogs."

Sansa nodded, blinking in surprise, that Tommen would know of such things, even if she knew that her own lowly status meant that she would not. "I am sure that is just a rumor, Your Grace."

"Yes, but it got your mind off the Queen," Tommen said, giving her a shy smile.

Sansa grinned at him, blinked as he sat down on the step she had just been crying on and patted the space next to him. She sat, still eying him.

"I know what that's like, missing somebody," he told her, and Sansa felt a small pang of sympathy.

"Your grandfather," she surmised.

"I miss him a lot," Tommen whispered, resting his chin on his knees and hugging them.

"I am sure that your grandfather is in a better place, Your Grace," Sansa lied, giving him a small smile.

Tommen shrugged. "He was a good man," Sansa bit back an undignified snort, "and the gods are just. I...I still miss him, though. He was the only one who treated me like-" he shut up then, side eying Sansa before letting out a small sigh. "Mother doesn't seem to miss him at all. Nor Joffrey."

Sansa reached out tentatively, placing a hand on Tommen's shoulder, relieved when he didn't shrug it off immediately, as Joffrey might have done. "They're very busy," she reminded Tommen. "Your grandfather's death has left the Crown in a very vulnerable position."

Tommen sighed. "I wish we didn't have the throne," he confessed, and Sansa jerked where she sat, blinked when the little boy turned to look at her. "Then maybe I wouldn't be shut away all the time, and could actually do something."

Sansa measured her next breath, didn't dare to state that she wished the Lannisters didn't have the throne, either. "Surely it isn't so bad."

He raised a brow at her, lifting his head off his knees. "I hate it. Mother will never let me do anything, because it's too dangerous. No one recognizes me. I'm free to wander about the Keep as I wish, without all the stupid devotion my brother gets, but I can't go out, and no one but the kitchen boys wants to be friends with me." He let out a little breath. "I have the kittens, but..."

And Sansa was struck once again with how very young this little boy was. He was older than Rickon, of course, and her brother had been deemed old enough to be burned alive by the traitors who had taken Winterfell, but he was still very much a child still.

"Can I play with your kittens with you again, Your Grace?" she asked him. "Since you're already awake?"

He glanced up at her, sniffing conspicuously. "Why?" he asked, tone laced with something close to suspicion, and Sansa forced herself to smile.

"Because I could use a friend, and, I think, so could you."

Tommen smiled at her.

She held out her hand to him. “Come,” she invited, “Let’s go and find my husband and see if he is still up to reading to both of us, tonight.”


	250. CERSEI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates will be faster once midterms are over :)

Cersei fumed as she stalked down the stairs to the basement of the Keep, where she'd allotted the rooms for Maester Quyburn's...less than ethical experiments. She knew how the Grandmaester had moaned about them, when she'd still had the man working alongside the other maesters of King's Landing.

They fit Maester Quyburn far better, and made it far easier to ensure that there were no incidents with those who shouldn't know walking in on those experiments. They also managed to shut up the Grandmaester, and as much as Cersei would prefer to do so permanently, she knew that she couldn't afford it.

This was easier, even if it did make for a rather long walk in which to build up her anger about the things going on in the wide world around her.

And she had much to be fuming about, despite her recent victory against her brother, pleasing though it had been.

She couldn't believe the little Highgarden whore. Even from across the realm, she held an influence over Cersei's son which she loathed, an influence which terrified her because she had never seen her son so affected by...anyone, even his own mother.

Her son had informed her, rather primly today, that no, he wouldn't be annulling her marriage to Willas Tyrell. He understood her irritation with the marriage, and with a husband who could not fulfill his duties, but for the sake of the realm, she would remain married.

Cersei had stared at him for several moments, knowing that the poison he spewed came from that little bitch's mouth, and she wasn't even in King's Landing anymore.

She hated the influence the woman had over her son. Hated that it was an influence she had lost. She was far too dangerous to allow to live for much longer, even if Tyrion, for whatever reason, was determined to keep the alliance.

There were other ways to be rid of a woman which did not involve selling her out to the High Sparrow, Cersei knew, and she intended to do whatever was necessary to ensure that the girl didn't ruin the realm with her plotting.

Still, Cersei still had some influence over him, if she was able to convince him to bring Jaime back to her. And once Jaime came back, once he returned Myrcella, they could be a family again.

And Tyrion could do nothing about it, she thought, rather gleefully. She had seen his face in the Small Council chamber, the defeat on his features as he realized that, despite his efforts, he had lost and Cersei had won.

It had not happened enough recently, and if only she could savor her victory, she would be pleased.

That was worth the indignity of remaining married to a husband she would hopefully never be forced to see again. Her father wasn't here to demand it, after all, and the Tyrells hardly seemed interested in doing so.

She sighed, pausing outside the doors of the room she was about to enter.

If all went well with the little project being conducted within, she would never have to worry about her family being torn apart by any outside forces again.

Not even by Margaery Fucking Tyrell.

She bit her lip, knocking lightly on the door in the way she had informed the maester she would, waited until he indicated that she could come inside.

She opened the door, blinked at the sight of the man on the other side, calmly wringing his hands as he stood over a stinking body, and Cersei grimaced, reaching up a hand to cover her mouth and nose.

It stank like shit and death in this room, and she was sure that, if not the long walk down here, would deter any little spies.

It almost deterred her.

Maester Quyburn glanced up at her, a tight smile on his face. "Your Grace," he greeted. "I hear that you are to be congratulated on your little victory over Tyrion Lannister in the Small Council chambers."

Cersei blinked at him, surprised that he had even heard of that, and then shrugged her shoulders. Her maester was far better a spy than Quyburn had ever been, for all that most did not even consider him a maester anymore.

When she had her influence back, Cersei would be sure to remedy that. For her own sake, of course.

"When will it be done?" she demanded, annoyance bleeding into her tone as she nodded to the putrid body laying on the table. The bulky form filled up the table, an arm hanging over the side where a normal man's would not.

But then, the creature lying on that table had never been a normal man. It was why Cersei had chosen him, after all.

Quyburn glanced at her, stilling his hands and returning his attention to his project. "When it is done, Your Grace," he said, typically infuriating in his vague answers after several moments, glancing up from his work for the first time since she had entered the room. "I believe I am reaching a breakthrough, however."

Cersei grunted. "Well, reach it faster. My enemies grow daily, and if you cannot deliver on your promise, I will find something else that can."

He dipped into a shallow bow, not appearing intimidated in the least by her threats. Useful as he was, she had yet to find a way to understand him, and that annoyed her. "Of course, Your Grace. Though I think you will be quite pleased, in the end."

Cersei eyed him. "I don't care if I am pleased," she said finally, pursing her lips. "So long as you deliver on your promise and Lancel Lannister is dead at my feet before he can betray me to those damned fanatics."

The former maester smiled. "I can certainly deliver you that and more, Your Grace," he promised. "And when Lancel Lannister is dead, this creature will turn to the Martells as he did once, long ago."

And Cersei allowed herself a small, tight smile, before she nodded. "Good," she said, and turned on her heel, skirts twirling around her as she moved. "My daughter's dignity has been destroyed by those monsters."

The maester nodded, distractedly poking his instruments into the body of the Mountain. "The poison the Dornish Prince used," he mused, poking the body again. "Could be useful, as well."

Cersei turned back, eying him. "I want them to know it is me," she said, after a long pause. "I want the Martells to lose everything they hold dear and to know that it was I who took that from them. That a Lannister always pays her debts."

The maester eyed her for several moments. She wondered if he truly was mad. "Yes, Your Grace," he said finally. "I think we can arrange that."


	251. MARGAERY

Highgarden was everything she had remembered, and she was so relieved to be back here.

Margaery found herself standing on the deck of their ship, staring out at the high spires of Highgarden where it stood on the tall hill overlooking the open harbor. She smiled widely, felt Loras squeezing her shoulder.

She glanced back at him, smile softening. "We're home," she whispered, and Loras smiled, looking genuinely happy for the first time in a long time, Margaery couldn't help but think.

It felt good, to be here again. As if she could suddenly breathe fully again after a long time without the pleasure.

She closed her eyes, breathing in the sea salt that someone smelt different than it had on the long journey here, the smell of fish and sheared wheat and the warm heat of summer searing through her nostrils.

Home.

"Your Grace," the Captain called, and Margaery turned toward the man, realizing abruptly that this was perhaps the first time in their entire journey that he had addressed her personally. Come to think of it, she supposed that was rather strange, but then, she, Loras, and Meredyth had barricaded themselves in her chambers for the most part, so perhaps not so strange.

"Captain," she sent him a small smile. "I trust everything is in order?"

The man blinked at her in bemusement, and then seemed to realize what she was asking. "My men would be happy to send your belongings along behind you, Your Grace, if you wish to depart immediately. Our papers are in order."

Margaery's smile widened. "I'm glad to hear it," she said, and then she extended her arm, waited until her brother took it. She practically pulled him off the ship, though Loras certainly wasn't complaining.

Meredyth walked along behind them, grinning at their antics, but the quiet girl seemed just as happy as Margaery to be back in Highgarden once more.

Loras stopped at the end of their dock and breathed in deep, as Margaery had done the moment they pulled into the harbor. "Ah," he breathed, and Margaery poked him in the side.

"You see?" she asked him. "I told you this would be good for us."

Loras eyed her. "I never said it wouldn't, Sister," he said softly, and Margaery squinted him.

"My lady!" Margaery spun at the sound of that familiar voice, blinking in surprise at the sight of her goodsister Leonette standing by a group of horses and green cloaks at the end of the docks, where the fish market began.

"It's 'Your Grace,' now, actually," she shouted over to the other woman, and could almost hear Loras rolling his eyes, beside her.

"It's 'Your Pretentiousness,' now, actually," he called after her, as they moved closer. Margaery jabbed him in the stomach as several commoners glanced their way, but Loras ignored her. "Could do her some good, actually, to remind her that she's not always been a queen."

"Oh, she's always been our queen," Leonette said, as they reached her, and then she was moving forward, pulling Margaery into a hug.

Margaery blinked, couldn't remember the last time she'd received a hug from someone who was genuinely glad to see her. She'd hugged Sansa, when she got on the ship, but before that?

"And how was the journey?" Leonette asked, running a finger through Margaery's hair, in the comforting way that Garlan always appreciated and which Margaery had never particularly cared for. Still, she didn't move.

"It was all smooth sailing," she reassured Leonette, pulling back from the hug. Leonette beamed at her. "The Seven must have been smiling on us. Not a cloud in the sky the entire journey here."

"The entire _long_ journey here," Loras interjected, over Margaery's shoulder, and Leonette grinned at him.

"It wasn't so long," Meredyth said quietly, and Margaery smiled gently at her.

"I'm sure you found some way to fill it," Leonette teased, side eying one of the sailors climbing down from the ship with another, pulling a barrel between them.

Margaery snorted. "Someone in the capital has turned our Loras into a monogamist," she said, punching Loras' shoulder.

Leonette raised a brow. "Really?" she asked, looking just as surprised as Meredyth by the news. Margaery would have thought it would have been obvious, for Meredyth. "I find that rather hard to believe."

Loras rolled his eyes. "Can't imagine why," he said, almost darkly, and Leonette seemed to realize that the topic wasn't up for discussion.

She shrugged, taking Margaery's arm and practically dragging her along the path back to the waiting horses and servants. "You'll be pleased to know that all of Highgarden has been turned upside down in preparation for your arrival," she informed Margaery. "Mother Alerie banned all lovers from her bed in order to ensure that you had the best feast Highgarden has seen since..."

She trailed off, and Margaery realized that the last time Highgarden had entertained a royal in a feast had been when Renly had taken her as his wife.

She forced a bright smile, glancing back at Loras, who appeared to have not heard, brooding in his own thoughts already.

And here Margaery had thought the journey away might rectify that.

"I'm glad to hear it," Margaery grinned at her goodsister, squeezing the other woman's arm. "It's what a queen deserves, after all."

Leonette rolled her eyes. "We're all miserable in anticipation," she said. "Or have been, these long months. Now that you are here we are hoping you can convince your mother to calm herself before she makes herself sick."

Margaery snorted. "You know I've never had any influence over Mother," she said, and Leonette let out a tittering laugh.

"I suppose not," she agreed, and then they were climbing on their horses, Loras helping first Margaery and then Leonette up.

It had been such a long time since Margaery had ridden a horse and been able to enjoy it, she couldn't help but think. The last few times she had ridden a horse, it had been to accompany Joffrey hunting, and while she had once been an avid hunter and hawker, Margaery could find nothing entertaining about watching Joffrey kill.

There was something totally different, she couldn't help but think, in hunting with her brothers a wild animal, and watching a wild animal hunt.

"Tell me all about Highgarden since we've been gone," Margaery said, flicking the reins of her horse. It was not her beloved mare, but then, she supposed, she would not have wanted anyone else to drive her sweet down here without Margaery to oversee it. She trusted only Willas with her sweet.

Leonette grinned. "Well," she said, glancing pointedly down at her stomach, "We will soon entertain another Tyrell altogether."

Margaery turned in her seat, staring at Leonette. Loras' jaw fell open. It had been some time since Leonette and her brother Garlan had been wed, after all.

"You're pregnant?" Loras blurted out, and Margaery rolled her eyes as the green cloaks around them shifted uncomfortably at the new topic. Men.

"Loras, for goodness' sake," Margaery muttered, "Have a care." And then she reached out, squeezing Leonette's hand. "I'm so happy for you."

Leonette smiled. "I know," she said, and sounded so sincere. Margaery had always thought the politics of Highgarden so intricate. She missed their simplicity, these days.

"But should you be riding?" Meredyth asked pointedly, riding along behind Margaery. "I thought..."

"The maesters say that it is fine, for now," Leonette said. "I have carried the baby this long, and it is only when we are close to delivery that they are to be worried about such things again. Besides," she shrugged, "The Martells may be known for their genius in horseflesh, but the maesters would have to rip me from a horse if they so cared."

Margaery rolled her eyes, totally convinced of her goodsister's words. "I'm sure," she muttered disapprovingly. And then she paused, a realization hitting her. "Does Garlan...did he know, before he went off to the Iron Islands?"

Leonette's face fell. "No," she said at last. "No, he didn't know."

Margaery swallowed, forced a smile. "Well," she said, "I'm sure he will be happy of the news when he returns."

Leonette nodded, swallowing hard. "Of course he will be," she agreed placidly, and Margaery narrowed her eyes at the other woman.

Leonette glanced back at Meredyth. "I'm sure you will be glad to know that your mother, Lady Crane, will be here in Highgarden for the feast," she informed Meredyth, and Meredyth grinned at the news.

"I'm glad to hear it," she said, and Margaery blinked at the sudden fog settling over her own eyes, of the reminder of the witch who had spoken of Alla, who had told her she would never see her mother again.

Margaery shook her head to clear it, for those had just been the words of some disgruntled seer, and she should not take them to heart, certainly.

After all, her brother had arrived safely in Highgarden.

And then they were riding along, and Margaery could think of nothing save the wind in her hair and the feeling of the horse between her legs, and she grinned, wanting nothing more than to savor this feeling forever.

But then they were at Highgarden, and Margaery grinned up at the tall, off white towers of her home, at the doors, thrown open in anticipation for the return of its children.

She swallowed. It felt as if it had been an age.

She rode forward, aware of the others falling in line behind her, and Margaery blinked at that for a moment, before she remembered that she was the queen and it was protocol for them to do so.

Abruptly, she hated being the queen.

Margaery rode into the courtyard of her home, and came to an abrupt stop, at the sight of what was left of her family here in Highgarden, gathered in the courtyard to see Margaery and Loras' return.

Her father had, of course, elected to stay in Highgarden, and she was sure Alerie would much prefer to see him, but then, she still smiled at the sight of her children entering the courtyard.

But it was not Alerie whom Margaery had traveled all of this way to see, and the moment Margaery caught sight of her brother, sitting in a chair fashioned for him by the maesters for the days when his leg ached too badly to walk on, sitting beneath a tree in the courtyard with a large smile on his face, and she was jumping down from her horse before she even realized what she was doing.

"Willas!" Margaery cried, rushing forward and throwing herself into her brother's arms, unconcerned with his inability to stand to greet her, at the moment. She heard his quiet oof, however, and pulled back, examining her brother's features out of concern.

"How are you?" she demanded, and Willas gave her a small smile.

"All the better, for seeing you here," he assured her.

Margaery rolled her eyes fondly. "You think you're so charming," she teased him, and her brother laughed, reached out to brush his curved index finger along her chin.

"Aren't I?" he asked her, and Margaery gave him an indulgent smile.

"Of course you are," she agreed, reaching up to squeeze at his hand. "Always."

Willas gave her a long, searching look, and then shrugged. "I do try," he drawled, and Margery rolled her eyes, tried to keep the tears out of them.

Willas blinked up at her. "I'm all right, Margy," he said, for he always knew her thoughts, and Margaery forced herself to smile.

"Of course you are," she whispered again, swallowing thickly, and then Loras was moving around her, moving forward to embrace his brother and press a gentle kiss to Willas' forehead.

He turned back to Margaery. "Now we're home," he said softly, and Margaery grinned.


	252. MARGAERY

"There, your rooms," Alerie said, reaching out and squeezing her daughter's waist. "Left just as you left them, after all this time."

Margaery forced a smile. "I worried you might have given them to Cersei," she confessed. "When she came here."

They were, objectively, the second best women's chamber in Highgarden, the first belonging to Olenna, and it would have been almost insulting not to, for the Queen Mother and Willas' new wife.

Alerie swatted at her. "Nonsense. That woman was placed in the rooms next to Garlan's."

At the far end of the farthest hall, keeping her out of trouble. Margaery couldn't help but grin, at that, as she watched Meredyth step forward and set her things down before her bed.

Meredyth turned back around, glancing between the two of them with a small smile before she turned to Margaery and Alerie.

"If it pleases you, I'd like to go and see my mother now," she said, tone hopeful, and Margaery beamed.

"Of course," she said, reaching out and Meredyth's hands. "Go on."

The girl practically skipped from Margaery's chambers, and Margaery wondered if the oppressive weight that had been resting on her shoulders since she arrived in King's Landing had affected all of her ladies in the same manner.

She felt guilty that she had not been able to bring them all along with Meredyth on this journey, felt guilty that she had not been able to bring Sansa, as well, but she knew it was not to be. Cersei would be suspicious if the Queen suddenly packed up all of her ladies and Sansa Stark and ran off to Highgarden to visit a brother whom she had shown less concern for when he was actually dying.

Margaery felt her breath leave her body at that thought, and she nearly stumbled. Her mother reached out, touching her arm.

"Are you all right, Marg?" she asked gently, and there was warmth to her voice Margaery heard from few in King's Landing.

Margaery shook her head. "I...I'm fine," she promised her mother, turning to smile at the woman.

Her mother did not need to be burdened with Margaery's guilty conscience, after all. The woman already worried over Margaery's lack of a child so far, and now Willas.

It was different, Margaery thought for Garlan to have a wife who had yet to have a child in the several years since they had been wed, and have a daughter who was married to the King and had not had a child within a week of the wedding.

She shook her head, distracting herself by glancing around her chambers furtively.

Ah, but it was good to be home.

Margaery closed her eyes, breathing in the dusty scent of her chambers, before stepping inside.

Her mother was right; they hadn't been changed since the last time she had been here, sleeping in her bed beside her new husband before they began the campaign against Stannis.

Her clothes all still hung in the open wardrobe, no doubt kept in pristine condition rather than attacked by mothballs, beautiful clothes far too modest for her to take with her to King's Landing, once she had divined the persona she would don once she had arrived, but not as closed off as the ones she had worn to Renly's camp.

On her desk still lay out pieces of parchment, curled around the edges but still waiting to be used, for Margaery had always adored letter writing, whether it was to her brothers from King's Landing or to the brother she'd barely known beyond letters, the one who served for so long as Renly's squire.

The painting she'd always insisted on keeping, the one which had always disgusted her mother but, it seemed, she hadn't had the heart to take down after Margaery left, hung above Margaery's bed, and Margaery smiled at the sight of it.

Truly, she looked nothing like the figure in the painting, but Renly had been clear: they must find some similarities between her and Lyanna Stark.

" _Something about the nose_ ," he'd said, and Margaery had lifted her chin, smiling as she displayed her button nose to a man she'd been hopelessly besotted with.

_"Do you think so?"_

When they were finished, Olenna proclaimed the painting "t _he plainest little rose she'd ever seen_ ," and Margaery had laughed.

" _Well, it will fool my brother until he's taken her to bed_ ," Renly said, and Margaery remembered that she was supposed to blush at such things only after the moment to do so had passed.

Renly's gaze on her had been considering, after that.

Loras had jokingly called it the Maiden, and the name had stuck, even as they made the replica for the locket which Renly showed to Eddard Stark, and Margaery had kept the first one.

Her mother hadn't understood why Margaery had wanted to keep it, hadn't understood the yearning Margaery had, for an ambition she could not quite place into words quite yet.

 _The_ Queen.

The woman hanging from Margaery's wall was not the queen, not the one Margaery had become, but she had been a step in the right direction, and when Margaery had last lived here, she had been as close to the queen as Margaery could imagine being.

The sheets had been fixed, the dried roses taken from the blankets, and the window opened to allow in the air. But other than that, it was the same, and Margaery found herself swallowing thickly.

That had been their wedding night.

The one night when she had actually lain with her husband as husbands and wives did, for the sake of legitimizing their marriage, though she had known by the time the night was over that her husband did not care for her form.

They had fallen asleep in awkward silence, until in the dark she'd felt Renly's arms wrap around her waist, felt him lay his head upon her shoulder. And he'd said nothing, only leaned against her in the dark until she felt his breathing even out in sleep.

And Margaery had spent the night wracked with silent sobs, the effort to keep her husband from waking exerting all of her strength.

It hadn't been so much that she had expected to fall into a love match, not when she'd known her feelings about men already at the time, with a man who spent so much time around her brother. She had only wished...

Well, there had been a part of Margaery which had hoped, from the moment she met the pretty young man her brother so intently wanted her to marry, without telling her why.

These rooms belonged to a different woman than she was now. Margaery Tyrell cared very little for whether her husband loved her, beyond that it was important to her own position.

Still, Margaery couldn't help but feel...touched, that her mother had gone to such trouble to preserve them, not knowing if her daughter would ever come home. It had been agreed, before Margaery had traveled to King's Landing to meet her new husband, that it was unlikely to happen, save in dire emergency.

Joffrey was the sort of husband who would tire easily of someone not present to adore him, Margaery thought, as she had worried then.

And yet, Margaery couldn't bring herself to care that she was absent from an easily distracted husband, now that she was in fact home.

Margaery spun back to her mother. "Willas' condition," she said softly. "What do the maesters say? Is he really recovering?"

Alerie beamed. "He's doing quite well, considering," she said, and then her smile faded. "When...when he was first ill, they thought..."

Margaery knew what they had thought. She had guaranteed a man's death because of what they thought.

And, even though she had insisted on coming here to see her brother, Margaery was not certain that she could face him, knowing what she had done to his friend.

No, she reminded herself. She had done it for Sansa, surely.

"But he's getting better?" Margaery clarified.

Alerie smiled, nodded. "The maesters say they are impressed with the level of recovery he has shown thus far," she said. "The type of poison, once identified, was easily dealt with, but they say that it should have taken Willas longer than it has for him to recover."

Margaery swallowed. She wondered how much of that was true; her brother had looked well in the courtyard, but pale and wan, and she missed the days when she thought her brother, cane and all, was the strongest man she had ever seen.

She still thought that, though in a different way, of course.

And she knew how he wished to spare their mother any pain, in the same way that Margaery often insisted on, that Garlan did.

"Mother," she said, as she stepped forward and sank down onto the edge of the bed. "How much contact did Cersei have with my brother while she was here?"

Alerie glanced at her. "They did not have a bedding ceremony, if that is what you're getting at," she said softly. Then, "In truth, she spent most of her time shut up in her chambers."

Margaery eyed her. "That's what Willas said," she mused. "What was she doing in there?"

Alerie shrugged. "She would eat with us at meals, though in truth she often looked put off by eating with us. As if she thought we were going to..."

Poison her.

Alerie's eyes went very wide, and Margaery ground her teeth.

She loved her mother, but it was instances like these which had prompted Margaery toward confiding in her grandmother, rather than her mother, for most of her life.

"I don't want that woman around my brother when she returns here," Margaery told her mother coolly, and Alerie blinked at her.

"She had very little interest in your brother while she was here, Marg," she promised in her soft, quiet voice that never failed to make a bit of Margaery die inside every time she heard it. "She was too busy writing her letters, when she was shut up in her rooms. The servants, when she would allow them in, said she was always writing letters."

Margaery frowned. "Letters to whom?"

Alerie shrugged. "She didn't say," she said whimsically, and Margaery groaned.

"I told Willas to have someone reading every communication Cersei sent out of this place," she snapped impatiently. "Why the hell didn't it happen?"

Alerie frowned. "My dear girl..." she said reproachfully, and Margaery sighed, reached out and squeezed her mother's shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Mother," she said finally. "I was overreacting, and I should not have snapped at you like that. Willas' condition, you see, has merely worried me for so long now, added to the other stresses of King's Landing."

Gods, sometimes she couldn't stand her own mother, and Margaery felt a fair amount of guilt, for that. Her mother was a dear, sweet woman, but so oblivious to the real workings of the world. To the fact that a cold voice and a snapping tone was the least of anyone's problems, these days.

She had never encountered the horrors of war, or the horrors of anything else, and Margaery did not begrudge her mother that, she only found it...frustrating.

Alerie nodded sympathetically. "Of course, dear girl. And your brother is quite well now, you'll see." She brushed her thumb along Margaery's cheek. "And you are here again. All is as it should be."

Margaery forced herself to smile. "Yes, Mama," she agreed. "Everything is as it should be, for once."

But it didn't feel like it was. It felt like something terrible was missing, and if only Margaery could put her finger on what it was, she might be happy again.

Alerie moved forward, clasping her daughter's chin and tilting it up. "We'll have a feast tonight," she decided, with a wide smile. "To celebrate the return of my daughter and son, and think no more of those Lannisters."

And Margaery, despite herself, smiled as well. "That is something I can happily agree to," she said.

Alerie smiled, pulled away from her. "Good. Then it's decided. Unpack and get yourself refreshed, because once we have you at the feast we won't be letting you go, I'm sure of it."


	253. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GRRM has a habit of not saying how long it takes to get anywhere in Westeros, so we're assuming that a trip to Dorne from King's Landing by ship would take a little over a week. Don't quote me on that, haha.

"You don't have to do that," he said, and Sansa glanced up, blinking at her husband.

"What?" she asked, and when he gestured to his untended shirt, sitting in her lap, Sansa shrugged.

"It's fine," she said. "I...I want to."

She did. It was, after all, one of the many duties expected of a wife in the North, and even if she was no longer a Northerner in any way that counted, this was something that Sansa could do, something she was capable of.

Something that could distract her.

Sansa closed her eyes, breathed in deep.

It had been over a week since Margaery had left, and already Sansa could feel herself bursting at the seams from boredom. Margaery had no doubt just made it to Highgarden.

She had Tommen to play with when she grew too bored, and the boy was sweet, but he was only a child, and every time Sansa looked at him, no matter how sweet he was, she was reminded of whose family he belonged to.

 _You belong to that family now, as well,_ her mind supplied, and Sansa opened her eyes, glared a little harder at the fraying shirt in her hands.

She had stolen it out of her husband's wardrobe that morning, after their breakfast, and had almost enjoyed the look of surprise on her husband's features, seeing her standing in his chambers with his shirt in her hands.

Sansa had studiously walked past him and returned to her own chambers, grabbing up her supplies before sitting down at the edge of her bed and not meeting her husband's eyes.

And then he'd suggested that she work in the parlor, while he worked on his papers, and Sansa had stared at him for several moments before responding.

She had a feeling, after all, that her husband knew what was wrong with her. She'd been more than vocal about her feelings after all, but then, so had he.

She was surprised that he wanted to spend time with her at all, and so Sansa had agreed.

Besides, she was moping, she realized. What she felt now was far too close to what she had always felt before Margaery had come into her life and changed everything; the loneliness of being a prisoner in King's Landing, without a friend in the world.

Margaery would be back soon enough, she told herself, and in the mean time, she could do this one small thing to repair whatever relationship she had left with her husband.

She was not the only one who had suffered in the Black Cells recently, after all, and Sansa shivered, stabbing her needle a little harder into the shirt she worked so feverishly at it.

It was in an embarrassing state of disrepair. She wondered if Tyrion had ever learned to mend his own shirts, or if he had gone this long without anyone to fix them because he'd not had a wife.

The thought was rather sad.

She could feel her husband's eyes on her, but Sansa didn't look up, just kept working on the shirt, and swore when the needle stabbed into her thumb.

Her husband walked out of the room as a droplet of blood appeared on her thumb, and Sansa was almost relieved for that, for she couldn't help staring at it, feeling the bruises she'd had in the Black Cells as she lay in the dark, body unused to much movement when the guards grabbed her roughly and dragged her out of the cell and before the King.

And Tyrion had endured that, as well.

She wondered what that said about her, that she was more able to identify with Margaery than she was with her husband, when they'd shared a far more significant experience.

Sansa turned her attention back to the shirt.

"Sansa?" Shae stepped into the room, and Sansa blinked up at her, sighing as she set the shirt down in her lap. So that was where her husband had gone.

"Shae," she said softly. "Something the matter?"

Shae cocked her head. "What are you doing?" she asked, instead of answering, and nodded down to the pile of clothes in Sansa's lap.

Sansa shrugged her shoulders. "I am his wife," she said, and hated the possessive wording of that phrase, as if she had ever been a true wife to her husband. Her husband, who had spent weeks down in the Black Cells while she had been running off to Dorne and now Margaery was gone, run off to Highgarden... "Is this not one of my duties?"

Shae raised a brow. "I've always attended to that in the past. You don't need to..."

"Always?" Sansa interrupted, and Shae blinked at her. "You've not been in King's Landing any longer than I."

And besides, the shirts looked as though they had never been touched.

Shae lifted her chin, closing the door behind her and walking forward to sit on the bed beside Sansa. Slowly, she reached out, taking the clothing and needle from Sansa's hands. "Sansa, do you want to talk about it?"

Sansa shook her head, studiously not looking at the other woman. "Talk about what?" she asked, though she knew damn well what.

Shae had known the truth about her feelings for Margaery nearly from the beginning, despite her harsh words to the other woman a moment ago, and she was constantly doing this. Trying to be understanding as if their situations were the same.

If anyone found out that Tyrion was fucking Shae despite his marriage, Sansa would be made into the woman who could not keep her husband's attentions, as if she had ever wanted them, and Tyrion would be seen as well within his rights to fuck another woman, especially a servant. Cersei may be annoyed, since she didn't like her brother's philandering, but there would be nothing wrong with what he was doing, all the same.

If anyone found out that Sansa was fucking Margaery, they could both lose their heads, if Joffrey decided to be kind.

Shae stared at her. "What's on your mind," she said calmly, eying Sansa with wariness, now, and Sansa had a brief moment's flicker of the fortune teller they had met in Flea Bottom, she and Margaery, who had seen so much of her.

She had been foreign, as well.

Sansa pulled the shirt back from Shae. "There's nothing on my mind," she said pointedly, but Shae was clearly not convinced by the words.

"Sansa."

Sansa lowered her head, studying the threads coming undone on her husband's favorite shirt. "I said there was nothing on my mind, Shae," she said, and winced at how sharply the words emerged.

Shae was silent for several long moments, before she reached out, squeezing Sansa's shoulder. Sansa flinched away, and Shae snatched her hand back.

"Besides," Sansa muttered, shoving the needle through an errant stitch, "Don't you have duties to my husband to perform, more than you do to me?"

Silence. And then, the soft treading of footsteps and Sansa didn't remember to breathe again until the door had shut behind the other woman.

She reached up, brushing at the single tear leaking out of her eye, and sniffed stubbornly.

This shirt would not mend itself, after all, and Sansa could convince herself that she was glad of the isolation.

Glad that Tyrion and Shae had gone, though they were no doubt standing in the other room now, talking about her. Worrying about her.

Sansa rolled her eyes. She had survived this long in King's Landing without anyone to worry about her. The thought that they were doing so now chafed.

She shook her head, turning her attention back to the shirt. She was hardly satisfied, but then, it had been some time since Sansa had found herself sewing.

She flushed at that thought, for her time had been, until recently, caught up in less clandestine matters.

"My lady?" a voice asked, and Sansa lifted her head, surprised at the sight of the septa standing in the middle of her chambers. She had not even noticed the woman walk in.

A cold shiver shot down her spine, and she thought of what the Seven Pointed Star said about what she and Margaery were doing together, in the privacy of their beds.

She swallowed. "Yes?" she asked, for the woman did not look familiar, and the fear that had until now not reared its head in some time had her shivering, despite the warm heat.

The septa smiled gently, stepping a little further into her chambers. Sansa could see Shae, skulking in the hallway behind the septa, and she looked almost as nervous as Sansa felt. Sansa only hoped she herself was doing a better job of hiding it, but then, Lord Baelish had told her she had a terrible lying face, and she doubted she had gotten better at it since then.

"Prince Tommen, my lady. He asked if you might not be willing to go out into the gardens with him. He thinks Ser Pounce could use the fresh air."

And so could Prince Tommen, though few of his attendants would allow him outside without a companion, Sansa knew.

It was strange, she thought idly; before Margaery had entered her life, she had felt some amount of affection for the boy. Had idly dreamed about what it would be like to marry him, rather than Joffrey.

But she had never pitied him before.

She smiled, standing to her feet. "Of course," she said, and then blinked, remembering the shirt she was now wadding up in her hands. "I must finish this, of course," she said, holding it up. "But when I am done I should be glad to."

The septa smiled; it almost looked genuine. "I shall inform His Grace," she said, "To expect you."

Sansa nodded. "Thank you," she said, and stayed on her feet until the septa had gone. When she was, Sansa couldn't help but let out a breath of relief.

In the doorway, Shae eyed her for several moments, before leaving and shutting the door behind her.

Sansa took her time with the shirt. When she was finished, she was almost happy with it, and Sansa clambered to her feet, unthinking as she went to return it to her husband.

It was ironic, she supposed, that she knew without a doubt that Shae and her lord husband slept together, and yet, had never seen them do anything beyond kissing and staring across the room at one another.

It was quite a different experience, to walk in on her husband and her lady in the midst of their lovemaking, and Sansa felt her face flush as red as the beets which Prince Tommen so hated.

Tyrion let out a startled noise as he glanced up and met Sansa's eyes, and Sansa flushed harder, glancing up at the ceiling in lieu of her husband.

Shae glanced up, but did not look quite as embarrassed to have been caught as Tyrion.

"I..." Tyrion looked to be blushing, as well, and Sansa wanted to roll her eyes then, but couldn't quite manage it.

"There," she said, stepping forward and holding the shirt out to Tyrion, not daring to look in Shae's direction, where the other woman lounged naked on her husband's bed. "That's done, then. I'm...going to find the Prince Tommen. One of his septas sent looking for me."

Tyrion squinted at her. "Ah...thank you, Lady Sansa." Then he shook his head, seeming to forget his own embarrassment for a moment as a question struck him. "Tommen?"

Clearly, he hadn't known they were interacting at all.

Sansa forced a small smile, swallowing. "Yes," she said idly. "We are good friends, these days."

And then she stumbled out of the room and shut the door before her husband could ask her more about that.

As she made her way out of the Tower of the Hand, Sansa couldn't help but think that, were Margaery here, this would be the time that she made her way to the Maidenvault.

The thought ached, especially in the knowledge of what she had walked in on Tyrion and Shae doing.


	254. MARGAERY

"A toast!" Alerie called, standing to her feet and clinking her fork against her wine glass until the feasting hall had fallen silent. She turned, beaming at Margaery and Loras, where they sat at the head of the table like foreign visitors.

Margaery's smile faded a little at that, and she took another sip of her wine before lifting it.

"To my dear children, come to grace us with their dearly missed presence once more." She swallowed, and for a moment, Margaery thought her mother was going to start crying then and there, in front of half the Reach lords' wives.

She flushed, moved as if to stand, but Loras reached out, wrapping his hand around Margaery's wrist and holding it down.

Margaery glanced at him, and he shook his head.

"May you have a wonderful respite, now that you are home," Leonette said, and Margaery forced herself to smile.

The guests cheered and lifted their glasses, and the drinking began.

And the Dornish might have had the best wine in Westeros, but the Reach knew how to drink it better than any Lannister, Margaery couldn't help but think, as she reached out and poured her own second glass.

Beside her, her brother was picking at the chicken on his plate, but he looked far less moody than he might have done in King's Landing. A servant Margaery thought looked vaguely familiar stepped forward, eying Loras openly as he poured for the other man.

Loras' eyes grazed over his form, and he stabbed his chicken a little more vehemently when the boy had moved away.

Margaery sighed, taking another sip of her glass and turning at her name.

"How long do you think you will be staying?" Alerie asked, and Margaery hated the hope in her mother's voice.

Margaery shook her head. "We just wanted to see how our dear brother was doing," she said, reaching out to her other side and taking Willas' hand in her own, squeezing it. "The King will expect me home soon enough, but he will not embarrass himself before the court by calling me home."

And, she didn't mention, it would not go well for her if he did.

Alerie nodded. "I wish you might stay until the Harvest Festival," she said, and Margaery laughed awkwardly, took another sip of her wine, glancing around.

"No wine for you," Margaery said, stealing the glass out of Leonette's hands and pouring it into her half empty glass.

Leonette's lower lip jutted out. "I wasn't going to..."

"Hmm," Margaery said, taking another gulp. She was just drunk enough to say her next words: "I'm sure you weren't."

She knew she was going to regret this in the morning. She'd not had more than one glass of wine per supper, if that, in all of the time she'd been married to Joffrey; she'd known it would be dangerous to lower her inhibitions before her husband the day she'd had her first moment alone with him.

Still, Margaery wanted to get drunk. She was home, with her family once more, and she could regret it in the morning.

"You're going to make a wonderful mother, you know," she informed Leonette proudly, reaching out to caress the other woman's stomach. Leonette rolled her eyes. "You are," Margaery insisted. "You taught Sansa how to play the harp. That was very good."

Margaery had certainly appreciated it.

Leonette raised an eyebrow. "So that makes me entitled to have children, then? Teaching Sansa Stark how to play an instrument?"

Margaery grinned. "Very. I don't even remember how to play the harp and I'm to be a mother, one day." Her face darkened. "Anyway. When am I going to be an aunt?"

Leonette rolled her eyes. "Some months still," she promised Margaery, rubbing at her stomach.

Margaery smiled at her. "Well, I'm happy for you," she said, and downed the rest of the wine in her glass.

The feast was wonderful, it truly was. The music, the food, all of it far finer than what she had eaten in King's Landing, of late. Or, at least, better to Margaery.

Still, she couldn't help but feel that something was missing, something she had never appreciated before, when she was younger and still called Highgarden her true home.

So she kept drinking.

She supposed she wasn't the only one to do so, when she glanced over at Loras some time before the meal was quite over, and saw that he was downing wine as steadily as her now, staring openly at the boy pouring for him.

The Reach lords still remaining in the Reach came over to pay their respects to their Queen, and Margaery found herself accepting gifts she was not even looking at as she set them aside, and the same from the ladies whose husbands had gone to fight alongside Garlan in the Iron Islands.

Lady Tarly, when she approached Margaery, looked almost nervous, but that was all that Margaery thought of the matter.

She had come home to escape court, after all, not to hold it here in Highgarden.

And the wine certainly helped with that. The servants had been ordered to let it flow freely all night, and they had certainly abided by those orders, for some time after midnight, when many of the guests had gone, Margaery thought she was beginning to get woozy.

Woozy. Good word, that one.

And then it made her snort, for soon she was thinking of Sansa, drunk for what Margaery very much thought had been the first time.

"Well, I'll be going," she heard Leonette say at her shoulder, and Margaery reached out to the woman.

"No, stay!" she said, and winced a little at how loud her voice was. "Come on, it's not every day I get to celebrate a new mother!"

Leonette smiled patiently, extracting herself. "Hmm," she said. "I think we'll celebrate tomorrow evening when you've woken, dear heart." And then she was gone, and far too sober as she left.

"Ah, only the fun guests remain still," she heard Loras saying at her shoulder, and for some reason she couldn't quite name, that was the funniest thing she'd heard anyone say that night.

She laughed until she felt a hand pounding on her shoulder, and glared at the smirking Luthor, who had done so, until the smirk slowly began to fall. He didn't much look guilty about it, though.

"Oh, Loras," Olene chided. "Come now. Just because us ladies cannot afford to drink while we're with child? For shame."

Luthor raised a brow in her direction. "You don't look pregnant to me," he pointed out.

Olene rolled her eyes. "Well, and such a good eye you have, Luthor," she teased him, taking another sip of her wine.

"Do you remember..." Loras interrupted whatever embarrassing tale he hoped to regale what remained of the court, all of whom had somehow ended up around their table, to snort into his wine, and Margaery rolled her eyes.

"Perhaps my brother is too drunk to remember it," she muttered, and that just sent her brother into another fit of snorting.

He held out a hand. "No, no, you're not getting out of this one, sweet sister," he said, and took another sip of his wine to steady himself, before turning back to his captive audience. "Do you remember when Margaery was so convinced that she could be just as good a knight as I was? When she turned twelve and forced me into that...dreadful tourney she made up, and you, Willas, you had to play the King."

Willas smiled, glancing guiltily in Margaery's direction even as he did so. "Ah, yes, when Margaery called herself Ser Margaery the Brave."

There was a chorus of laughter from the other nobles, and Margaery snorted.

"Just because I didn't know that ladies couldn't be 'sers'..."

"We know one who thinks they can," Loras said, and his voice darkened with the words. Margaery glanced at her brother worriedly.

She knew that he had accepted that Brienne had not killed Renly, that her story, however fanciful, must have been true to some extent, for her to be willing to tell it to Renly's lover.

But she certainly didn't want to have that conversation tonight, at what was meant to be a happy feast.

"And I refused to wear armor because of that bravery," she said very seriously to turn the tide of the conversation back, grinning and taking a large gulp of her wine.

Loras smirked. "See?" he asked, turning to their mother. "Her bruises were all her fault, she even admits it."

Alerie looked somewhere between horrified and amused, and very, very drunk. Margaery wondered if she had not drank since her husband had gone to King's Landing. "You were terrible children, between the two of you," she said. "I can't imagine having you both wreaking havoc in King's Landing. I'm rather relieved you've left it alone for a little."

Yes, so was Margaery.

"Do you remember when I trounced her with a sword?" Loras asked, and Margaery was almost tempted to make a snide comment about that, but she didn't think she was drunk enough to get away with it when her mother was standing right there.

"And I crowned her the Queen of Love and Beauty after she toppled you onto your ass," Willas said, rising to her defense, and Margaery laughed, along with half the courtiers.

"Oh-ho, the truth at last," she said, giving Loras a scorching look.

Loras rolled his eyes. "Only because I felt bad after I scraped your knee with that stick that we were pretending was a lance."

Margaery snorted, leaning forward. "You were pretending, dear brother, that that piece of driftwood was a lance. My...stick was much larger than yours."

Willas coughed into his wine.

Loras raised a brow. "Oh?" he asked, a conspiratorial smirk on his face. "Do you want to play that game?"

"Children," Talla Tarly muttered into her tea, but she was smiling as she said it. Margaery was quite sure that she had spiked the tea on purpose, after her lady mother had left. Or, at the very least, knew it to be spiked.

Of course, they'd all assured their guardians that they would be to bed in a timely manner, and not to worry, they would drink nothing more.

In any case, she was not much younger than Margaery herself, and should hardly be calling her a child.

Still, best embrace it, Margaery thought, taking another long drink of her wine.

"I think we both know I'd win," Margaery pointed out, slamming her glass down ont hte low table.

Loras stood to his feet, holding his hand out to her. "Care to put that challenge to the test?" he asked her, and Margaery smirked, snapping her fingers at the harpists playing in the corner of the hall.

"Something festive," she called to them. "You sound like a dirge."

Gods, she sounded like her grandmother.

The harpists grinned at each other, and then Loras was leading Margaery out into the middle of the hall, between the tables.

They paused as the music began, something fast paced that Margaery thought she remembered, though she couldn’t put a name to it, just now. Still, she thought she should have been able to, and Margaery furrowed her brow as she let Loras spin her.

Their little crowd of courtiers was cheering, and then Loras was spinning Margaery away from her, attempting to woo the crowd on his own, and oh yes, this was definitely going to be a challenge that the young maids and lords of the Reach whose fathers were out fighting for them would remember, Margaery thought with a grin, lowering her hands to her sides and scraping her legs along the floor of the feasting hall.

She heard someone - she thought it might have been Talla - cheering her on, and Margaery smirked, glancing pointedly at her brother as she pivoted again, rushed toward him a little too quickly.

He caught her, raising an eyebrow and smirking, and Margaery rolled her eyes, pushing away as gracefully as she could manage in her current state, and watching his attempt at wooing the crowd once more, laughing all the while.

It had been so long since she'd had fun, Margaery thought. Real fun, and been carefree enough not to feel guilty for it.

She glanced up, and saw Willas, sitting in his chair with a solemn look on his face as he regarded her, and Margaery didn't want to notice that face anymore, crouched down on one leg before extending the other out in front of her, glancing at Loras out of the corner of her eye before she _moved_.

It felt like flying, for several moments, and then she was skidding to a halt again, standing and curtseying to the crowd in one fluid motion. She didn't think she quite managed the elegance she could manage sober, but it felt far more fun this way.

She got applause, and turned to look at Loras, to watch as he attempted to show her work up.

And then her brother was fairly leaping through the air, and Margaery gaped as he spun around her and caught her up in the movement. She let out a startled yelp as her feet were no longer touching the ground, and then she was moving through the air again, until she landed in Loras' arms, head less than a hand's length from the floor.

Their audience cheered excitedly, and Loras pulled Margaery to her feet, bowed to their crowd.

"Well, you may be the Queen of Love and Beauty," she heard Rickard exclaim, "But I think your brother has you beat as King of Dance and Frolics."

Margaery turned, winking at the man. "Well, the latter was never in any doubt," she teased, and Luthor snorted so hard he nearly dropped his wine glass.

Loras rolled his eyes, grabbing his sister's arm and helping her back to the tables. She sat on the end of one, between Megga's brother Rickard and Olene, who was still chugging at the wine. She took the glass from the other woman, who pouted, and drank some down herself.

"I hear your sister is soon to be wed," she told Olenna, who glanced up at her with glazed eyes.

"Oh, yes," she said, smirking. "They have been saying that for ever so long a time. I don't think the Queen will be rid of her soon though, do you?" and she batted her eyelashes.

Margaery rolled her eyes, swatting at the other girl. "I must admit, she's waxed poetic about this lover of hers for so long I am beginning to wonder if he is the Father himself. The Father? No, that's rather forbidding, actually." She blinked at Olene. "Is he like the Father?"

Olene snorted. "I'm surprised you managed that dance, Your Grace," she teased, and Margaery snorted, too.

"Yes, well," she reached out towards thin air, "Meredyth insisted on spending the evening with her mother, and sober. For shame."

Olene's lips pulled up into tittering laughter. "Indeed," she said. "So. Is my sister to be married soon?"

Margaery licked her lips. "I don't suppose she's written anything about it to you?" she asked. Olene shrugged. "Very well." She reached out, bobbing Olene on the nose. "You can rest assured that it won't be too long, now."

Olene's eyes widened. "You haven't fallen out with each other, have you?" she demanded, and, tipsy as she was, Margaery hastened to assure the other girl.

"No, of course not," she said. "Only, I think she really likes this one, and I'd like to see her happy."

Olene's face fell. "Is King's Landing really so horrible?" she asked, and Margaery reached out for her wine glass again, downing the rest of it.

"Where are the servants?" she called out loudly. "I thought we gave orders that our glasses were never to run empty!"

Luther snorted, glancing at one of the serving boys. "Ah, you heard your Queen!" he called, and they erupted into laughter again, the servants looking just as amused as they, save for the one who had yet to take his eyes off of Loras.

Margaery thought he looked somewhat familiar. Perhaps they had fucked before, she thought, and found herself rather pleased at the thought. It might just pull her brother out of the rut he appeared to have fallen into with that Olyvar.

"All right, I think that might be enough wine for you lot," she heard someone saying, and then Willas was pulling a half empty glass out of her hands, and she blinked at him in betrayal.

"Willas!" she heard Loras call, just as scandalized as she felt. "We come all of this way to see you, and this is how you repay us?"

Her brother, sitting in front of Margaery now, rolled his eyes. "Come on," he told her. "The feast was over at least two hours ago."

The crowd that'd collected around their table, which had turned into a complete mess at this point, groaned at the words, but none protested.

Margaery let him pull her to her feet without a fuss, groaning a little at the same time that he did, and then Margaery's eyes widened where they stared down at the golden cane she'd had commissioned for her brother on his last nameday, as she realized what she was allowing him to do, and she pulled abruptly away from him, swaying slightly.

"I've got it, darling," she said, focusing on standing upright.

Willas gave her an unimpressed look, though he was leaning heavily on that cane, she couldn't help but notice. "I'm not going to break into pieces, you know," he told her, "just because my lightweight sister needs help standing."

Margaery pouted at him. "I'm not a lightweight," she insisted, and his lips quirked into a smile.

"Sure, Margy," he said. "Come on, then."

She saw the others dispersing around them, saw Loras, with his arm around the waist of that serving boy, and Margaery thought perhaps it wasn't worth putting up a fight to go to bed, just now.

She was rather sleepy, come to think of it.

She let Willas lead her down the hall, his free hand in hers, and though their progression was slow, she couldn't help but think that this was almost...rather nice.

Just being here, walking alongside her brother once more.

"Willas," Margaery moaned, leaning against her brother and nearly throwing them both into the wall. She noticed that his knuckles were white around his cane, but he didn't pull away and let her fall.

That was her brother, and if Cersei Lannister had killed him, she would have seen all of King's Landing burn for it.

Well, all of it save for Sansa, of course, she thought idly, before choking the thought down.

"Margaery, you're whining," Willas chastised, amusement coloring his tone, as he helped her stand upright once more.

Margaery blinked several times at him. "No I'm not," she informed him. "I am the Queen. The Queen doesn't whine."

"Hmm," Willas mused. "And I suppose the Queen doesn't shit or fart, either?"

Margaery sent him a winning smile. "See, you're learning. If Loras had his way, I wouldn't even be the Queen, and you wouldn't all have to bow and scrape for me at all."

Willas raised a brow. "Have we been bowing and scraping to you since you arrived and I simply didn't notice?"

Margaery's smile widened. "Such is the power of my influence," she informed him, and Willas rolled his eyes.

There was something...off about his expression, and somehow she didn't think it had to do with the fact that her poor brother was helping support a sister who could barely stand.

She squinted at him, and then she could do nothing but stare at him. At the craggy lines of his face, which had somehow grown so much older and so much less amused since the last time she had seen him. At the strain he placed upon that damn cane, so much harder than she remembered him doing in the past.

Mother had said that was because of the poisoning, but a part of Margaery that was suddenly leaping to the forefront wasn't so sure.

"Willas," she said seriously, laying her hand on her brother's chest. "I'm sorry. Please forgive me."

Willas blinked at her. "Sorry?" he echoed blankly, giving her a lopsided smile that didn't quite cover the loneliness in his eyes. "For what?"

Margaery shook her head. "I...I can't tell you. Grandmother forbade me from talking about anything important to you boys again; Loras so royally fucked it up the last time, after all."

Willas looked unimpressed with her words. "And when I have ever told anyone your secrets?" he asked her, and Margaery cocked her head, because, while she wasn't certain of much with the fog currently laying over her brain, she was quite certain of that.

Still, there was some reason she wasn't supposed to tell. Something about Loras and a whore...

"About Cersei," she found herself babbling, and once the words were out, they wouldn't stop. "You married her because of me, and I'm sorry you had to."

Her brother made a strangled noise in the back of his throat, and then he was reaching out to touch her face, and Margaery flinched away.

It was an instinctive reaction, and one Margaery knew she should have done a better job of hiding. And she would have done, if this were Joffrey and she were only pretending to be drunk.

She'd once been so good at being drunk, had so much fun convincing others she was far drunker than she was because she could handle her liquor, and now here she was, piss poor at it because she hadn't had a stiff drink since she'd realized how in control she would need to be, to marry Joffrey Baratheon.

She shook her head, made to speak, but Willas beat her to it.

"I would gladly marry her a thousand times," Willas told her, "if it meant giving you some relief there."

Margaery shook her head. "No," she said. "No, you don't understand."

Willas' eyes were kind. In her current state, she couldn't make out more than that, but Margaery could see well enough how kind his eyes were as he took her by the hand.

"I think it's time we put you to bed, dear sister," he told her, and Margaery shook her head, lower lip jutting out into a pout.

"Not tired," she informed him.

Willas smiled in the sort of way that had always convinced her he would make a good parent. She had thought he would make a good husband, too; to someone like Sansa, not to someone like Cersei.

"I think you've rather taken over that position, Sister," her brother teased, and Margaery blinked, hadn't realized she'd spoken the words aloud.

"Huh?" And then she realized what her brother was implying, and blushed. "Who told you?" She was going to kill Loras for that.

Willas raised a brow. "Half your letters in the past months have been about Sansa Stark. What other proof did I need?"

Margaery blinked dazedly at him, and Willas chuckled, reaching out and mussing her hair.

"Let's get you to sleep, Margy, eh?" he asked, and Margaery blinked, realizing a moment later where she was.

"We're in my rooms!" she said, a little too excitedly, and Willas snorted.

"Yes, we are, mindless," he teased her, and led her over to the bed, sitting her down on it. "Can you handle your shoes or must I embarrass you by going to find Merry to help with that?"

Margaery rolled her eyes, bending over and moaning. "I...I got 'em," she said, pulling at the laces and kicking until they came off. She glanced up triumphantly, though Willas looked slightly less impressed than her foggy mind had expected him to be.

He grabbed her legs, pulled at them a little, and even in Margaery's drunken state she knew to be a little less limp than she would have been if Loras was putting her to bed, climbed under the covers with Willas only needing to pull them over her.

She felt her brother reaching out to maneuver her, and then he groaned, muttering something about her weighing stones. "Come on, Margy," he coaxed, "On your side."

Margaery groaned, turning on her side without thinking about it, letting her brother arrange her pillows around her to ensure that she stayed there.

She felt a kiss pressed against her forehead before Margaery didn't notice much of anything more.


	255. MARGAERY

The room was spinning and far too bright when Margaery woke. She blinked, remembered the partying they had done, long into the previous night. The night she had finally come home.

"Oh gods," Margaery muttered, reaching up and rubbing at her forehead. "Fuck."

"The mouth on her," a voice muttered to her left, and Margaery blinked awake, realized that Willas was sitting in a chair beside her bed, an open book in his hands, though he was looking at her in lieu of it.

Margaery groaned. "Have you been there all night?"

Her brother stood to his feet, and she could hear the stomp-tread of his irregular footsteps as he made his way toward her, slow but steady enough that she did not open her eyes, and then he was tilting her head up, and Margaery squeezed her eyes shut at the first hint of bright light before her brother was pressing a glass of refreshingly cold water to her lips.

She took the glass from her brother, downing the rest of it before she dared to open her eyes. Her head was still pounding, but she supposed she felt a little less sick. Marginally.

Whatever the expression on her face, it seemed to amuse Willas, for he set the glass aside, blissfully empty, with another smirk.

"Feeling better?" he asked her. "I'm sure I can find a maester to give you something for it." His face clouded. "They're always around, these days."

Margaery tried not to think too hard about that, about the reason she was here. Of course they were always around.

"Quieter," she muttered, and Willas smirked.

"Is this better?"

"I'm supposed to be here to take care of you," Margaery said belligerently, half rising out of the bed and then groaning. "Not the other way around."

Willas gave her an unimpressed look, cheek twitching. "Well, you can feed me some of the soup I've had the servants make for you later."

Margaery groaned, head flopping back down onto the pillow. The soup he was referring to, made special by Willas' squire was a wonderful hangover cure.

Even if it was disgusting. And made mostly out of cabbage juice and sugar.

"Margaery," she heard the hesitance in her brother's voice, the strain that was from standing on his leg after spending the night in an uncomfortable chair, and Margaery swallowed, not quite ready to have this conversation. She peeked an eye open, glancing up at him.

"Yes?"

He gave her a knowing look. "Perhaps after the soup," he suggested, and she beamed. She was certain she could find something to distract him with by then, even if it meant drinking that horrible soup down.

"Read to me?" she asked, and Willas gave her a knowing look before walking back over to his chair, picking up the book he'd abandoned on it.

She watched him walk, eyes never leaving his leg as he shuffled along, the steps awkward, and she felt another stab of annoyance at herself.

That was not why she had come here, after all. To make her brother worry, and yet it seemed that was all he was doing so far.

She listened with her eyes closed, waiting for the soup to come. The book sounded familiar, but was not one she'd read in a while. There was little time for her to be reading while she was attending to her duties as Queen, after all, and even then, she usually kept to books that she thought would be helpful with managing Joffrey.

A book about breeding horses certainly wasn't going to help with that. Well, not unless she was trying to come up with some idea to entice her husband into sex.

Her brother knew to read slowly and quietly, but his words grated against eardrums nonetheless, and by the time Meredyth came stumbling into her chambers with a rather large bowl that smelled horrifically, Margaery was almost relieved.

"Soup, Your Grace," Meredyth chirped as she walked inside, and Margaery sat up a little too quickly, her head spinning, as Meredyth brought the soup to her in bed. Willas kept going as Meredyth walked, and when he got to a particularly...graphic description, Meredyth turned around to glare at him.

Margaery snorted, picking up the wooden spoon Meredyth handed her and setting to work on the soup in her lap.

"Willas Tyrell!" Meredyth snapped, and Margaery's brother flushed.

"It's not meant to..." he started, and Margaery took pity on her brother, from the way he was blushing now.

"Now, Meredyth," she chastised, "He's reading about horses, and any silly girl walking in right in the middle of the chapter or not ought to realize that."

Meredyth turned back to her lady, dipping her head. "Of course," she said, though her lips had pulled into a small smirk.

Margaery knew what she had been doing, of course, teasing poor Willas like that.

Garlan had once been the great love of every young maiden who made her way into Highgarden, once he had outgrown his childish fat, but Willas was the heir of Highgarden now, and Margaery supposed that he was pretty enough, besides.

He was also kind, and Margaery didn't doubt that had at least some bearing in the minds of ladies who had spent any amount of time in King's Landing.

"Feeling better?" Meredyth asked nastily, and Margaery rolled her eyes.

"Just peachy," she muttered, and Meredyth giggled. Margaery ground her teeth. "And how is your mother?"

Meredyth shrugged, moving to grab some clothes out of Margaery's wardrobe for her. Margaery had not even realized that the other girl had packed her things away, last night.

Of course, she'd come in drunk at some point long after midnight, but she would have thought Meredyth would have gone to stay with her mother immediately after leaving the banquet.

Perhaps she understood a bit of what Margaery herself felt, having returned to a home that no longer felt quite like her own.

Meredyth's smile was only slightly strained. "She was very glad to see me, Your Grace," she said, and Margaery winced at the addition of that title.

Willas, too, looked sympathetic, when Margaery glanced his way. "But you were perhaps not as excited to see her?"

Meredyth shrugged. "I was," she said, "before she started mentioning betrothals."

Margaery pursed her lips to keep from smiling. It wasn't hard, with the headache still ravaging her. "I'm sure she's just getting ahead of herself, Merry," she said, reaching out and clasping the younger woman's hand. "You know how she can get."

She knew that many of her ladies were still quite young to be thinking of marriage, Meredyth included, yet it was a specter which hung forever over their heads, especially with their lady being a queen. That would gain the notice of the most eligible of bachelors, especially in the Reach, and no doubt Meredyth's mother had been inundated with requests since Meredyth had left for King's Landing.

Meredyth forced a smile. "Of course," she said. "And she was very glad to see me. She's made another quilt for me, to take back to King's Landing. It is rather cold for us Reach ladies there, even if our blood runs hot," she said, sending Margaery a wink.

Margaery did smile, then. "Gods, I wish I'd never have told you that," she said, and Willas, the fiend, of course perked up, then.

"Told her what?" he asked, and Meredyth glanced only once at Margaery, just long enough to see her avidly shaking her head, before she blurted out the answer.

"Oh, when your sweet sister wanted to make a good first impression on the King, she told him that the clothing she wore didn't make her cold at all because we Reach girls' blood runs quite hot."

And then Meredyth laughed again, because Margaery could remember returning triumphantly back to her chambers in the Maidenvault after that little dinner, telling the girls all about the shrew Cersei Lannister.

Willas, however, wasn't smiling. His eye flicked between Margaery and Meredyth, and he opened his mouth to speak-

The door flew open, and a young maid walked inside, curtseying with wide eyes when she saw Margaery.

Margaery waved a hand. "It's all right, Kasandra," she admonished the girl. "I'm still the woman you knew."

Kasandra's lips twitched. "The girl I knew, Your Grace," she teased, ignoring Margaery's mock affront, before turning to Willas. "Maester Lomys wishes to remind you that you have an appointment this morning, my lord, and are not in your chambers."

Willas grimaced. "So I'm not," he said, standing laboriously to his feet.

Margaery eyed his stiff stance, the grimace, and turned to Kasandra, another flash of guilt running through her, that her brother had remained at her bedside all night. "Tell Maester Lomys that he may see to my brother here," she told Kasandra.

The girl hesitated, and then, "He will want to see your brother on the bed, Your Grace," she said, and Margaery stopped smiling, then.

"And so he shall," she gritted out. "Now, go and find him."

Kasandra dipped her head, and left, shutting the door quietly behind her.

Margaery glanced at her brother. "Meredyth," she said, not looking at the girl, "Help my brother Willas onto the bed, will you?"

Willas looked at her in alarm. "Margaery," he started, "I'm fine."

Margaery shook her head. "Meredyth."

The girl glanced between the two of them, before walking over to Willas, taking the arm not now wrapped around his cane and laying it over her shoulder. Willas shot Margaery a look, but limped along beside Meredyth, features pulled tight, face pale.

Meredyth swallowed, helping him down onto the bed beside Margaery, and Margaery handed the girl her empty bowl, which the girl then lay on Margaery's bedside table, before Margaery reached out and squeezed Willas' hand.

"You should have gone back to your bed last night, brother," she chastised him. "It would have been far more comfortable than that dusty wooden chair."

Willas sent her a small smile. "I brushed the chair off, before I sat on it," he insisted, and Margaery swatted at him.

"Even still," she said, voice going soft, and Willas squeezed her hand, brought it to his lips and kissed it.

Margaery swallowed hard. She supposed she hadn't realized, not even when she induced Sansa to speak against Oberyn at the trial because of it, how close she had come to losing her brother. How close her brother had come to death, and without Margaery ever seeing him again.

"You need to be more careful," she heard herself saying, though those didn't sound like her words, and Willas' smile was gentle.

"So do you," he said, and Margaery's eyes widened at that, but she didn't have the chance to ask what in the seven hells her brother meant, before the door to her chambers propped open and old Maester Lomys shuffled inside, glancing between the two of them before bowing deeply to Margaery.

"Your Grace," he said, the words coughed out of his old frame. "My lord."

Willas' lips quirked in amusement. "I've told you a thousand times, Lomys, it's just Willas."

The old man stood tall, then. "Yes, of course, my lord," he said, walking further into the room and then around to Willas' side of the bed.

"Meredyth, you can go," Margaery told her maid, not taking her eyes off her brother.

Meredyth dropped into a little curtsey before disappearing, and Margaery watched her go dispassionately as Maester Lomys undid the first few fastens of her brother's shirt before listening to his heartbeat.

And then he was checking her brother over for other things, asking him if he'd been sick lately and if so, what was the quantity and color, if he'd had a hard time holding his liquor the night before or any issues in going to the bathroom.

Willas rattled the answers off easily enough, not at all bothered to be discussing such things in front of Margaery, for he'd spent a lifetime - far too long, at the very least - at the hands of maesters, and long since learned not to be embarrassed over it.

Still, Margaery's eyes narrowed, and by the time the maester was finished with his questions and his examination, which included taking Margaery's empty bowl full of Willas' spit, for testing.

And that was the last straw, for Margaery knew quite well what that meant. Maester Lomys would be checking for poison in that spit, and she was almost surprised he had not asked for a sample of blood, as well.

"How is he?" Margaery demanded, well aware of Maester Lomys' rambling explanations and furrowed brows, considering every avenue before he bothered to share it with a worried family.

It made her wonder why he'd told her mother of the poison's origins, in Dorne, if he was not absolutely sure, but then, Margaery supposed he would have brought in maesters from the Citadel for something so important.

Trust them to fuck it up.

"His lordship is on the way to a rapid recovery. The recovery is simply...slow," the maester assured her, and Margaery closed her eyes in relief, despite the odd explanation, for Maester Lomys had ever been so.

Her mother, when dealing with less stressful medical issues, liked to say that it was because Lomys had almost reached one hundred summers. At which point Olenna would often interrupt, muttering that this was nonsense.

" _I can remember he was just as batty when he was delivering my babies_ ," she would mutter, and Margaery would try not to laugh at the words.

Gods, she wished her grandmother had agreed to come along.

She had known, of course she had, that Willas was getting better. That he was recovering, he really was, but to hear it from the mouth of a maester rather than her grandmother was a far greater reassurance.

Of course, her grandmother was back in King's Landing now, with Cersei. It seemed that no Tyrell would ever be free of the wretched woman, not truly.

"Good," Margaery said, crossing her arms. "And I think I know what shall help him to recover even further."

Willas raised an eyebrow at her, but she merely held out a hand, wiggling it until her brother took it.

She waited patiently as he climbed to his feet, Maester Lomys holding out his cane without being asked. Willas took it in one hand and Margaery in the other, not protesting this time as she led him down the hall at a pace Maester Lomys would have perhaps been more comfortable with.

She glanced back at the old man, who was still waiting in her chambers, and gave him a small smile. "You're dismissed, Maester Lomys, that wasn't an invitation," she told him, and the old man blinked wearily at her before gathering up the bowl of spit and hobbling along behind them and out of her chambers.

Meredyth was waiting out in the hallway, biting her nails, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheeks, resolving that she was going to have to have a conversation with Lady Crane, if this was the reaction from it.

"Come along, Meredyth," she told the girl, and Meredyth was all too happy to comply.

"Where are we going?" she asked, clearly mindful of Willas' lack of mobility, today.

"Not far," Margaery said, for both Willas' and Meredyth's sake. "In fact, I need you to find four strong young lads and get some torches made. Not a lot of fire, however - we're after the smoke."

Willas raised an eyebrow, and Meredyth blinked at her.

"Uh..."

Margaery winked at them both. "And then come and meet Willas and I in the chambers Cersei Lannister used while she was here. I'm sure you can ask someone where she was staying, but the stench of wickedness should lead you there just as well."

Meredyth's smirk grinned, and she hurried off.

Willas paused, pulling Margaery to a stop with him. "And, uh, what are we doing with torches and Cersei's old chambers?" he asked, pale from what little they'd walked already.

Margaery was resolved not to get drunk again, while she was here.

Still, she managed a grin she didn't quite feel, for her brother's sake. He had always hated her pity. "Why, we're going to fumigate it, of course." She smiled at him. "You didn't think I would actually burn it, did you?"

Willas gaped at her, but she didn't give him time to protest before dragging him along again.

"Margaery..."

"No, no, you're not getting out of this," Margaery said. "I got the idea from Cersei herself, you see, and it was quite cathartic."

Willas just stared at her as if she had grown a second head, but he didn't complain again, and very soon - far too soon for Margaery's liking, considering - they came to the chambers Alerie had shown her.

Meredyth was already there, a torch in her own hand and two more in the hands of the boys who had come with her, looks of bemusement on their faces as the smoke billowed about their heads in thick black clouds.

"Was the Queen Mother sick, Your Grace?" one of them asked, peering nervously into the room.

Margaery grinned, taking the torch from his hand. "Oh, no," she said, "She was quite well." She handed the torch to Willas, who stared at it for several moments before taking it out of Margaery's hand. Margaery's smile widened.

Willas pushed open the door to his lady wife's chambers. "I really don't see how this is supposed to..."

"Gods," Margaery cursed, lifting her sleeve to her nose, "Did no one clean this room after she left?"

For it stank, as badly as the shit in Flea Bottom.

Meredyth grimaced, but didn't cover her nose. "Perhaps she really was sick," she muttered, taking the last torch from the other boy and dismissing him, before passing the torch to Margaery.

Margaery and Willas exchanged glances, before Willas stepped inside, in much the same manner a knight might enter a dragon's den, and Margaery couldn't help but to smile at the comparison.

Her brother held the smoking torch aloft, and Margaery watched as the smoke from his torch curled itself through the air, running along the walls of Cersei's chambers in thin grey pearls.

Margaery wondered, suddenly, if Cersei hadn't just fumigated her father's chambers in the Tower of the Hand because she'd thought he was ill when he died. As she'd told Willas, there was something strangely cathartic about the act, and she found herself spinning in circles alongside Meredyth even as they both began to cough.

Even Willas was smiling now, and that was, truly, why she'd done this in the first place. Well, that and because she really hated the thought of Cersei living in these chambers, even if they were for guests. And they really had stunk, though now they smelled only of smoke.

"What the fuck are you doing?" a familiar voice asked, and Margaery turned, still grinning, to the sight of Loras, standing bleary eyed in the doorway and looking just as hung over as she had felt, not so long ago.

Clearly, he'd not had some cabbage soup.

"What does it look like, brother?" she asked.

Loras frowned at her. "It looks like you're burning the castle down," he quipped, "And I'm sure that's what the guards think, too."

Margaery swore under her breath, for she hadn't thought to warn them. Ah, well. Nothing for it, and the Tyrell children were known for their pranks, after all. They would just have to finish before the guards came to see if there was a fire.

"We're fumigating Cersei's chambers," Willas said pleasantly, waiting for the bemusement to pass over Loras' features before turning back to Margaery. "Tell me, because he doesn't look quite so surprised, is she some sort of demon, my wife?"

"Yes," Loras responded unironically, before Margaery could, snatching the torch from Meredyth's hands and holding it high, and they all devolved into mad giggles, then, that had Alerie even more concerned than the sight of the chambers being fumigated, when she and half a dozen guards walked in on them some time later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Funny story, cabbages and sugar was actually one of the least weird of medieval hangover cures that I found (apart from the part I omitted: rubbing salt and vinegar on your privates, too). Margaery could have eaten some nice, raw eel, instead.


	256. SANSA

"His Grace would like you to have this, my lady," the serving boy said, holding out the ball of yarn to her, and Sansa had to fight down the blush staining her cheeks, for she knew that was a foolish reaction.

Of course, it was a tad bit embarrassing, to be receiving a ball of yarn on behalf of a little boy.

"Actually, he, uh, wants to know if you'll make something out of it for the kittens to wear when winter comes," the serving boy continued, boredly reciting the words without glancing at Sansa's face for her reaction.

"Make something," Sansa repeated slowly.

The boy nodded. "Like a coat for them to wear or something," he said.

Sansa stared at the yarn dubiously. "I don't know how well that would keep them, when winter does come," she said, but the boy just shrugged. "Why not ask his septa to do it?'

The boy shrugged again. "She said it would be a frivolous pursuit, as cats don't need coats," he said. "That's why he's asking you."

Sansa frowned. "That was unnecessarily unkind," she muttered, and didn't care if the boy did take those words back to the woman. She didn't like the thought of that septa coming around her, anyway. "I'll do it," she agreed. "You may tell the Prince that."

The boy gave her a short little bow, and then scampered off, and Sansa found herself as the strange new owner of a purple ball of yarn, sitting and staring at it in the middle of the library.

She'd resorted to the library once more, not for songs or research about a house which would never accept her as its member despite making the very same demand of her, but simply to boredly peruse the library's contents.

So far, she'd found little of interest, and the songs she'd once enjoyed no longer interested her at all.

But here was this ball of yarn.

"Don't you grow tired of it?" a voice asked idly, and then Megga Tyrell was moving forward out of the shadows, and Sansa startled a little at the sight of her. The other girl didn't appear to notice her unease, sinking down into the loveseat beside Sansa. Sansa blinked, clearing her throat and pulling the ball of yarn a little closer to her side.

"Tired of what?" she asked idly, for she could not help but think the other girl was referring to Margaery, how Margaery had grown tired of her and had returned to Highgarden.

Sansa swallowed hard.

"He's a sweet little boy, of course," Megga said, "But then, I don't think I could spend my every spare moment playing with a child whose only interest is in kittens."

Sansa squinted at her. "Have you been following me?" she asked bluntly. She supposed some of Margaery's ladies might have an interest in books, especially with their lady no longer here to keep them much occupied, but she couldn't help but think that Megga Tyrell did not look the bookish type.

Megga smiled at her. "My queen asked me to keep an eye on you," she informed Sansa. "Well, she asked us all to, but the other girls seem quite preoccupied with their own lovers now that attending to the Queen no longer demands so much of their time, so I've taken up the challenge alone." She shrugged.

And that thought rankled, that Margaery had left her here but had the prudence to tell her ladies to spy on Sansa.

"I don't mind," she said softly, not responding to that bit of enlightenment, just yet. Megga raised a brow. "About Tommen, I mean. I've spent my every spare moment in...other activities, of late, and Tommen is a sweet child."

Megga grinned at her, clearly understanding what Sansa had been alluding to, just then. "Have I offended you?" she asked, not sounding particularly sorry.

Sansa squinted at her. "I suppose not," she said, for while it rankled, she supposed there was a part of it that was also comforting, to know that Margaery had been keeping an eye on her. That she cared.

Sansa shook her head. She had been the one to push Margaery away this time, and she shouldn't be offended by Margaery leaving her.

A part of her certainly understood the impulse.

"Why didn't you return to Highgarden with Queen Margaery?" Sansa asked her, a dangerous suspicion arising in her, but Megga merely smiled sadly.

"She thought it best to take as few as possible. And...I have quite a few suitors here," she said. "My father thought it would be best if I remained here and...enticed them."

Sansa swallowed, hating everything about what Megga had just said. "I see."

"I hate it here," Megga blurted out, and Sansa stared at her in surprise. Megga shivered. "I do. When Margaery and Merry were here, it was bearable, and I barely noticed, but...I hate it here. Alla and Alysanne...they're much younger than I." She shook her head. "I'm sorry, that must sound empty headed of me, to complain about this place to you, of all people."

Sansa nodded sympathetically. She could certainly understand the sentiment, after all. The loneliness these tall domed ceilings could cause was something she was more than familiar with, after all.

"If it weren't for Ser Mark, I wouldn't have stayed at all, I suppose."

Sansa raised a brow. "Ser Mark Mullendore?" she asked, and Megga flushed.

"He's one of my suitors," she said. "My father disapproves of him, but...I think he is the only one whom I could imagine myself..." she flushed again.

 _Loving_ , hung in the air.

Sansa flushed without quite realizing why. "Do you?" she asked, and then flushed deeper. "You don't have to answer that," she said. "I realize that we aren't..."

"He wants me to marry him," Megga confessed, which, Sansa reflected, wasn't really an answer at all. "I asked the Queen to give him a new monkey after his was lost during the Battle of Blackwater, and he asked me if he could court me after I gave the monkey to him."

Sansa thought that all very strange, but forced herself to smile. "Does he make you happy?" she asked.

Megga shrugged. "I don't...I don't know," she said. "Do you think he has to?"

Sansa swallowed, thinking of Margaery, thinking of the words Olenna Tyrell had said to her. "I think..." she bit her lip. "I think so, yes."

Megga stared hard at her. "Does Margaery make you happy?" she asked bluntly, and Sansa's eyes widened, glancing around at those words.

"Megga!"

She smiled softly. "So she does," she said, and Sansa shook her head, standing.

"We shouldn't be talking about such things here, out in the open," she said reproachfully, and Megga snorted, getting to her feet and moving so that she stood directly in front of Sansa, their bodies so close they were almost touching.

"Do you know, when Margaery was to be married to Renly, she knew very little about him?" she asked. "Loras and Margaery are so close, and yet, they were hardly raised together. He was sent to Storm's End to serve as a squire for Renly when he was quite young, as a punishment to our house for siding with the Targaryens during the war." She shrugged. "So they rarely saw each other. But...He didn't bother to mention to her, when he plotted with their father, about Renly's...inclinations."

Sansa blinked at her. She hadn't known that, about Loras and Margaery not really being raised together. Well, she supposed she knew it on some level, for the Knight of Flowers was considered a fierce warrior who had not been trained in Highgarden, but she had not put the two together, certainly.

Still, they seemed so close, and she couldn’t help but wonder how he could plan his sister's marriage without even telling her...

"Wait..." Sansa said softly. "Loras knew of Prince Renly's inclinations?" she asked.

Megga smiled at her, but this time, the smile almost pitied. "My dear girl," she said, pulling Sansa back down onto the loveseat and squeezing her hand. "Why do you think he is called the Knight of Flowers?"

Sansa blushed fiercely at that. "I thought...Because of the House..."

Megga snorted, but it was not unkind, somehow. "How sweet," she said. Then, "Anyway, Margaery suspected, and there were certainly enough rumors about it back then, and she had us figure it out. She didn't want to confront Renly directly, because he seemed such a skittish, courtly lover, but she wanted to know what she was getting into."

Sansa nodded, certainly understanding that. She felt abruptly jealous, that she had not had a harem of ladies to send as spies on her prince, back when she had been betrothed to Joffrey.

It might have changed so much.

Megga shrugged. "Anyway, my point is, I suppose, that we ladies are quite good at keeping secrets for Her Grace."

Sansa licked her lips, unable to hold the words back now that they were here. Margaery had known about Loras and still encouraged Sansa's crush. "Lady Rosamund wasn't."

Megga's face darkened. "Because she was a fool," she said. "Even Alla understands the foolishness of turning on our lady."

And that caught Sansa's attention, because it almost sounded like... "What happened to her?" she asked. "Lady Rosamund, I mean. I haven't seen her since..."

Megga smiled, squeezing Sansa's hands. "I would like very much to get to know you better, Lady Sansa," she said, and then clarified, "As friends." Sansa blushed. "Would you be amenable to that? I think we are both lonely here and could use the company, but if you prefer, I could keep spying on you from afar."

Sansa found herself nodding. The other girl was bold and loud, and yet, Sansa couldn't help but think that she was right, that Sansa needed to be with other people who were not men.

All men.

"I would like that," she said, despite the other girl's ominous refusal to discuss Lady Rosamund. She wondered if the girl thought she was being subtle, changing the topic the way she had.

Sansa certainly intended on reopening it, once Margaery returned.

Megga grinned. "I'm so glad to hear it," she said. "Come," she held her hands out, and Sansa took them, hesitantly. "The other ladies are probably having tea and gossiping about Lannisters, just now. You can fill us in."

Sansa blanched. "What?"

Megga's smile faded, but only a little. "Because you're forced to be around them so much," she said. "I'm sure we'd all like to know why Tommen is so damn interested in kittens."

Sansa snorted in spite of herself, glancing over her shoulder. "You are very blunt, for someone who has spent any amount of time in King's Landing, you know."

Megga smirked. "I find it gets me things far faster," she said. "Of course, I'm not the Queen."

Sansa felt a pang, at those words, but she forced herself to smile. "I think the kittens are just a distraction," she said. "Because we're all forced to stay here, and with our beloved King, no less."

Megga stared at her for a moment, features pulled in clear surprise, before she burst out laughing. "There, you see?" she asked. "Isn't it much better?"


	257. MARGAERY

"I'm so tired of receiving nobles," Margaery muttered, even as she allowed the man to kiss her hand. "I escaped the court for this, you know."

Willas raised a brow at her. "I thought you came here for me," he said, and Margaery smirked.

"Of course, dear brother," she said. "That's of course what I meant."

Willas grinned, standing to his feet. "I have an idea, dear sister," he said, reaching out and taking her hand before she could give it to another noble. "Come."

Margaery stood to her feet, taking his hand and letting him make some excuse about being tired, so that the rest of the nobles scattered, some still looking back at the Queen, no doubt wishing to keep her favor, somehow.

She ignored them, following her brother out of the parlor, and breathing a sigh of relief the moment the door shut behind them.

"Shouldn't Loras be with you?" Willas asked suddenly, and Margaery turned, blinking at him. "I thought the Kingsguard was meant to be with the Queen at all times."

Margaery shrugged. "We're in Highgarden, brother dear," she said. "What sort of trouble do you think I could get into, here, anyway?"

Willas gave her a long look, and then asked, rather bluntly, "How is he?"

Margaery swallowed, suddenly wishing she'd stayed inside that parlor. "He's...Loras," she said, and then grimaced.

Willas nodded, squeezing her hand. "Perhaps we should invite him."

"Where are we going?" Margaery asked, laughing.

Willas glanced back at her. "You're going to find Loras," he told her. "I'm going to put on some boots, and then we're going to Oldtown."

Margaery stared at him. "Are you...sure?" she asked, and Willas frowned at her.

"Margaery, if I spend the rest of my life worrying about whether or not I'll be able to handle it, I'm never going to manage anything," Willas told her bluntly, smile faded completely.

Margaery closed her eyes, swallowed. "Right," she said. "I'll go and find Loras, then."

Willas squeezed her hand again. "Tell him the fresh air will be good for him," he told her. "That might work."

Margaery rolled her eyes. "Oh, I'm sure," she said. "I'll go and find him." She waited, though, watched as her brother walked towards the opposite door, heading back to his chambers for those boots.

He was hardly limping, today, but still, she was concerned. It had been some time since he had gone into the city, she was certain, considering his illness. Their mother would not have allowed it.

She turned once he had left the room, going to find her errant brother, who, Willas had been correct, was supposed to be at her side at all times.

She hadn't thought to go and find him this morning, because she thought he might need a respite from her as dearly as she needed one from him, but it would be necessary to have him with them in the city, anyway, for the image.

She found him in his chambers, the second place she looked after going to the training fields beyond their chambers, and didn't knock, walking in as she would have done when they were younger, or back h...in King's Landing.

She rather wished she'd knocked, once she walked in. She was going to have to learn to start doing that, she couldn't help but think, one of these days.

Because her brother was rather busy, with two young men she thought might be squires, except...no that was definitely the serving boy who'd been giving him wine two nights ago, at the feast, looking up at Margaery with the same sultry eyes he'd been giving Loras, the other night.

Margaery rolled her eyes.

"Well, I was going to ask if you wished to come along to Oldtown with Willas and I, but I see that you're quite busy," Margaery said.

Loras blinked at her, and then he was pushing the boys off him and reaching for his trousers. "No, I can make it," he said, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek.

"Really, Loras, I'd rather you didn't, if that's going to be a problem the entire trip."

He glanced down, and then flushed. She was surprised her brother was still capable of it. "It's fine," he said, and Margaery quirked an eyebrow.

"If you say so," she said, then paused. "You know, Willas and I could wait? Until you've..." she gestured, and this time, both of the boys with Loras did blush, though Loras just stared at her.

"That's really not the way it..." he shook his head, grimacing. "Never mind. I'm ready now."

Margaery lifted her hands in the air. "All right," she said, "if you say so. Just don't expect us to be sympathetic if you're miserable the whole time."

"Margaery!"

And then she was skipping out of her brother's chambers, laughing. She found Willas out in the courtyard, waiting for her along with half a dozen green cloaks, and Loras was not long after her, limping a little obviously and not meeting anyone's eyes.

"Would you rather take the litter?" Margaery asked Willas, smirking slightly.

Willas grimaced. "I'm rather feeling a walk, aren't you?" he asked, holding out his arm, and Loras gritted his teeth and followed along behind them, not seeming to appreciate their humor.

The walk to Oldtown was rather long, and Willas was wheezing by the end of it. Margaery found herself wishing she'd insisted on that litter, but she knew how stubborn their brother could be.

She resolved to make frequent stops, once they were in the city, to resolve the situation, so long as Willas didn't catch on.

But then, Loras was rather useful for distracting their brother from that sort of thing, after all.

Margaery had not smelt the sea air of Oldtown in so long. They had traveled around the city to return to Highgarden, and Margaery regretted that now, tired though she had been at the time from the journey.

If King's Landing was a shithole of a city, as Olenna called it, Oldtown was an overly perfumed one, beautiful and lovely, but altogether too crowded, to Margaery's mind. When she was young, she was not allowed to visit the city at all, confined to Highgarden until her father was not worried that she would get lost within Oldtown's great walls, and allowed her mother to take Margaery to visit the poor.

It had been exciting for Margaery, those first few times her mother took her to Oldtown, to see the town itself. It was beautiful, and huge, and everyone in it had known who she was. There was a merchant who sold flowers, she remembered, lovely tulips and quite a few roses, as well, considering where he lived.

He had called her a princess, every day, and given her a white rose without demanding payment. Garlan used to tease her, that perhaps one day she would be.

Margaery turned to Willas, wrapping her hand around his arm. He refused to take a litter, despite his bad leg, and she knew this would not be a long journey, because of that, but she was already glad that he had insisted on this.

She could see the tall spires of Hightower, as they were let through the tall city gates, where her grandfather remained shut away with that witch these days, and the Starry Sept, where her mother had spent much of Margaery's childhood.

She had no desire to see it herself, these days. The Sept of Baelor was far larger and more beautiful, she thought, if less devout, but the Starry Sept had been hers since she was a child, and she had no desire to feel the sting of having lost it, again.

"Where to first?" she asked, and Willas smiled at her.

"I was thinking the flower merchant," he said, lips quirking, and Margaery eyed him.

"Is he still in business?" she couldn't help but ask, and Willas shrugged.

"I'm sure he's around here somewhere, sweet sister," he teased her, "And if he isn't, I'm sure you can pay for a flower yourself, these days."

Margaery smiled slowly. "Or you could," she told him. "After all, the Queen is not meant to carry coins on her person unless she's giving them to the poor."

Loras rolled his eyes, pushing past the both of them into the crowded marketplace. "Flowers!" he shouted, and suddenly there were a dozen merchants crowding around them, recognizing their some time absent Queen and carrying roses in their hands.

Margaery laughed, letting go of Willas' hand for several moments to find a white one, gesturing for Willas to pay once she'd chosen it.

He snorted, for he could see the purse she carried clutched under her arm, she was certain, but handed over the money easily enough.

That was the thing she loved about her brother, after all.

They walked through the marketplace for some time, where the journey might have been far quicker for anyone else, and before Margaery quite realized that Willas had been steering them, she found herself standing on the edge of the Thieves' Market.

Loras glanced back at Willas, clearly having realized the same thing. Their guards shifted nervously around them. "What are we doing here?" he asked.

The Thieves' Market was not the place for young Queens or their noble brothers to go, after all. Oldtown was far cleaner than King's Landing, but it was still a hive of villainy that their mother had always warned them against traveling to.

Of course, that sort of thing would never stop Willas.

"I thought it would make a nice walk," Willas said, coolly, and Margaery gave him an incredulous look, before rolling her eyes.

They walked, and she could feel the eyes of everyone they came across upon them, remembered the time Cersei had told her about the riot in Flea Bottom. There hadn't been a riot in Oldtown in two decades, and yet, that warning could not get out of her mind, once it was there.

And then they were stopping, beside a fountain shaped like a ship, made of bronze, and Margaery was frankly surprised that it was still standing, after all of these years. It was the sort of thing she'd have expected to have been stripped down and sold by the urchins who lived in this part of the city long ago.

A little boy sat on the edge of the fountain, one leg swinging into the pool of water below the ship, the other tucked under him. He glanced up at the sight of the green cloaks, eyes wide and frightened, and then they cleared when he took in the sight of Willas.

Margaery crossed her arms over her chest.

Willas sat down on the edge of the fountain, too, glancing back at his siblings. "This looks like a nice place to take a rest," he said, patting the area beside him, and Margaery gritted her teeth as she sank down beside him.

"If you're going to invite me on an outing," she muttered, "Then for gods' sake, be frank," she murmured, though there was no heat behind the words.

She was quite certain her mother hadn't allowed Willas out of Highgarden, before this, now that they were here. Quite certain that this was the first time he'd been allowed to get back to his plotting, since he had been ill.

Willas patted her shoulder. "I don't know what you're talking about, Sister," he said, leaning back a little where he sat. "My legs are just tired."

Loras glanced around, hand now on the pommel of the sword Margaery hadn't even realized he'd brought until now. He wasn't wearing his white cloak, but he looked every inch a night, still.

And then the little boy struck, lightning fast as he shoved his hand into Willas' pocket, as the green cloaks called out at the sight of an urchin robbing from their lord, but Willas didn't move, didn't seem at all concerned as two gold coins and a small, crumpled note fell into the little boy's hand.

And then he took off down the street, his bare feet slapping against the cobblestones before he disappeared around the side of a building, gone forever.

Margaery raised a brow at her brother, and Willas shrugged, almost looking bashful.

"The merchants are playing their usual games, Sister," he said, looping his arm once more through hers, and she helped him stand to his feet. "I'm merely ensuring that they go my way."

Margaery nodded, allowing her brother to pull her along through the crowd, clutching her purse a little closer until they had left the Thieves' Market. She didn't bother to ask what that had been about, exactly, and she knew Willas had no interest in their brother's games, anyways.

If her pet project had always been charity for the poor, Willas' had always been the city itself, and he was far better at his project than Margaery was at hers, she could admit that.

The poor would always be among them. But there could only be one capitol in Westeros.

Oldtown, she knew from the stories Willas used to read to her as a child, had once been the greatest city in Westeros. It was certainly the wealthiest, she knew, and second in size only to King's Landing, but it was not the great city it had once been, and she knew that her brother resented that.

When they were younger, Mace had never trusted them within the city walls. Had always said that it was not safe; the place was perfumed and lovely on the outside, but if one traveled far enough into the Thieves' Market, they could find themselves just as easily in Flea Bottom.

Willas had been very sick after Oberyn Martell threw him off his horse, but Margaery remembered that he had emerged from the experience with a renewed energy toward Highgarden's closest city, an obsession, almost.

Willas' goal, for as long as she could remember, had been to remedy what her father saw as the failures of Oldtown where others in Westeros only spoke of its beauty and riches. To create a city so self-sufficient that it required no outside contact, but lent what it must to those outside its walls, never borrowing. A city huge but able to sustain its own people, the crime carefully controlled so as not to become the issue it often was in King's Landing.

A city controlled by the people who lived in it, and not by a distant king.

Unlike his grandmother and his sister, Willas' ambitions did not stretch to the Iron Throne, but in a different direction altogether.

Margaery had never really understood those ambitions, not when she was younger and not now, when the King could merely come with an army and take what he wanted, but she knew that her brother's vision stretched farther than that.

That, in such a vision, Oldtown stretched farther than that. He had never held with her becoming Queen because he thought it an antiquated title, however powerful it remained.

Oldtown had no princess. Its government lay in the hands of Lord Leyton, Margaery's grandfather on her mother's side. She hardly remembered the old man, beyond that he was half mad and relied upon Malora the Mad Maid, but she knew that Oldtown would never fall into Tyrell hands, into her brother's hands, through inheritance.

It was a good thing, then, that her brother was as skilled as she at manipulating events from the sidelines. At controlling something without being seen to do so.

Sometimes, she wondered if her brother enjoyed it, as she sometimes wished she could admit to, when Joffrey was not being too much of a beast and the power was heady. She would never ask him that, of course, but Oldtown was thriving, these days.

Under constant threat as it grew stronger, but thriving nonetheless. Her brother had done wonders even in the time that Margaery had been away; even she could see that. Even in the short time that had been, before he fell ill.

Fell ill. As if it had been so innocent.

They walked back through the marketplace, Margaery rather certain that was the end of their outing, for Willas was starting to limp rather badly already, and she couldn't help feeling annoyed, that he had refused that litter, once more.

Loras was walking ahead of them, pushing people out of the way he did in King's Landing, none too gently, and Margaery remembered that, when he was home in the Reach, he'd not liked spending time in this city anymore than he did in King's Landing.

And because he hadn't been a glorified bodyguard at the time, he'd not had to go to the city with his siblings very often.

Willas squeezed her arm, again, and she glanced at him. His voice was low, and she had to struggle to hear over the din of the city when he spoke.

"How is he?" he asked again, and Margaery knew that she wouldn't be able to deflect the answer, this time.

"He hasn't recovered, I don't think, from Renly. I..." she looked away, biting her lip. "I worry about him. That's part of the reason we came here, in fact."

Willas nodded, not looking surprised. "And how are you?" he asked her, and Margaery smiled brightly at him, the way she sometimes did with Joffrey, these days.

"I'm fine," she told him. Willas raised a brow, and she sighed. "I...I'm just glad to be home, Willas," she said. "I just wish..."

He tilted her chin up. "Wish what?" he asked.

She shrugged, aware suddenly that they were no longer moving. "Wish I felt more at home," she said. "It's been so long since I was last here," she shrugged. "I'm sure that's it."

Willas nodded, understanding what she wasn't saying, she thought, for he had always been so good at that. "You have Loras, there."

"He's with me all of the time," Margaery said, "And yet, at times I think he is the one I am the furthest to."

Willas reached out, squeezing her arm. "I'm here, Margaery," he said.

Margaery felt her eyes stinging. She stepped on her tip toes, kissing Willas' cheek. "I know," she whispered. "I know." And then she called out to Loras, "Shall we return, Brother, or are you busy?"

Loras glanced back, flushing. "We can go," he said amiably, and Willas snorted.


	258. SANSA

Sansa felt guilty, after she left the party of Tyrell girls, gossiping and drinking rather too much honey wine, though they'd tried to tell Margaery's septa, who had noticeably not gone back to Highgarden with her, that it was merely sugared juice.

Not because she had enjoyed it even without Margaery there beside her, but because of who she had passed up to come here.

And then she tried to tell herself that feeling guilty about that was foolish. Tommen could not become her only friend in King's Landing now, just because Margaery was gone and Shae was too attentive to her lord husband.

And besides, Tommen was not her age at all, and Jeyne was, so even though he had sent his septa to ask her to play mere moments after Megga had burst into her rooms with the question, Sansa had turned him down.

"Oh!" Sansa had said, when Tommen's septa came to ask if she was busy that afternoon, biting her tongue. "I...If the Prince demands it, I'd be happy to, but unfortunately I agreed to tea with some of the Queen's ladies," she said.

The septa eyed her, then dipped into a small curtsey. "Of course, my lady," she said. "The Prince won't mind, I'm sure."

But he would, and for a moment Sansa had had to remind herself that he wasn't his brother, that he wouldn't hurt her if she turned him down.

But she had been thinking about what Megga had said, about how she must be getting sick of playing with a little child, someone who wasn't her own age.

When she was younger, she used to refuse to play with Rickon because she was busy with Jeyne, because she was far too old and elegant to be playing in the nursery with her youngest sibling.

She'd give anything to play with Rickon now, but Tommen wasn't Rickon, and she needed to realize that. If she didn't, their relationship was going to become complicated, she knew that. Already, Cersei seemed suspicious of the amount of time they spent together, and she didn't want to encourage another one of the Queen Mother's schemes.

Tyrion's eying her as if she were the Stranger, all of the sudden, was bad enough, surely, and so Sansa had gone with Megga to the tea party the Tyrell ladies were having, and found that she liked it rather more than she thought she would, as awkward as she felt amongst these girls who didn't have a real care in the world beyond finding the most beautiful and wealthy of husbands.

And there was Megga, clasping Sansa's hands and jumping up and down when she arrived.

"Sansa!" she called, and the other ladies, seated in their customary enclosed garden, glanced up at the sight of her, varying degrees of surprise on their faces. "Oh, I'm glad you came. The other girls didn't think you would, but I thought so."

Sansa flushed, realized that Megga was still holding her hands as she dragged her over to the table.

"Of course she will, I said," Megga went on, not seeming to notice at all as she pulled another chair out by her toes beside her own and plopped Sansa down into it. "It's not as if any of us have any more pressing engagements."

The girls all laughed, and Sansa found herself smiling with them. "I suppose not," she agreed, attempting to keep her voice light. She couldn't especially remember the last time she'd engaged in this sort of...banter.

"Is that dust on your cheek?" Megga asked, reaching out and brushing it away. "Have you been in the library all morning? If I'd known, I would have dragged you off sooner."

Sansa bit her lip. "Well..."

"Anyway, we're trying to decide what Elinor should wear to her wedding," Megga said, gesturing to the other girls, and Sansa was surprised to see Elinor sitting amongst them. She had known, of course, that only one Tyrell lady had gone with Margaery, but she had assumed, perhaps a little enviously, that it had been Elinor, who seemed to be Margaery's favorite.

Elinor sent Sansa a shy smile. "If you don't mind," she said, "I'd welcome your input. Alyn, ah," she cleared her throat, to the laughter of the other ladies, "Ser Alyn is from the Reach same as us, but there is a rumor that the wedding is to take place here, in King's Landing, and I wouldn't want to offend anyone with my choice of attire."

Sansa flushed again, thinking of what Margaery had worn to her own wedding and the plentiful and snide comments Cersei had had to say about that dress, and supposed she understood the toher woman's nervousness.

"I want to offend everyone possible when I get married," Megga butted in, then. "It's the only way to have fun in this wretched city, pissing everyone off."

"Megga!" Elinor scolded, but she looked slightly amused. "Well, I suppose that's why I'm the one getting married and you're having such a difficult time finding a suitor."

Sansa blinked, surprised that the other girl would say such a thing, but Megga only laughed. "Perhaps you're right. We should all be droll and do our level best to offend no one."

Sansa's eyes widened a little, but Elinor merely took another sip of her honey wine and said, "Well, Sansa? Do you think I'm right or Megga is?"

"That's mean, both of you," Alla interrupted, glaring at the other girls, and then giving Sansa a sympathetic smile. "They don't mean anything by it. Clearly, the only correct answer is to wear something that's easily gotten off, as the bedding ceremony won't allow for anything to be kept."

The other girls cackled, and Sansa found herself smiling with them, thinking that perhaps they weren't so strange and slightly terrifying as she had once thought, in agreeing to go to to tea with them.

Not even Megga.

Megga reminded Sansa a bit like Jeyne Poole, and at the same time was nothing like her at all.

Sansa supposed it was just the fact that she now had another friend in King's Landing that made her think that way. Margaery was a friend, or she used to be, before Sansa declared that wasn't quite what she wanted, of course she was, but she was also...complicated. And Megga wasn't interested in Sansa's body.

At least, Sansa didn't think so.

She was definitely interested in Sansa, though, and Sansa didn't think it was just because Margaery had ordered her ladies to keep an eye on Sansa.

She seemed...lonely, even sitting amongst these other girls, the way Sansa felt, but not as somber about it. Perhaps Sansa wasn't the only one in King's Landing who was so.

It felt...strange, gossiping with the Tyrell ladies. Their conversation moved from Elinor's upcoming marriage to bachelors in Highgarden whom Elinor could have chosen instead, most of these provided by Megga, who seemed to know all of them rather well, and Sansa found herself drifting, for she didn't know these men as the other girls did.

She'd gossiped with them before, of course, while Margaery was there, and she used to love it rather too much back with Jeyne in Winterfell, but, for some reason she couldn't quite explain, Sansa felt...wrong, doing so now. As if she were totally out of practice at something, and being thrown into it.

It took her rather too long to realize this was because she spent very little time in the company of so many women her own age.

And then, after the tea party, when the guilt ate away at her and Megga asked her if she thought she might be able to sneak out into the city, Sansa begged off.

For one thing, she didn't think the Queen Mother would give her permission for that.

And she found herself returning to Tommen's chambers on her way back, because she did feel a little guilty about abandoning him the way she had, even if he wasn't Rickon, now that she knew how lonely the little boy was.

Perhaps it was to be her lot in life, to only, maybe, befriend the lonely of King's Landing.

She thought perhaps that wouldn’t be so bad.

Tommen was sitting in his rooms, a book whose title she found very familiar, for her husband sometimes, in a fit of nostalgia, could be found reading it, in his lap. He glanced up at the sight of her, and Sansa forced herself to smile.

"Sansa," he said, setting aside the book and blinking at her. "I didn't think you'd come."

She felt a pang. "I was with some other girls, but I wanted to apologize for brushing off your septa, earlier," she said. "If it's all right, we could play now?"

The little boy shrugged, and in that shrug, she saw a little of Joffrey's petulance. It sent a shiver down her spine. What was she even doing here?

"I have to go to bed soon," the little boy said, and Sansa relaxed. "But you could...read to me?" he held the book out to her.

Sansa eyed it for a moment. "I have a different idea," she said, and held out her hand. The boy eyed it suspiciously, and then took it, tucking the book under his arm.

They made the short trek down to the Tower of the Hand, Tommen raising an eyebrow as they entered it, but Sansa just smiled, leading him up the winding staircase to her husband's chambers and hoping against hope that her husband wasn't...entertaining Shae.

"Has your uncle read to you recently?" Sansa asked. "I'm told he loves tales of dragons."

Tommen shrugged one shoulder. "He hasn't had the time, recently," he said, a bit sullen, and Sansa smiled.

"Well, I'm sure we can convince him to make some, just now, for his favorite nephew," Sansa said, and knocked hard on the door to her husband's bedchambers.

Tommen giggled, muttering something under his breath about how he didn't think he should be Tyrion's favorite, but Sansa chose to ignore the words.

He was certainly Tyrion's favorite nephew, of the two choices, she thought.

She heard her husband call out, and Sansa squeezed her head through the door first, relieved when she found her husband alone.

"Sansa," her husband began, but then Sansa opened the door as well, dragging Tommen inside the room with her.

All at once, she found herself wondering if it had been a bad idea, to bring Tommen here. She'd thought it might be a good idea to bring Tommen here because he seemed lonely, and she didn't like the idea of him growing up as miserable and alone as she sometimes wondered if Joffrey had felt, as a child left in isolation by his father.

Or the way Sansa herself often felt.

But now that she was standing in her estranged husband's chambers, Sansa thought this had been a foolish idea. There was no reason this whole thing wouldn't be totally awkward-

"Tommen would like you to read to us," Sansa said, and Tyrion blinked.

"What?" he asked.

"Read to us," Sansa repeated, and Tyrion raised a brow.

"Both of you?" he asked, glancing between her and Tommen.

Sansa forced herself to smile as she squeezed Tommen's hand. "Well, I can't very well leave my own bedchamber, can I?"

They both knew the truth. That this was not, and had never been, Sansa's bed, even if it did belong to her husband. Still, she remained, and Tommen seemed none the wiser for the interaction going on above his head.

Tyrion eyed his wife for a moment longer, and then nodded, taking the book from Tommen's hands. He glanced at the little boy now, giving Tommen his full attention.

"Any particular story you'd like to hear first?" Tyrion asked, and Tommen scrunched up his face, apparently deep in thought.

Sansa found herself wondering if Joffrey ever put so much thought into anything he did. Finally, the boy shrugged.

"The story of Princess Rhaenyra?" he asked, glancing up at Sansa. "I think Sansa would like that one."

Tyrion raised a brow. "Would she?" he asked, his gaze on Sansa contemplative, and Sansa had to struggle not to blush under that look without quite knowing why. "And why not the Dance?"

Tommen shrugged again. "I supposed we'd get there eventually," he said quietly, looking down at his shoes, and Tyrion chuckled, patting the bed beside himself, and Sansa realized then what he'd been doing, half a dozen pieces of parchment sitting in his lap, no doubt more missives about the war.

No wonder Shae had not been there. She'd been complaining, recently, that Tyrion had no time for anything but the droll news of war.

Tommen jumped up on the bed beside his uncle, a wide grin on his face, and Sansa found herself smiling as well, moving forward and sitting on the bed, as well.

Her husband began to read, and Sansa found Tommen leaning his head against her knees, closing his eyes. Tyrion had a...surprisingly relaxing voice, when he was reading rather than getting into arguments with Sansa, and Sansa found herself lulled into the tale, surprised to find herself enjoying it.

This had not been the type of story she'd enjoyed as a child, preferring the tales of brave knights and not of women queens who'd ended up fighting horrible battles.

Before long, she blinked her eyes open, realized that she hadn't quite faded off, but, in her lap, Tommen was asleep.

She glanced up at her husband, saw that the book was still open in his lap, though he was staring at her.

And the words forced their way past her throat, words she didn't think she would have said if she were more aware of her surroundings.

"I'm sorry, my lord."

Tyrion's brows furrowed. "What?"

She shook her head, making sure to keep her voice quiet lest she wake Tommen. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "For everything that happened to you, recently. For threatening you, and...and for your imprisonment."

A pause.

"Sansa..." Tyrion hesitated. "What happened to me, my imprisonment, the loss of Casterly Rock, that was not your fault."

Sansa sniffed suspiciously, hands beginning to shake as she topped off his wine, spilled some of it onto their spacious table. Tyrion sighed, reaching out and taking her hands in his, stealing the wine bottle away and setting it down.

"Sansa," he said gently, "look at me." Sansa looked up. "What happened was because I have shit relatives, who have done shit that you've suffered for, and who wanted to make me suffer as well. But that has nothing to do with you."

Sansa looked away. "I..."

"Sansa?"

"They wouldn't even have had a case against you if it weren't for me running away with the Martells," Sansa gasped out, far too aware of Tommen so close to her, sniffing and wiping at her nose. "I know how that made you look guilty, and I knew that you would get in trouble even before I left, even if your father hadn't died, but I didn't think about it at all. I didn't think about you at all."

He stood to his feet, gestured her forward, and Sansa bent down a little, allowed him to wrap his arms around her waist. "I think we've both suffered enough to put that behind us completely, don't you?"

Sansa closed her eyes. "What have I suffered?" she asked. "A few days in a cell alone before I turned on the very person trying most to help me."

Her husband pinched her, and Sansa yelped, opening her eyes and turning to stare at him.

"Then what did I suffer?" he asked her bluntly. "You blame yourself for the very thing which happened to me that you do not seem to find so difficult when it happened to you."

Sansa thought of the way she had sobbed, in that cell, as Oberyn tried to calm her down in the cell adjacent to her own. Thought of the guilt tearing away at her, that she had been willing to speak against him before the King, lies that the King himself had relayed to her through Margaery.

"I..." she didn't know how to explain that to Tyrion, that the two situations were so very different.

Tyrion might have died for being locked away in that prison cell, for a murder he hadn't committed, and Sansa would never have been killed, because the Lannisters knew all along what she would do.

Because that was who she was.

Sansa Lannister.

"Sansa," Tyrion repeated, and she sniffed. "I am sorry that you had to go through that. That you were forced to go through that."

Sansa swallowed. "My lord, I..."

She didn't know what to say. Didn't know what to say to fix this situation between them, nor the situation at large, and Sansa hated it, the helpless feeling sweeping over her. She leaned down, running her fingers through Tommen's straw blond hair. The boy twitched in his sleep, but didn't wake.

Tyrion glanced down at him. "I'm glad you've managed to find another friend, Sansa," he said, the words terribly gentle.

Sansa closed her eyes, snatching her hand away from Tommen. "I..."

She wanted to say something then, anything, because somehow she thought it important that her husband know she had befriended Tommen only because he was there, that there wasn't anything more she wanted of him.

She thought they had changed footing, she and Tyrion, since the trial. That he no longer knew what to expect of her, so he suspected everything of her. Suspected that she was capable of anything.

Sansa shook her head, not at all certain how to put those feelings into words.

"Besides," Tyrion continued, "I do not know that it is right to say that Oberyn Martell was the only person trying to help you, was the only friend to you. Nor the one who helped you the most."

Sansa blushed. "I'm sorry, my lord," she said quietly, not meeting his eyes. "I know that you did your best-"

"I was not talking about me," he said, and Sansa did look up at him then, did meet his eyes.

Tyrion bit his lip, and then smiled sadly. "I do not say that I understand all her motivations, which is quite frankly annoying for me," he said, trying to raise a smile, she thought, and when that effort failed, he grimaced. "But the Queen seems to care very deeply about you, Sansa, and her plan to keep you safe...well, it worked, didn't it?"

Sansa swallowed. "You said you thought she turned on you," she said. "That it was all a game to her."

Tyrion shook his head, and now he stared straight ahead, at the far wall. "When I was younger," he said, the words almost idle, and Sansa straightened at them, for that seemed to be her hint that the subject matter was not at all, "I fell in love with a whore."

Sansa blinked, abruptly lost.

"And...I was too young to know that love doesn't belong to us," Tyrion continued. Paused. "Nobles."

Sansa cleared her throat. "My lord..."

"We ran away together," Tyrion continued, swallowing thickly. "We were going to be married."

Sansa shook her head. "I don't..."

"My point," Tyrion said finally, "is that in the end, she betrayed me. And I've never done more than use a whore since."

Sansa shifted, uncomfortable with the way he'd said those words as much as that he'd said them, as much as that, if she was reading him correctly, he was equating those words to Margaery.

"But Shae..." he glanced toward the door, as if by saying her name she would appear. She did not. "She's the first woman I've been with whom I genuinely think might be..."

Sansa swallowed. "I'm sorry that I threatened you," she said, and he blinked, the moment that was hanging like a fog over him seemingly lost, and Sansa clarified, "With Margaery. I'm sorry I threatened to go to the King. I would not have done it."

Tyrion cleared his throat. "I think you might have," he said, and reached out, squeezing her hand.

Sansa shook her head, because it was important that he know this, important that... "I would not have," she repeated, and Tyrion let go of her, pursing his lips.

"I should not have threatened to take away your only friend in King's Landing left, Sansa. It was unkind," he said, not looking at her. "But don't lie to either of us now, please."

And then he turned on his side, lying down with his back to her, and Sansa blinked at his form, dipping into the bed with Tommen between them.

And she felt the urge to say those words again, to whisper that she would not have, to repeat it until Tyrion believed it.

Instead, she laid down herself, running her fingers through Tommen's hair.


	259. JAIME

"These fuckers don't know how to quit, do they?" Bronn asked, shoving the dead Iron Islander out of his way as the battle wound down to a close.

Jaime sent a glare Bronn's way and didn't respond, pulling the sword he'd just barely gotten better at using out of the man he'd just finished off. He glanced around, saw a flash of straw blonde hair in the distance, and had to bury the sigh of relief that wanted to escape him, at the sight of it.

Bronn was right, though; these fuckers didn't know how to die, and it starting to get on his nerves.

They'd managed to secure Dragonstone from the skeleton crew of soldiers Stannis had left behind just in time for Euron Greyjoy's fleet to arrive, and the moment it had, Jaime had known that they would be outnumbered. Had known there was a chance they might not win this battle.

He had the soldiers he would have needed in an ordinary fight, but after one day's battle with Euron, he'd known the bastard wasn't an ordinary man, the men who fought under him not quite sane, either.

He wondered if that was because they were from the Iron Islands, or merely because their new king was Euron Greyjoy.

This battle had raged on the beach below Dragonstone, Jaime not willing to get closer and risk losing the stronghold to the Islanders. Bronn had been rather vocal in his disapproval, because the sand reminded him of the woman he'd left at home, or something, not that the way he carried on around Brienne gave any indication he missed his new wife. They were shit on land, though, and that at least gave Jaime something of an advantage, even if it was a piss poor one, at this point.

He didn't want to send to King's Landing for reinforcements, not after the way he had left it. He knew how slim of a margin it had been, that Joffrey had even authorized his command of the army here at Dragonstone, and while Jaime had been furious about being sent here in the first place and separated from Cersei, he'd much rather die here than return to King's Landing in shame. Or beg for reinforcements for a command an able bodied man not depending on some great wench could have won easily.

A voice that sounded far too like his father's murmured, _"The lion does not concern himself with the opinions of the sheep."_

Jaime closed his eyes, shook his head. Shouted for his men to pull back. Beside him, Bronn spat on the man he'd killed, and followed Jaime off the beach.

"How many casualties?" Jaime asked one of the lords, as they made their way through the bog of dead men, wearing both Lannister red and the Greyjoy sigil. He grimaced in distaste at the sight of one of his men, little more than a boy, with a knife through his eye, a dead Greyjoy at his side.

"Less than they suffered, my lord," the knight reported, and Jaime turned to him, noticed the way he was staring.

Jaime reached up, wiping the blood out of his eyes. Beside him, Bronn snorted and muttered something under his breath about "lily-bellied lordlings."

Jaime shot him a look, before turning his attention back to the knight. He was a Tyrell, but Jaime couldn't remember his name. "How many?"

The man dipped his head. "The count is one hundred and twelve so far, my lord," he reported. "We have not finished, however, and there were many seriously wounded."

Jaime lifted a brow. "And the wounded?"

The man grimaced. "We have not finished the count yet, my lord," he said, and Bronn made a choking sound.

"What the fuck you still doing here, then?" he asked, and Jaime sent his gaze heavenward, before glancing back at the deserted beach.

The soldiers were already beginning to burn the bodies, at least to be rid of the stench of the dead a bit faster, but beyond the smoke; Jaime could see the retreating ships.

They would be back, soon enough. Euron Greyjoy did not know the meaning of defeat. Or surrender, an opportunity which Jaime had foolishly offered him some time ago. He was half convinced that Bronn was still laughing about how much of a fuck up it had been, that.

Euron was a bit like Robb Stark, in that way and Jaime could only hope that he would meet a similar end.

"Leave the dead," Jaime ordered the Tyrell knight. "We need to ensure the castle is more easily defensible, next time."

The Tyrell gulped, and Jaime would have felt sorry for him if he was any younger. "You think they'll be back, Ser?" he asked nervously.

Jaime met his gaze, and the man hurried off.

Behind Jaime, he could hear Bronn starting to chuckle. "I'm starting to wonder how their little queen is keeping your cunt of a nephew so preoccupied," he said, a smirk on his face. "The rest of these flowers don't seem to have spines."

Jaime shook his head, not willing to be brought into the other man's banter, just now. They'd managed to keep the fighting to the beach this time, but it had been far too close of a call for his comfort.

He glanced up at the towering castle in question, aware that his lips were pulling into a grimace just looking at it.

It was an ugly as shit castle, though he supposed it would have suited Stannis. All hard lines and pragmatic stone. And, strategically, in a good spot.

Even if they could keep the ugly monolith out of Euron Greyjoy's hands, there was no guarantee that Stannis wouldn't decide Winterfell was too difficult a target and return, the moment he learned it was under attack, to take it back.

"Well, at least I'll have a nice hot bath and a whore before those fuckers come back," Bronn said conversationally, and Jaime ignored him, squinting now, as the harsh of the light of the sun beat down on them, now that they were away from the flames on the beach. "What about you, my lord? You going to finally have that wench or do you think I've a chance with her?"

And all for an ugly, empty castle that yielded precious enough crops for the effort being placed into keeping it, and was built atop a pile of stone, rather than anything useful.

Well, Jaime thought idly, ignoring Bronn for the time being as he reattached his sheath to his waist, perhaps the Targaryens of Aegon the Conqueror's days had thought it a useful place to build a castle. There was certainly nothing beautiful in it, but then, there were things more important than beauty.

Damned if they couldn't build one a bit closer to the ground, lest one had to walk up a wall to get to it.

"Lord Commander!" he heard the shout, and Jaime glanced up, aware that Bronn had fallen silent at his side, apparently respecting his wish for silence for the first time that Jaime could remember in their...acquaintance.

A boy ran down the narrow walkway from the castle, legs flopping against the stone as he held a small missive above his head, and Jaime blinked as the boy drew closer, face red and sweaty.

"My lord," the boy said, bowing at the waist when he approached, and Jaime waved a hand impatiently. "A raven from King's Landing-"

Jaime snatched the letter out of his hand, paused at the sight of the royal seal upon it, glancing up at the boy. "Did you read this?"

Beside him, Bronn placed a hand on his sword. For all his faults, the man was loyal enough when he was well paid.

The boy hurriedly shook his head, and Jaime nodded, opening the letter the rest of the way.

He'd (foolishly) expected it to be from Cersei, despite the seal on the front of the letter, and a part of Jaime had known not to hope for that, but even still, as the blockier handwriting of his brother appeared, he could not withhold his sigh.

He knew who had sent him to Dragonstone, after all. His brother might not have been the one to give the order, but Joffrey didn't believe that his uncle was any longer capable of holding a spoon, let alone a sword, and Cersei would not have sent him away.

Cersei would not have sent him away, he had to believe that. Not after all they had suffered away from each other. She would not have sent him away, and not with Brienne at his side, if she could help it, he knew that as much.

He didn't know why his brother would have wanted him sent away to Dragonstone, but the knowledge that he'd somehow used Cersei to do it stung as much as the knowledge of what he had done to his sister, in telling her he would be taking Brienne with him if he left, and Jaime read the beginning of the letter with disinterest.

And then he read it again, paling.

"Bad news?" Bronn asked, raising an eyebrow. "The Queen already lost control of your cunt of a nephew?"

Jaime reached out, slamming his flesh and blood fist into Bronn's cheek, and the man grunted in pain, pulling away from him and rubbing at his sore jaw.

"Son of a bitch," he muttered, massaging it and glaring at Jaime simultaneously. "The fuck was that for?"

"That's my nephew you're talking about, and your King," Jaime muttered distractedly, an argument he'd been halfheartedly having with the sell sword for some time, but then he supposed if he tried to distract himself too much, the news on the page might disappear and turn into an entreaty from Cersei for him to return home.

Jaime lifted his head, staring down at the herald. "Boy, tell the Tyrell Commander-"

"I knew you didn't know the cunt's name," Bronn muttered, and the boy's eyes widened as he glanced at Jaime.

Jaime ignored the sell sword. "Tell him to send for reinforcements once I'm gone from King's Landing or we'll lose this barren rock. And that's an order."

He marched on toward the Keep.

"And where are you going, my lord?" the boy asked. Jaime turned back to him.

"Dorne," he said, feeling Bronn straighten beside him. Jaime let the letter in his hands crumple, feeling the hot heat of an anger he'd only felt a few times in his life consume him. "We're going to Dorne."

"We?" Bronn repeated, with a great groan.

Fuck."

Jaime did glance back at Bronn, that time.

"I was hoping you wouldn't say 'we,'" Bronn muttered, pressing his hand into the bleeding lump of cloth at his side that Jaime had failed to notice before this moment. "I don't suppose that wench of yours knows how to stitch up a good wound?"

Jaime rolled his eyes. "She's not my wench. And give it here. I've seen more battles than she has, at any rate."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't forget to comment!


	260. MARGAERY

Margaery couldn't remember the last time she'd had tea without worrying about having to invite Cersei Lannister, or someone equally as unpleasant. Her husband hated tea, of course, so it was always a welcome reprieve from him, but Cersei had enough of her spies at court, after all.

Sitting with only her mother and Leonette, not worried at all about having to invite guests Margaery would have to talk to, Margaery thought this was nice.

"This is nice," Leonette said, smiling as she looked out at the veranda they were sitting on, the vines crawling around the railing of Alerie's apartments. It was a sunny day, the warm heat beating down on Margaery's bare shoulders, and she sipped at her iced tea, wondering how she had ever been bored in a life where tea parties were a daily occasion.

Alerie's smile was sad. "If only you could come and visit us more," she said. "Your husband seems to keep you in King's Landing far too long."

Margaery was sure her face was pinched, for suddenly Leonette was saying, "Yes, but it is nice for her to be here now," she said, then turned fully to Margaery. "And, of course, she can watch me drink these herbs our septa swears by."

Margaery turned to her, mixing some sugar into her tea. Not nearly enough for her grandmother, of course. "Is that herbal stuff your septa is making you drink really helping the baby?" she asked, "Or making you sick?"

Leonette grimaced, setting down her tea cup. "It tastes like piss," she confessed, and Alerie sent her a scandalized look.

"Leonette," she admonished the other woman, "Our septa is a wise woman, and I suffered through those same teas myself. And look at me," she gestured to Margaery, "I had far too many children."

Leonette snorted. "Yes, and far too stubborn, too."

The ladies laughed, and Margaery found herself laughing at her own expense with them.

"We've heard...distressing things about your new husband," Alerie said, choosing her words carefully, and Margaery glanced up sharply.

"Mama..." she started, but Alerie merely shook her head.

"Are the rumors...true?" Alerie asked, setting down her tea cup, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek, glancing at Leonette.

"Mama, Margaery would of course tell us," Leonette began, but Alerie cut her off.

"Margaery, my love, I was only in King's Landing for a short time, but your husband seemed gentlemanly enough, then. Did he remain so?"

Margaery forced a smile, not glancing in Leonette's direction. "He is a wonderful husband, Mama, if a bit too...ravenous."

Leonette flushed, and Alerie blinked at her daughter for a moment before snorting, herself.

"But you needn't worry," Margaery continued. "Joffrey is..." she gritted her teeth, glad for once that her mother didn't look too closely into the things her children told her. "Kind to me."

Leonette cleared her throat rather loudly, as she took another sip of her tea. Margaery was confident enough that her siblings had not told her mother about her troubles, confident enough that even if Garlan had told Leonette, which seemed plausible, considering how close he was with his lady wife, he wouldn't have told their poor mother.

Alerie smiled, clearly relieved, and finished her tea.

"It's such a shame Renly didn't live," Alerie said, sadly, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek.

"Of course it is, Mama, but I have a new husband now," she reminded the other woman, "And he is a true king."

Alerie blinked at her. "Of course," she said, a stiffness entering her voice, and Margaery swallowed.

She remembered when they had learned of Loras and Mace's plot to marry Margaery to Renly, remembered how excited her mother had been, for Alerie had been charmed by him the moment Renly arrived in Highgarden.

Of course she had; Renly had been sweet and charming and friendly, and the perfect lord for a lady's daughter.

If only she'd known, of course, that he was rather too perfect, but Margaery didn't think that her mother had ever figured that out.

The Tyrell children all loved their mother, but it was in situations such as those that Margaery found herself wondering whether her mother saw anything at all about the reality of the world.

"My lady?"

They all glanced up, before Margaery remembered that was no longer her title, and no servant, not even in Highgarden, would refer to her in such a way, unless they were teasing, and she did not know that voice.

Alerie blinked at the serving woman standing in the door.

"My lady," the serving girl curtseyed to Alerie, "The Steward wishes to see you," she said. "Something about..." she shook her head, looking idly confused. "The guest rooms being allocated to different guests."

Alerie sighed, setting her tea cup back down on the table. "I...I should go," she said, voice rather sad. She reached out, squeezing Margaery's cheek, and Margaery smiled as well, leaning into the touch.

"I'll see you at supper, Mama," she promised, and Alerie nodded, before heading off.

Leonette pinched Margaery.

Margaery turned to the other woman, aghast. "What was that for?"

"If you lie that badly to your husband, you must be miserable in King's Landing," Leonette admonished the other woman.

Margaery rolled her eyes. "I was hardly that bad," she said.

"Hmm," Leonette grunted, sipping at her tea again. "And this husband of yours...ravenous? Really? To your mother?"

Margaery snorted. "She's heard worse, especially from Loras."

Leonette chuckled. "I suppose she has," and then she propped her feet up on the chair that Alerie had vacated, groaning and rubbing at her stomach.

Margaery's eyes followed the gesture, and when she looked up, Leonette met her gaze.

"I envy you," Margaery confessed, and Leonette laughed.

"And where you should not," she chuckled. "You may take this burden if you want it so badly. I dislike being fat and weepy all of the time. When Garlan first left, I cried for days because I had somehow convinced myself he had made up an entire fight with the Greyjoys merely because I was irritating him."

Margaery huffed out a laugh. "Indeed?"

Leonette shook her head. "Being pregnant is horrible," she said. "You're always weeping and bloating and making yourself sick. I don't see what the trouble is, either; it just leads to more of the same." Margaery raised a brow, and Leonette flushed. "I'm always saying things like this, since I grew heavy with child."

Margaery snorted. "I suppose it does make a rather good excuse," she teased, and Leonette shrugged.

"Indeed," she said, keeping a straight face for only a few moments before collapsing into giggles.

Margaery chuckled, as well, before her eyes went soft and she found herself staring down at Leonette's belly. She wasn't quite completely fat yet, the way she was carrying on, but Margaery thought it was still noticeable.

Leonette followed her gaze.

"You will have one soon enough," Leonette promised her, laying a hand over Margaery's. "You are young yet, as is your husband. You have time."

"But the Realm does not," Margaery muttered, and Leonette glanced at her goodsister in concern.

"Have the Lannisters told you as much?" she demanded a coolness seeping into her voice. "They are far more desperate for an heir than you should be, dear girl."

Margaery shook her head. "Joffrey has said nothing, but..." she shook her head. "I worry about it, all the same. I know that Cersei loathes me, and would be happy to have a more controllable wife."

Leonette snorted. "Cersei will hate any wife her son marries, I noticed that much about her while I still lived in King's Landing," she told Margaery. "And she can't be rid of you, you must know that. It would put her in a spot of trouble to do so."

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. She knew that Joffrey cared for her in his own, strange way, and that her lord father would raise hell if anything happened to her because of the Lannisters, but she did not know that that would stop Cersei, in the end.

It was an ever growing fear, she could not help but think.

"Yes, of course," Margaery agreed airily after a long pause, because she knew that it would make Leonette unduly worried to say anything else.

"I do know one thing," Leonette said quietly, far too perceptive, and Margaery glanced up. "Such stresses as you face as a Queen are not good for the thought of conception."

Margaery swallowed, rubbed at her flat stomach. "I fear there is no cure for that," she whispered, and Leonette tutted sympathetically.

"There is one thing you could try," she said, and Margaery blinked up at her.

"What is it?"

Leonette smiled. "Don't think about it so much," she said. "Often times, that only makes things worse."

Margaery snorted. "You're right, of course," she agreed placidly. Then, because Leonette, despite her intentions, had twisted the knife and Margaery hated it. "Is the child Garlan's?"

Leonette inhaled sharply, and she glanced up reproachfully at Margaery. "Any child I would have would be Garlan's," she told Margaery, and Margaery swallowed, forced a smile.

"Of course it would," she agreed placidly, and Leonette went stiffly back to her needlework. Margaery reached out a hand, squeezing the other woman's wrist until Leonette looked back up at her. "I have spent too long in King's Landing," she told Leonette. "It is a world of its own."

Leonette sniffed. "I suppose it must be," she said, and Margaery nodded, confident that the conversation would be forgotten.


	261. SANSA

"Sansa!"

Sansa turned, blinking in what she hoped didn't look like surprise when Megga practically accosted her.

"Lady Megga," she said, trying for a curtsey, but the other girl just snorted at her.

"Don't try it," she said, and Sansa flushed, not entirely sure why she was doing so. "Where are you going?"

Sansa blinked at her. "I was going to the..."

Megga raised a brow. "If you finish that sentence with the word 'library' I will..."

Sansa flushed again. "Right. I was just..."

Megga looped her arm through Sansa's. "I have the most delightful gossip to share, and it involves a certain young lady who-"

"Lady Sansa?" a voice called, and Sansa turned, surprised yet again as a herald stepped toward them. She felt a thrill of fear run down her spine, remembered idly that heralds no longer came bearing nice messages to Sansa Stark, and swallowed.

"Yes?"

"The King would see you," the herald said, and Sansa felt her throat close. "In the throne room."

"Yes, well, where else would he wish to see her?" Megga snapped, looking rather more annoyed at the herald's interruption than Sansa thought it warranted, though when she looked at the other girl, Megga merely shrugged.

The herald dipped his head. "I am only relaying the King's message, my lady-?"

"Megga," she said, cocking her head at him. "And I believe you're not important enough for me to bother." She held out her hand. "Come, Sansa, I believe we can find our way to the throne room ourselves." Her eyes shot back to the herald. "Unless the King specified that this was to be a private meeting."

Sansa felt the outline of the dagger Margaery had given her against her side, and suddenly understood exactly what it was Megga was doing here, constantly seeking Sansa out. She swallowed, mouth suddenly gone dry.

The herald dipped his head. "As you command, my lady," he said, before hurrying off, and Megga watched him go with barely concealed disgust.

"Do you ever wonder," she said, the tone almost idle, and Sansa wondered if she had meant to say the words aloud, "How it is that men, who are so convinced they are so much our betters, are so willing to scrape and bow before each other like dogs?"

Sansa's mouth was suddenly dry for another reason altogether. "Megga..."

Megga turned, forcing a rather wide smile. "Forget I said anything, dearest," she told Sansa. "I meant nothing by it. Come. The King is expecting you, apparently, though why he couldn't be bothered to warn you before the hour at hand..." she made a face.

Sansa forced herself not to smile. "The King can do as he likes," she reminded Megga, taking a deep breath at the thought that she had garnered Joffrey's attention once more, somehow.

Megga merely shrugged. "If you say so," she agreed, and then she was dragging Sansa along, and Sansa could do nothing but comply, a heavy pit in her stomach.

She'd thought Joffrey had lost interest in her, what with Margaery to distract him, but she had been a fool not to realize that his gaze would turn on her once Margaery was gone again.

Or, perhaps she had known, but a part of her had wished, anyway.

She made her way into the throne room, glad of Megga at her side even if she knew there was little the other girl could do if Joffrey decided to be too cruel, and the herald announced them rather excitedly, though Sansa could not imagine why.

Joffrey glanced up from the scroll in his hands, where he stood in front of the Iron Throne, and Sansa licked her lips, suddenly dry.

By her side, Megga squeezed her hand before letting go of her, but she did not move far away.

Sansa's thigh, where the knife Margaery had given her sat against it, began to sweat.

"Ah, Lady Sansa, there you are," Joffrey muttered, belligerence sneaking into his tone, and Sansa swallowed.

"Your Grace," Sansa stepped forward as she was bid, dipping into a shallow curtsey before the King.

She did not dare to meet her husband's eyes, did not want to know why it was that he was here.

Joffrey eyed her in a way that Sansa thought she had avoided for far too long, now that she thought of it, and she forced herself not to blush.

It was surprisingly easier to do, these days.

Joffrey finally looked away, turning back to his scroll, just as Sansa glanced up and saw her husband, standing not too far away from the King, frowning at the both of them, though he looked far more protective of Sansa than angry at her, and she supposed that was something, with the words he had spoken to her the other day.

"Stannis has routed the Boltons from King's Landing with some sort of elaborate plot," Joffrey said, "involving...sacrifices."

Sansa bit her lip, hoping that Joffrey would not embrace his irritating self and explain further.

"The majority of their forces remain in Winterfell, but they have suffered some losses," Joffrey continued, as if any of this should mean something to Sansa. "But they say they do not need the reinforcements that we are sending."

Sansa had thought they had sent those reinforcements some time ago, but she merely blinked up at him, still wondering why she had been summoned for this. She glanced at Megga, and thought the girl looked as confused as she felt.

"Yes, Your Grace?"

"What are your thoughts on the matter?" he asked, and Sansa blinked, squinting up at him.

"Your Grace?" she asked incredulously, and then shook her head. "I have no thoughts on the matter, Your Grace. I don’t know warfare.”

Joffrey glared at her. "But it is your home," he snapped, and Sansa gulped. "Surely you must have something to say about it. Should we continue to send the reinforcements, or not?"

Sansa licked her lips. "I am only a lady, Your Grace, and have no understanding of such matters, I should think." She shook her head. "But I would rather it not fall into the hands of my enemies." She cleared her throat. "Our enemies."

Joffrey stared at her, and then his lips pulled into a smirk. Clearly, he had not noticed the slip, though, by the glare Cersei was sending her way, the other woman had. "Indeed, Lady Sansa," he said. "Indeed."

He turned back to the rest of the court, turned to look directly at Tyrion. "You heard her, didn't you, Lord Hand?" he demanded of his uncle, and Sansa grimaced inwardly. "Go out and ensure that Winterfell does not fall into the hands of that traitor Stannis! Get your men together, if you are still loyal to the Crown!"

Sansa's heart felt like a stone in her chest. When she looked up, she realized that Tyrion was staring at her, not his nephew, and his expression was like ice.

Margaery was gone, and Joffrey was back to his old ways, Sansa thought, the fear spilling down her body until she wanted nothing more than to pull out the knife that Margaery had given her and use it - on Joffrey, on herself - but use it, nonetheless.

She shuddered, and the knife remained carefully hidden away.

"At once, Your Grace," she could hear Tyrion saying, as if from a great distance, and then Lady Megga was stepping forward, reaching out to take Sansa's hand in her own.

"If it pleases Your Grace," she could hear the other girl saying, and she still sounded so far away, "Lady Sansa was just about to have her afternoon meal with me. We can postpone it, if that is your-"

Joffrey waved a hand, and Megga practically dragged Sansa from the throne room.


	262. MARGAERY

"He's beautiful," Margaery said, running her fingers through the horse's black mane.

"His name's Edgor," Willas said, at her side. "He's beautiful, but he's a fierce creature, and I'm having a spot of trouble breaking him in."

"No," Margaery said morosely, and he glanced at her. "This one doesn't deserve to be broken in," she went on. "He ought to be free, free to run where he will."

Willas was silent for several long moments, and then his hand was being placed over hers, and Margaery glanced up at her brother, blinked at the sight of tears in his eyes.

"Willas?" she asked hoarsely, alarm filling her. "Gods, have I kept you out too long? Mama will kill me..."

"I'm fine, Margy," he told her, turning and clasping Margaery's hand in his. "I just...I'm fine."

Margaery cocked her head. "Come," she said, leading him away from the stable. "We can go back now, it's all right."

"Margaery, I'm fine," he protested. "Besides, I have a gift for you."

Margaery blinked as he pulled a book out of the satchel he'd been carrying at his side when he suggested they go out to the stables. She hadn't expected it to be as large as it was, though, and she couldn't help but feel that it might have been the thing bogging her brother down.

She felt a bit guilty for the thought, of course, for her brother wasn't spun glass, but still, she worried.

Could he truly blame her, with everything that had gone on recently?

And then she was staring at the book in Willas' hands.

She remembered that she used to like to read, before she became a queen. Well, she had liked hearing Willas read to her, and by extension had liked the tales themselves, though clearly not as much as Sansa, for all the time the girl spent in the library.

And, since marrying Joffrey, Margaery had found that she had precious little time for things she had once enjoyed, such as reading.

But the book Willas held out to her was beautiful, a black cover inlaid with spun gold, spelling out the words of the title. She'd never seen a book quite so beautiful, beyond the ones Willas used to smuggle from the Citadel-

"Did you steal this from the maesters?" Margaery asked accusingly, and Willas merely smiled.

"No," he said. "No, I had it made for you. I know you love this story."

Margaery smiled, glancing down at the book again.

_The Dance of the Dragons._

She had loved it, once.

"It's beautiful," Margaery said, rubbing her fingers over the cover of the book and glancing back up at her brother. She turned back to Willas. "Joffrey gave me a copy, back in King's Landing, not so beautiful as this. I should have brought it; I know how you adore Westerosi history."

Willas smiled, though it was rather tight. "Joffrey, is it?" he asked quietly, and Margaery swallowed, spun away before Willas could pressure her into answering his real question.

She suddenly understood why he had brought her out here to look at these horses. Being near horses had always calmed her as a child, though she still couldn't say why.

Perhaps it was the freedom they teased.

"Though I suppose everything about the book pales in comparison to the actual dragon bones inside the Keep," she grinned, knowing that ought to entice her brother, but when she looked back she saw only that Willas was frowning at her.

"Margaery."

She whirled back to her brother. "What?" she asked, voice dead, and Willas' face softened.

"How does he treat you, Margaery?" he asked quietly. "I have heard...conflicting accounts, from Grandmother and Mace and now from Loras, and I know that you and Grandmother were...worried, before the wedding."

Margaery took a deep breath, forced a smile that might have convinced Loras but which she knew Willas would never be fooled by. "He is my husband. He treats me as any man does their wife."

"Margaery."

Margaery closed her eyes.

She hadn't wanted to have this conversation with her brother, never with Willas, or with her mother. She didn't know why, for she knew that Willas would never think less of her for what she was trying to do, even if perhaps he couldn’t understand her ambition as she could not understand his, but she hadn't wanted to explain it, anyway.

Hadn't wanted to see him pitying her, or judging her, and she had known it would come down to one of those, in the end.

But she supposed Loras could never keep his big mouth shut, and now that the issue was raised, it was bubbling up in her breasts, and she couldn't keep the words down.

"Sometimes I think I am dying," Margaery whispered, glanced up at Willas' sharp intake of breath. She reached out, tangling her fingers through Edgor's mane. The motion soothed her as it had when she was a child. "Oh, I know that sounds dramatic, but I think that I am. Or that I am already dead." She let out a bitter laugh. "If the Gods do exist, the Stranger has surely damned me already."

Willas moved forward, arms reaching out to her, before he hesitated, allowed them to fall.

"And every day that I think that this is worth it, every day that I remind myself of everything I have gained and how it is far above and beyond the price of a madman's affections, I have Sansa Stark, standing as a shadow behind my throne, reminding me of everything I am losing."

She fell deathly silent then, realizing how damning those words had been. But that made them no less true. Every day that she looked at Sansa, she remembered that Sansa had once been in her position, that, no matter how tightly she clung to the title of The Queen, she could always end up as Sansa had, with no protection and nothing to see, for all of her ambitions.

She did not pity Sansa, for she had escaped Joffrey, and Margaery feared what might have happened, if the girl had not. But she knew that if she fell into Sansa's position, it would be a pitiable position indeed.

Willas swallowed. "I'm sorry," he said, and she glanced up sharply, feeling tears stinging at her eyes. "That you have to deal with him."

"Don't be," Margaery said, voice hoarse. "I was the one who chose him, after all."

Willas shook his head. "Our father chose him, Margaery," he reminded her gently, reaching out and touching her shoulder, and for a moment she was terrified that he was going to pull her into an embrace. He didn't, though, instead releasing her and changing the subject entirely.

"I wish that Grandmother's plot to have me marry her might have worked out," he said, and Margaery glanced up sharply. "Only...I think she probably might have been happier here, as you clearly are."

Margaery supposed that he was right, and what's more, she was glad to move on from the subject of her husband.

She felt as if a great weight had lifted itself from her shoulders, the closer their retinue had gotten to the Reach, and when she had entered the gates of Highgarden, she had felt liberated in a way she had not felt since marrying Renly.

She did not want to waste that feeling by focusing on Joffrey in her own home.

She cleared her throat, anyway. "We should talk of happier things," she said. "Arstice. How is he coming along?"

Willas gave her a knowing look; she had never been so good at her manipulations with him. "You saw my hawk two days ago, sweet sister, and you're the more likely to go hawking than I."

Margaery smiled. "And a lot can happen in two days," she reminded him.

Willas rolled his eyes. "He's fine. I visited him this morning."

Margaery smirked. "Aha," she murmured.

Willas raised a brow at her. "Oh, come," he said. "We both know that if Mama had allowed him, Garlan would have taken Arstice to the Iron Islands."

Margaery sighed, for she knew it was true.

“I just wish that all of us siblings could be together again,” Margaery whispered, leaning her head on Willas’ shoulder and closing her eyes.

Willas’ warm chuckle answered her. “Garlan wouldn't be pulled from a fight with those damnable Islanders even if the Crown demanded it, at this point."

Margaery shook her head. "They just might," she commented idly. "Everyone in Westeros may hate the people of the Iron Islands, but the Crown is growing concerned about the Dornish. If it comes to an open fight, we will need Garlan's troops defending the Pass."

Willas sighed. "You've always had a knack for these things," he muttered, with a small laugh. "Sometimes, I confess, I felt quite dull beside you when we were children."

Margaery swatted at her brother's arm. "What nonsense," she muttered. "You were always better with figures than I. And you were Grandmother's favorite, so you were guaranteed to become the best of us all."

Willas rolled his eyes fondly. "I was Grandmother's favorite until I confessed I was still friendly with Prince Oberyn," he said. "And then she remembered that you were much smarter than I."

Margaery stiffened at the mention of Prince Oberyn rather than rejoining, and it took Willas only a moment to realize it. "You were grandmother's favorite until I grew a pair of tits," she corrected him, a little too much heat behind the words.

"Margaery," Willas said gently, turning her face toward him with the crook of his finger, "Please, will you tell me..." he glanced away. "How did he die?"

Margaery swallowed. If she had not wanted to speak about her husband, she wanted this conversation even less. Damn her brother for bringing her out here, where no one would overhear them. Damn him for asking in the first place, even if he had every right to do so.

She closed her eyes, and saw Sansa's panicked expression in the Black Cells, as Margaery told her the only way she knew how to fix this. How open she had been, how trusting, when Margaery told her that there was no other way that would not lead to an open war that her family would not fight.

"Fighting Gregor Cl-"

"You know that's not what I meant," he interrupted her gently, and Margaery swallowed again.

"Willas..."

"Margaery, please." She glanced up, met his eyes and swallowed again. Those tears that had been threatening to spill did so now, and she thought of how hard it might have been, to spend a lifetime writing only letters to Sansa, knowing that she could never see the other girl because of an impediment Sansa gave her, because of how greatly their families detested one another.

Margaery looked away, stared at the horse in lieu of her brother, because somehow, that was easier.

"He died bravely," she said softly. "He died avenging his sister and her children."

She did not have the heart to finish that sentence, not aloud to her brother. _And he died because of me_.

She wondered if he already knew, or suspected. She knew that he had his spies in those little children in Oldtown, but did not know how great his reach went. Or, perhaps he had simply asked Loras, who would not have withheld the truth from him, she knew.

He would not have seen a reason to do so. Would have thought Margaery in the right, in any case.

Margaery could remember the day Willas had told them why the Tyrells and the Martells hated one another so much. Sure, there were territorial issues between them, and age old grudges that neither party would let go, but the real truth of their rivalry had nothing at all to do with any of that, not in their father's eyes, and certainly not in Olenna's.

Loras and Margaery had taken one look at each other after Willas had explained the tale of his crippling to them without the rose colored, indignant words of their father, and decided to keep that grudge for him.

It had been an anger which Margaery gradually attempted to force herself to forget, over the years, as Willas read her his letters from the Red Viper, entertaining and amusing as they were, as Prince Oberyn Martell sent gifts to the Reach each year, including dolls and gowns for Margaery which, despite her insistence to Willas she did not need, she loved as dearly as any other gifts, because Willas had wanted her to.

It had been easy to let go of the anger then, for Willas was her brother and she loved him whether he was a cripple or not, loved him because being a cripple had never made him lesser in Margaery's eyes.

But it had been an anger which Loras had flamed within her once more when he returned home from the Stormlands, and which she had allowed her heart to foster when she had met Prince Oberyn in King's Landing, standing tall and proud and threatening to steal away her Sansa.

She recognized that her own reaction had been somewhat uncalled for, but she had been furious, had allowed that fury to overtake her, once she learned what might happen to two of the people she loved most in the world because of that man.

She could have lost Sansa to Oberyn's plots. Could have lost Willas, who had trusted Oberyn and laughed over his letters and cared so much every time they were delivered by raven, and that fury had consumed her.

And even now that he was dead, Margaery could not bring herself to regret it.

She had saved Sansa's life, by convincing her to testify against Oberyn, and Sansa could be as angry as she liked about it for as long as she liked, and Willas could mourn his closest friend and feel ire that she did not, but Margaery would not regret what she had done.

She had thought Willas was going to die, and she had thought it was Oberyn's fault. For all any of them still knew, it was, and Oberyn was not the friend Willas had always thought him to be.

She took a deep breath, and glanced at her brother, hoped none of those thoughts shown in her eyes.

She knew the moment their eyes met that they had.

Willas looked away first, wiping at his face and making a sound low in his throat that had Margaery swallowing hard.

"Willas..." she started, because she needed to say something, but then it was too late.

A servant came running out, face pale and holding a letter sealed with a Tyrell rose, and Margaery turned away from her brother.

"From Ser Leo Tyrell, Your Grace," the page said, bowing as he handed over the letter, and Margaery wiped her hands on her riding gown, reaching out and snatching it from the boy's hands.

"Urgent?" she asked, before she saw that the Tyrell rose was not green, but black. She paled, thought of that fucking fortune teller in Flea Bottom, and ripped the letter open, skimmed through it as the page still waited, as Willas wouldn't meet her eyes, and her world ground to a halt.

"Oh no," Margaery whispered, staring down at the letter.

Willas glanced at her, voice and eyes dead when he spoke. "What is it?"


	263. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nope, Garlan is relatively safe. For now.

Sansa supposed it was a good thing that she had made friends with Megga when she did, if friends were what they were now.

Tyrion wasn't speaking to her again. She had thought that this would happen, with the strange conversation they'd had while Tommen slept against her, but she still felt strange, as if there was cotton in her mouth or something.

She couldn’t explain it, but Sansa almost felt worse, after that conversation.

Which was why she found herself going to Megga's chambers again that afternoon, after a long morning of knitting in which she felt as if Tyrion's eyes were following her the entire time.

She knocked on the door, and no one answered, but Sansa could hear voices within. She blushed, and knocked again.

She felt vaguely nervous about this entire...relationship she was cultivating with Megga, or maybe Megga was cultivating with her, and she didn't want to mess it up.

The door opened moments later, and Elinor, standing on the other side, blinked at her in surprise. "Sansa," she murmured, and Sansa took a half step back, already feeling awkward, for the look Elinor gave her was hardly inviting. "Did you want something?"

Sansa glanced around her, and saw that half of Margaery's ladies were in the room, gathered around the bed, where Alla was seated, something in her hands and tears streaming down her face.

"Is...is something wrong?" she asked, and Elinor sighed, opening the door wide and gesturing for her to come in. The gesture didn't seem to go along with the other girl's body language, and Sansa felt rather awkward, stepping around her to come inside, like perhaps she shouldn't be here at all.

"It's fine," Alla said hoarsely, glancing up and wiping at her face. "Sansa should..." she shook her head. "She already knows."

Sansa raised an eyebrow. "What?" she asked, for she couldn’t think of anyone in King's Landing who knew less than her.

"It's my mother," Alla gasped out, burying her face in her hands. "She...she..."

Sansa glanced at the other girls, faces solemn, Megga's arms reaching out to wrap around the youngest of Margaery's ladies and pulling her close.

Alysanne stepped closer to Sansa, touching her arm. Sansa glanced at the younger girl, and Alysanne's eyes were wide and sad.

"She's dead," Alysanne murmured. "Alla's father, Ser Leo Tyrell, has just sent word."

Sansa swallowed hard.

Alla collapsed into Megga's arms, sobs wrenching out of her loudly as she clung to the other girl.

Sansa closed her eyes. She didn't know Alla very well, didn't know any of Margaery's ladies, though that was her own fault, in part; she had never taken the time to get to know them, because she had seen the way Margaery had been with Elinor, before, and had no interest in knowing that was reciprocated in any of the rest of Margaery's ladies.

But she could sympathize with the loss of a mother, Sansa thought, her mind instantly imagining what she had learned of her own mother, that she had been stripped naked and tossed in the river with her neck still cut, that she had died after watching the last of her sons and his wife die brutally in front of her.

And Alla was younger now than Sansa had been when she lost her mother.

"I'm so sorry," Sansa murmured, and Alla didn't look up, just buried herself a little further into Megga's touch.

Megga gave Sansa a sad nod, and Sansa swallowed hard, for it was on the tip of her tongue to ask Alla how her mother had died, but she knew that was none of her business.

"Do you...do you need anything?" Sansa asked, however, because she couldn't just sit here and do nothing.

Megga shook her head for Alla, running her fingers through the girl's plaited blonde hair. The girl didn't lift her head, still sobbing, the wrenching sounds echoing through Megga's chambers, and that was when Sansa noticed what Alla had been holding in her hands.

It was a letter, with a black symbol of a rose on the outside of it, and writing Sansa couldn't quite make out from where she was standing within. It stretched on rather long, but already it had been badly smudged, no doubt by Alla's tears.

Poor girl.

But still, Sansa's forehead wrinkled as she thought about what Alla had said, when she first walked in the room and asked what was wrong.

That Sansa already knew.

And she didn't. She didn't know about this, just because her husband was the Hand of the King, and the only time Sansa had ever even heard of Alla's mother ahd been when-

And then Sansa understood what Alla had meant, that Sansa already _knew_.

_"When will I return to my mother? To Highgarden? Will it be for the Spring feasting?"_

_"You will never return to your mother. You will return to Highgarden only once more, my lady. But after, you will never leave King's Landing again."_

Sansa shuddered, hugging herself, though she knew it was not for her to be comforted.

_"The snowy halls you will have again, and you will make it back to the cold courtyards of Winterfell once more."_

She swallowed, and the words left her before she could stop them. "It's all coming true," she whispered, and Elinor glanced up at her in concern. "All of it."

Alla's head shot up from where it lay buried in Megga's shoulder. "What are you...?" she stared at Sansa for several moments, and then her eyes widened, as if she had forgotten what she had said when Sansa entered the room, and she shot to her feet. "She did this!" Alla hissed out. "That witch!"

Megga reached out, grabbing Alla's arm in concern. "Alla, darling, what are you talking about?" she asked, while shooting a glance Sansa's way.

Sansa closed her eyes, because surely...

Margaery had acted so unconcerned about the whole thing, that for a moment or two, Sansa had let herself forget about the woman in Flea Bottom's prophecy. And then after that, when Margaery had gotten on that ship, Sansa hadn't wanted to think about the prophecy at all.

But here it was, coming back to haunt all of them once more, and if the witch had been right about this, what else had she been right about?

"The witch," Alla said, and when Sansa opened her eyes, the girl's lower lip was trembling. Sansa looked away, unable to look at her. Margaery hadn't believed, but it was clear that Alla knew exactly what she was referring to, had in fact thought of it before Sansa.

Nysterica, Margaery's septa whom Sansa had so rarely seen in the company of the other girls before today, stepped forward at that. "A witch?" she asked, disgust flitting across her features before she did a better job of hiding it.

The girl was quite young for a septa, and not particularly pretty for one of Margaery's companions, but Sansa had never seen the other girl frowning. She was frowning now.

Alla nodded, tears filling her eyes, now. "We encountered one the last time we went into the city," she stammered out. "And she told us...She told us..." she shook her head. "She did this, I know it. She cast some horrible spell on my mother, and now..."

Another sob overtook her, and she gasped out her next few breaths, clearly unable to continue her words.

"Alla, sit down, please," Megga said, taking Alla's arm and leading her back to the bed. "Please, this is a horrible shock, and you're not well."

Alla shook her head, fighting against Megga's grip, but the other girl was bigger and taller than her, and pushed her down into the bed anyway. "No, I..."

"Alla, breathe," Megga hissed, until Alla did so, sucking in great, gulping breaths of air, and Sansa looked away, reminded without wanting to be of the way Margaery had said that to her in the Black Cells.

Nysterica moved forward then, her gaze oddly intense, and Sansa swallowed at the steely resolve in the young woman's eyes.

"We will find her," Nysterica promised, squeezing Alla's hands until the other girl glanced up at her. "Alla, we will find this woman, and she will pay for this."

Sansa felt a shudder run through her, had the selfish thought that she had not asked her third question of the woman.

"Nysterica..." Megga started, and Nysterica shot her a look that quelled even lighthearted Megga.

"She did this," Alla repeated, whispering the words like a chant. "That witch killed my mother. Oh gods..." she glanced up, all eyes, toward Sansa. "Ser Loras."

Sansa felt cold dread rush through her, as she realized that it wasn't just her imagination, that someone else had had the same thought as she.

But Alla was crying again, and Nysterica turned hard eyes toward Sansa. "What is she talking about?" she asked, and Sansa had never heard her voice so cold.

Sansa swallowed. "She cursed Loras, too."

Nysterica went pale, but then Elinor was speaking, nearly stumbling over her words. "They're just words," she said harshly, standing and pulling Sansa aside harshly. "This is just...a horrible coincidence, but they're just words."

Alla's face was red as she lifted her head, but it wasn't from her crying, Sansa saw. The girl was furious. "She'll pay for them, nonetheless," she whispered, and there was a steely resolve to her voice that had Sansa wondering if perhaps Margaery wasn't the only thorny rose of the bunch.

Elinor touched Sansa's arm. "Please," she said. "She's suffering enough now, don't you think?"

Sansa stared at her. "I...I'm sorry," she said finally. "I didn't mean to cause more distress. I can..." she shook her head, started toward the door, but then Elinor's hand was clutching at her arm again.

"No!" she said, and her cry was a little too startled. Sansa thought about what Megga had implied that Margaery had tasked all of her ladies with keeping an eye on Sansa, and she once more resented that. "No, you don't have to go. I just..." she lowered her voice. "Maybe just don't mention the fortune teller again, all right?"

Sansa nodded, glancing over at Alla, pitching her voice low. "How did she die?" she asked, morbidly curious.

Elinor shook her head. "There was a complication in her pregnancy," she said, and then bit her lip rather hard. "Alla didn't even know."

Sansa shuddered, glancing down at the letter, now fallen to the floor. "I'm sorry to hear that," she said, and wondered if, back in the Reach, Margaery already knew.

The ship, she thought, the words tumbling through her mind. The woman had warned them about a ship, about Loras, and Margaery had gone and taken that ship anyway.

She shook her head. Elinor was right. This was all...superstitious nonsense. A coincidence, at the worst.

Alla hadn't even known that her mother was pregnant with another child.

Sansa swallowed, glancing at the crying girl once more, a dread filling her that she couldn't quite explain, for some part of her thought that this was only the beginning, that, against all logic and reason, the rest of those prophecies were about to come true, as well.


	264. SANSA

As guilty as she still felt over Oberyn's death, and her own part in it, a part of Sansa knew that she had merely been a pawn to him, in his stake in the games.

She didn't know if she had been anything more than that, though she knew that it was likely not the case, if what she chose to believe - what Margaery chose to believe - was indeed the truth.

And Sansa was sick and tired of being a pawn.

She remembered how friendly Margaery had been to her, when they were still starting to get to know each other. When Margaery was getting to know her merely because she wanted to know what it would be like, marrying Joffrey.

And now that they were beyond that, now that she...trusted Margaery, perhaps even more than she should, there was a part of Sansa that wondered about that.

Wondered why Margaery had devoted so much time to befriending her, to learning about what a monster Joffrey was, if she was still going to marry him.

That thought had stuck with Sansa for such a long time, buried at the back of her mind since the wedding, but now that Margaery was no longer here, now that Megga was befriending Sansa for reasons unknown, Sansa couldn't help but wonder about it.

Olenna Tyrell was a powerful matriarch, and she may not be the Queen Mother, but Sansa had seen how irritated she was, with the thought of her beloved granddaughter marrying Joffrey, after Sansa told them both the truth about him.

She couldn't believe the woman had allowed it, if she were being honest. Couldn't believe the woman hadn't packed Margaery up a long time ago and carted her away to Highgarden, where she would be safe.

And it made Sansa wonder, now, if Highgarden was the retreat that it should have been, if Margaery was relieved to be there now, instead of here, with her husband.

With Sansa.

But even while she had been angry at Margaery for all but abandoning her here, she understood why the other woman had done it. Things had not been the same between them since Oberyn, and while Sansa missed the simple (ha!) way things had been before, she had a feeling that their...whatever they had...would never return to that.

They had irrevocably wrapped themselves round one another in this sick game, and the spiral would only continue. Sansa had chosen a side, and she could not let go of it without also letting go of Margaery.

She understood, sort of, where things stood with Margaery.

She didn't understand at all where things stood with Megga Tyrell. The girl, for all that she was loud and brash and let her opinions be known whether they were to the King or to her ladies or suitors, was an enigma.

Sansa was beginning to wonder if they took lessons in that sort of thing, in Highgarden. In making themselves look transparent without being so at all.

And she was beginning to hate it.

"How is she?" Sansa asked, over her tea cup, squinting at Megga.

Megga had invited her to a "game of cyvasse" in the Maidenvault, and Sansa hadn't realized until she arrived that she had in fact been invited to a high stakes game of gambling being played amongst the men who stuck around court looking for wives (or conquests) and the wealthier of those ladies.

The large parlor room, just off the Queen's chambers, was bustling with activity, and with drink, and a bard, singing in the corner, and this wasn't the sort of activity Margaery had ever invited Sansa to, though she knew that Margaery had participated in events like this before.

Sansa couldn't help but wonder why Margaery refused to invite her to such things, though Joffrey was sometimes present, even if he wasn't today, and Megga did.

She wondered if perhaps Megga didn't know what Margaery did; that Sansa didn't have a coin to her name, and that she certainly would never be comfortable with asking her husband for money to gamble with.

But that was silly. Everyone in King's Landing knew that Sansa owned a grand total of seven dresses, these days, and Megga seemed far more perceptive than most of the ladies at court.

Megga glanced up at Sansa over a cup of what she had earlier termed "tea." From her flushed cheeks, Sansa didn't think that was the case.

"Who?" Megga asked, just as one of the young lords turned to her.

"Are you in or out, my lady?" he asked, gesturing to the two young men leaning over a table intensely, both staring at the board.

Megga smirked coyly. "All in," she said, to the surprised gasps of the people sitting in a semi circle around them, pushing a pile of jingling silver coins forward.

The man sitting beside Megga smirked, too. "You sure?" he asked her, leaning a bit too close.

Megga's smirk widened. "Let's make it more fun, shall we?" she asked, and then she was reaching up around her neck, pulling off a golden necklace there.

Sansa thought she had seen that necklace before.

"Megga..." Sansa started, but Megga merely beamed at her.

"I have a good sense about these things," Megga said, winking at her and placing her necklace into a steadily growing pile, as the other women around the table placed their bets in.

The two men actually playing the game sent each other glances Sansa couldn't read, and then Megga was leaning into Sansa's space.

"She's...doing well, for what happened," Megga said, smile never leaving her face, a weird contrast to her words. "She and her mother were very close. Alla is...not quite as young as Alysanne, but she is still quite young."

Sansa hummed in sympathy. "Is she going back home?" she asked, taking another sip of tea.

Megga shrugged. "I doubt it," she said. "Margaery will not risk being gone for much longer," she said, and Sansa's head jerked up, for she hadn't thought of that.

"You know when she's returning?" she asked.

Megga smiled widely. "I have something for you, perhaps," she said, winking at Sansa, and Sansa's heart fluttered, even knowing that Margaery had asked her for space.

She didn't know what it was Megga was offering, a letter or a message, but she didn't care. She knew it would be risky for Margaery to send a raven directly to her, but Sansa hadn't expected Margaery to send her anything, during this trip.

"Oh!" the crowd around the table gasped suddenly, and Sansa turned her attention back to the game, noticed Megga's face falling.

"Damn," she murmured, and the men around the group started to laugh.

"Better luck next time," one of them murmured, pulling the pile of coins that not just Megga had contributed to into a large purse.

Megga sent a playful glare in the direction of the losing cyvasse player. "We had a lot riding on you," she told him, and he ducked his head, grinning and taking another gulp of the wine in front of him.

"Perhaps you'll win it back," the one who had taken the coins said, and Megga raised a skeptical eyebrow in his direction.

"From you?" she asked, smirking. "Please."

The young man looked playfully dejected for only a moment or two, before holding out a hand to her. "Dance?" he asked her, winking. "And then you can decide."

Megga cocked her head, just as the bard who had been singing stepped down. "There's no more music," she said coyly, and Sansa blushed despite herself.

She wondered if this was what it was like in Highgarden, what Margaery had hinted at.

The young man glanced rather pointedly down Megga's gown. "I think we can be resourceful," he said, and Megga reached out, taking Sansa's hand and squeezing it.

"Be back in a moment, dear," she said, winking at Sansa, and then she was allowing the young lord to lead her away.

Sansa gritted her teeth, suddenly sitting alone in a group of people she had never bothered to interact with before, and uncertain of what to do now that Megga had essentially abandoned her.

"Lady Sansa," a voice said, and she blinked, turning to stare at the Blue Bard, who was standing in front of her with his hand extended.

Sansa swallowed hard. "I...hello," she said, and couldn't think of a single instance when the Blue Bard had approached her, didn't quite know how to respond, suddenly.

As a rule, men in King's Landing didn't tend to come to her.

The Blue Bard had come to King's Landing with Margaery, she knew, around the time of her betrothal to Margaery. He was a young man, expressively pretty, almost like a girl, and was a beautiful singer. He had sung at Margaery's wedding to Joffrey, between the times when Joffrey had been using the singers to humiliate Sansa and her husband, but Sansa had not been able to pay much attention to his singing, at the time.

She wasn't even certain what his real name was.

"Would you like to dance?" he asked her, batting long eyelashes, and Sansa swallowed thickly, glancing around.

She noticed that there were other couples, standing in the middle of the parlor, standing close together and swaying, though no music was playing. She didn't see Megga, however.

Sansa swallowed again. "I..."

The Blue Bard's face softened. "I...Would not mean to impugn a lady's honor," he said. "Only...I would like to speak to you of something, if you are so willing."

Sansa raised an eyebrow at the formal words, but stood, following the Blue Bard out onto the makeshift dance floor, flinching a little when he placed his hand on her waist.

He didn't seem to notice, pulling her flush against his body, and somehow, it made her think of Janek. Sansa swallowed, pulled a little away from him.

"Ser..." she swallowed, realized abruptly that she didn't know what to call him. Didn't know if he had been given any accolades for his services, by House Tyrell. Still didn't even know his name.

The Blue Bard smiled, and then he was moving forward, his lips whispering against her hair, and Sansa shivered a little.

"I have something for you," he said, and Sansa jerked back, blinking at him.

"What...?"

And then his hand on her waist was moving, and she flinched a little as they were pulled closer again, to a music that the Blue Bard only seemed to hear. And then she felt it.

The scrape of parchment against her gown, and Sansa blinked as the folded piece of paper slipped into her open palm. She blinked down at it, then up at the Blue Bard, who dipped his head once.

Sansa swallowed thickly, tucking the letter away with a warm feeling in her chest as the Blue Bard stepped away from her, bowing deeply.

Sansa glanced around. No one appeared to think they had been doing anything strange.

The letter rubbed against the dagger Margaery had given her, two presents that Sansa would not soon forget.

She swallowed, wondered if she could leave now to read whatever it was the Blue Bard had handed her without it looking suspicious, after so little time here.

And then she saw the lords still playing that game of cyvasse, one of them waving out to her, and, despite her eagerness to read that letter, for she knew who it had to have been from, Sansa didn't quite want to leave.

This was the first time, she couldn’t help but think, since she had watched her father killed that Sansa felt as if she were just another lady in King's Landing, and a part of her would always cling to that, she knew.

"You want in?" one of the lords asked her, blinking at her as if he hadn't seen Sansa humiliated dozens of times in the throne room before. As if she were...just another of the ladies.

Sansa shrugged, leaning forward. "My husband, you can add it to his tab, yes?" she asked, and the man grinned widely.

"The Hand of the King? Sure," he said, and then the next game was starting, and Sansa found herself leaning forward, invested in the game despite herself.

She exchanged her tea for something a bit stronger somewhere near the end of the game, heard the music coming back, and then she was standing and swaying, and Megga was touching her arm once more.

"Sansa?" she asked, and there was amusement in her tone.

Sansa glanced up at her. "Yes?"

Megga smiled at her. "The Blue Bard is singing again," she said, "And the song is not to my taste. I'll walk you back to the Tower of the Hand. I'm sure your husband will want an explanation for why half his accounts are gone."

Sansa glanced in dismay at the playing board, and then blinked. "You won?" she asked, turning to the man she had bet on.

He grinned at her. "You're a lucky woman," he said, giving her a sultry glance, and Sansa blushed fiercely as the group laughed, and Megga pulled Sansa to her feet.

"For shame, Donil," she mockingly told the man. "Sansa here is a married woman."

Sansa blushed again, suddenly feeling far more sober, and then Megga was pulling her out of the parlor and into the open corridors of the Maidenvault.

There were far less guards here, Sansa noticed, without the Queen to protect.

"Did you have fun?" Megga asked her, as Sansa swayed and reached up to rub at her cheeks.

"I think I drank a bit too much," she admitted, and Megga giggled.

"Yes, that does seem to be a problem, at these types of parties," she admitted, and Sansa squinted at her.

"Do they happen often?" she asked.

Megga winked at her. "If you have an invitation," she said. "Sometimes, Joffrey himself comes to them, but it's much better when he's not around."

"The King," Sansa corrected her, and Megga shrugged.

"Anyway," she said, leading Sansa along. "I have something for you. Do you still want it?" and then she was pulling Sansa into an empty corridor, shoving something warm into her hands. Sansa glanced down. It was the pile of coins that she seemed to have forgotten she had won.

It was then that she noticed how flushed Megga was, and Sansa thought of the letter the Blue Bard had given her, wondered how the two of them had planned that as she took out the sealed letter he had given her.

Megga's eyes widened and she slapped Sansa's wrist, giving her a sharp look and motioning for her to put it away with the coins. Sansa was beginning to wish that she had larger pockets.

"Did you win back your coins?" she asked, trying not to sound judgmental and not quite certain whether she succeeded.

Megga grinned at her. "You know, Margaery's always on about how innocent you are," she said, and smirked. "I think she should invite you to way more of these parties."

Sansa found herself smiling; too, as she clutched the letter the Blue Bard had given to her close to her chest face before she thanked Megga, giving the other girl a quick hug that clearly startled her.

"Thank you," she whispered, and Megga eyed her for a moment, before smiling widely.

"Of course," she murmured. "I hope...I hope you like it," she teased, giving Sansa a scandalous wink.

Sansa blinked at her. "Like...what?" she asked, brows furrowing.

Megga snorted. "The gift," she said. "The letter."

Sansa flushed. "Megga..."

"I know, I know," Megga said, still smirking. "Young love. Secretive, and all that."

Sansa rolled her eyes, glancing around the corridor. It wasn't just that, and certainly the other girl most know that. If anyone found out...

"Sansa," Megga said, and from the seriousness of her tone, Sansa glanced up once more, sharply.

Sansa blinked at her. "What is it?" she asked, heart skipping a beat. "Is it Margaery...?"

"Oh, no," Megga assured her. "It's only...I spoke to the Blue Bard earlier, and...We haven't been able to find her," Megga whispered, and Sansa blinked at her.

"Find who?" she asked, wondering if perhaps the drinks she'd had addled her more than she'd thought.

Megga rolled her eyes, moving closer. "Why, the witch, of course. The one whom Alla says cursed her mother and Loras."

Sansa swallowed. "I see," she said, and hated that there was some spark of relief in her, at hearing the news.

Megga's eyes narrowed, and she glanced over Sansa. It took Sansa a moment to realize that was concern in her face. "Are you all right? Sansa, did she curse you, too?"

Sansa shook her head. Hard. "No," she blurted out. Then, "No, she just..." another shake of the head. "She didn't curse me."

Megga raised an eyebrow. "All...right," she said, pulling a little away from Sansa. "Well, I was going to tell you another bit of weird gossip going around the Keep lately, but now I don't think I will."

Sansa rolled her eyes. "Don't be like that," she said, and was surprised at how teasing her own tone was.

Megga wrapped her arm around Sansa's, pulling her along as they walked back to the Tower of the Hand. Sansa no longer felt wobbly, but she found herself leaning into Megga, nonetheless.

It took her a moment to realize that Megga was leaning into her, too.

"Maester Quyburn is doing experiments for Cersei in the lower levels," Megga confided in her. "Experiments I've...never seen a maester perform."

Sansa raised a brow. She knew about the maester, the strange one who had saved Jaime Lannister's arm, though that was hardly what he was known for in King's Landing these days. But the fact that he was doing experiments was hardly knew, for she'd heard mutterings from her husband about the crazy man Cersei employed, whom he almost seemed frightened of.

Her husband did not seem frightened of a great many people.

But she was surprised, to hear that Megga had heard of the man. Cersei kept him a careful secret, and besides, it was not the sort of thing a carefree young girl like Megga tended to think about, Sansa couldn't help but believe.

Still, she was intrigued that Megga had brought it up at all, especially here. They were alone, of course, but anyone could hear them.

Against her smallclothes where she had tucked the letter from Margaery, Sansa could feel it burning into her skin.

"What?" she asked, blinking and pausing to stare at Megga.

Megga motioned for her to keep walking, and Sansa stumbled along beside her.

"What...How do you know that?" Sansa asked. Surely it wasn't the sort of thing spoken about, not with Cersei Lannister back in King's Landing to protect her maester.

Megga grimaced. "I saw one, once," she said, eyes flicking away from Sansa. "I wasn't supposed to be down there, but..." she looked away. "Margaery has this way of asking you to do something that just makes you want to do it."

Sansa understood that sentiment, as well. She waited for Megga to continue, wondered why the other girl had brought it up, at all.

"She wanted me to figure out if Cersei was doing anything...untoward, here. She thinks..." she took a deep breath. "She's worried."

So was Sansa, with that tone of voice.

"So I followed her around for a time. I don't think Cersei even realized it, but then I followed her into the lower levels, saw her speaking to Maester Quyburn, and...you know that Mountain, the...thing that killed Prince Oberyn?"

Sansa flinched, and Megga took an actual step back.

"I'm sorry," she stuttered out. "I didn't mean to upset you. I don't have to tell you, if you don't want to hear."

Sansa hugged herself. "I want to hear," she murmured, and Megga eyed her for a moment, before nodding, leaning forward as if imparting a great secret.

"He's...Maester Quyburn is doing experiments on the body," she said, and Sansa startled, turning to stare at her incredulously.

"Surely not," she breathed, but Megga merely nodded miserably.

"He is," she confirmed. "I saw one, once, and then I ran away because I was frightened that he saw me."

"The Mountain?" Sansa asked, her breaths shortening, the image of Oberyn that she had never quite been able to get out of her head springing to mind, fo the Mountain, stabbing the eyes out of Oberyn's head with his own fingers.

"No," Megga said, sending her a look. "Maester Quyburn. He's such an...unsettling figure, I didn't want him to notice me so I ran away when he looked up once, and I haven't quite summoned up the courage to go down there again."

Sansa squinted at her, a horrifying truth settling in, just then. "Megga," she said, and tried to keep her voice light, though she doubted that she managed it. "Is that why you befriended me?" she asked. "Because you want someone else to go down into the lower levels for you?"

Megga went pale. "Of course not," she said. "Sansa, we're not friends."

Sansa's head jerked up. "What?" she asked, and was surprised at how pained she felt, at those words.

Megga was blushing, now, and she glanced around at the empty corridor. "I'm sorry," she said. "I thought you understood that, from our first conversation. The Queen ordered me to keep an eye on you, and that is exactly what I have been doing." She bit her lip, looking rather guilty, now. "You seem like a nice girl, Sansa, but I've been spending so much time with you because that is what my queen demanded of me and unlike the other ladies, I took that mandate seriously."

Sansa felt the blood rushing from her face. Every time she thought she had learned something, only to realize she was just that stupid little girl all over again!

"I..." she didn't know what to say. "I see," she said, finally.

Megga gave her a look that was almost sympathetic.

"But honestly, do you think the Queen would want me to drag you down to the lower levels for this sort of mission?" Megga asked. "She wouldn't. She's far too worried about you as it is. She wouldn't even invite you to one of these secret parties in case Cersei figured out about it and found some way to punish you for it."

Sansa stared at her, unable to respond to any of that, just now. Unable to even figure out what to say. "I..." Sansa shook her head. “Megga...”

“Sansa,” Megga interrupted her, reaching out and taking Sansa’s hands in hers. Sansa flinched back, and Megga’s face softened. “Girls are disappearing. Serving girls, and ladies who are dispensable members of the court. And...I’m scared.”

Sansa licked her lips. She hadn’t noticed that, but, combined with what Megga had just told her about the Mountain, it frightened her, too. She didn’t know what it meant, anymore than she thought Megga did, didn’t know how to put those pieces together, but Megga was right; it was frightening.

Still, with what Megga had just said, she didn’t feel particularly sympathetic. “And why should I help you?” she asked.

Megga chewed on her lower lip for a moment, clearly weighing the question, and Sansa wondered how she hadn’t put that together. The way the other Tyrell girls had reacted when Sansa had come to Megga’s rooms and seen Alla crying, as if she didn’t belong there. The studious way Megga sometimes looked at Sansa, as Margaery once had, when she wasn’t quite Sansa’s friend, either.

And it stung far more than it should.

"I'm not asking you to come with me because we're friends and I'm frightened," Megga said, "Or because it is what the Queen ordered of me."

Sansa swallowed. "I wasn't aware you were asking me at all," she said, and thought about how she could get this girl in trouble with just one word to Tyrion, telling him that she had been spying on his sister.

And immediately felt guilty for the thought. If it had been under Margaery's orders, she woudl be getting Margaery in trouble, too, and as annoyed as she suddenly was with the toher girl for leading her on (or, not doing so, as Megga seemed to think) she didn't want to hurt Margaery.

Megga made a face, pulling Sansa closer, until their noses were almost touching. "I'm asking you to come with me because you seem bored out of your mind here, and I think you could use a bit of intrigue, no matter what Margaery thinks about shielding you from it. You keep sitting here, wasting away, and you'll find your hair turning grey."

Sansa jerked away from her. "Margaery..."

"Is trying to protect you," Megga agreed. "I know. I jut don't think you need it."

Sansa blinked at her. "What?"

Megga didn't give her a moment to process those words. "And," she reached out, taking Sansa's arm, "You're Sansa Stark. The King is hardly going to allow his mother to execute you for spying on her pet maester. So." She met Sansa's eyes, and there was not a hint of guilt in them. "What do you say?"

Sansa swallowed hard, a sinking feeling in her gut. “What would it matter?” she asked, pulling away entirely from the other girl. “Honestly? If we found out where those girls are going, if we found out what that maester is doing with the Mountain’s body, what would that do?”

Megga lifted her chin. “You’ve been here a long time, Sansa Stark,” she said. “And I know that in some ways, that has made you smarter about the things that go on here. But I also know that it’s made you tired.” Sansa opened her mouth to protest that, but Megga kept speaking. “We’re helping the Queen, Sansa. The Queen Mother is dangerous, and Margaery needs to be able to protect herself from that woman’s plots. And you can help her do that.”

Sansa chewed on her lower lip. When Megga said it like that, even if the other girl was rather mean, she couldn't help but think...

“Fine,” she gritted out, pushing past Megga. “But I’m doing this for Margaery, not for you.”

Megga’s smile was cold. “I would expect nothing less,” she said.


	265. CERSEI

This was nice, Cersei thought. She could not remember the last time she had supper with her son without any unwanted interlopers with them.

And now it was just she and Joffrey, at his request, which Cersei had been surprised at before she remembered that when Joffrey did take his meals alone, they would normally be in the presence of his little wife, these days.

Hanging from his arm, eyes laughing at everything that Cersei said, whispering things that Cersei could not hear in her son's ears.

The thought that it had been so long since she had been alone with her son had angered her, and she came to her son's chambers resolved to take back the influence she'd once had over her son, whatever she had to do to gain it, the moment he invited her to eat with him this night.

She wasn't going to let that little whore win now that she was a hundred leagues away. Joffrey was her son, and the little queen would do well to remember that, once Cersei had exhausted the time she had alone with her son.

Joffrey was waiting in his chambers when she arrived, a smirk on his face as it always was these days, and that was a disconcerting realization, that he had learned that expression from his bitch of a wife.

That she had that level of influence over him.

Cersei closed her eyes, sitting down at the dining table beside her son and allowing the servants to pour their wine. And then she ordered them away, and Joffrey raised an eyebrow, but waved them off after a moment's pause, a moment that had Cersei gritting her teeth.

The influence that bitch had over her son was more entrenched than she had thought, apparently.

Joffrey took a sip of his wine, grimaced, and set it aside, reaching for his plate, and, after a pause, Cersei did the same.

There were some things she did want to remember, come morning.

"I'm glad that we could do this together," Cersei spoke up, when the silence grew too long and she began to wonder if her son was angry with her over something, if that was why he had called her here.

Joffrey shrugged. "The Small Council has been nagging me all day,” he said. “I’m sure they’ve treated you the same.”

Cersei raised an eyebrow. She remembered when Joffrey was young, how he would watch the way Robert treated her, never physically harming her because Jaime was always nearby, but always with his snide comments, and fucking of whores, sometimes right in front of her.

And she had known that her son took that to heart, had known that a part of him hated the way his mother was treated, even if the rest of him was colder than Cersei had ever thought possible to the sufferings of others.

But his sympathy had always been expressed far more covertly; a request for her to have commissioned a new sword for his practice, so that she felt useful. A comment to his father that got him slapped, or telling the Hound to go and guard her chambers, this night, and send away anyone who came near because she was ill.

Considerate things, like that, which she had grown to love. That, she thought, was part of the reason why she resented his new wife so badly; she was able to elicit the same responses, at times, and Cersei hated that she had to share that part of her son with anyone else.

“I will endure, my love,” she said, and Joffrey shifted in his seat, taking another bite of his food.

“I don’t think you are,” he said, and Cersei lifted her head, surprised.

“My love?”

He grimaced. “You’re drinking too much,” he said, and Cersei went still, blinking at the boy.

“Joffrey...” she glanced at her untouched wine glass.

“I want you to stop,” he interrupted her, and Cersei ground her teeth.

She reached out, placing her hand over his and squeezing it, and wondered if this was yet another one of Margaery Tyrell’s ploys, to take one of her few other pleasures from Cersei, the way she had taken Jaime away from her.

“I’m not your father, Joffrey,” she said gently, because some part of her wondered if that was what he was worried about, that she was becoming a drunken slob, the way Robert had done.

A part of her felt a great deal of annoyance that, in his head, Joffrey should make such a comparison.

Joffrey lifted his head, met her eyes, and there was no concern in his, no sympathy. “I know,” he said. “That is why I can order you to stop drinking, Mother.”

Cersei stilled. “All right,” she said finally, even as the scent of sweetwine called to her. “I will stop, if that is what you desire so.”

Joffrey nodded. “It is,” he said, and he snatched his hand away from her. “I’m glad you’ll see sense, Mother.”

They ate in silence.

Then, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, Joffrey said, “I hope you are not angry that I gave _The Maiden Slayer_ to Margaery,” he said.

Cersei schooled her expression, not daring to react in any obvious way. “I will admit, I was hurt, but I could see that she had more need of it at the time than I.” She smiled at Joffrey. “Besides, it is a beautiful ship, belonging to a Queen.”

There. So the bitch had given him the idea to make Cersei stop drinking. She knew her son, knew how he thought.

And that thought...hurt, that Margaery Tyrell was more concerned about Cersei’s sobriety than her own son.

Not that she could understand why the girl would care. Surely, in her eyes, it would be better for Cersei to drink away her feelings, that she be less capable of fighting against her. Not that that was at all the case, of course.

Still, Cersei let none of those thoughts show on her face.

"You miss her," Cersei said, reaching out to touch her son, but the boy flinched away.

"I'm fine," he snapped.

Cersei shook her head, clasping her hands in her lap. "It's perfectly natural," she said, though a part of her was gleeful, that the boy at least understood that there was no reason for him to miss the whore. "She is your wife, and a King has...needs. Besides, I suppose she is rather pretty."

Joffrey shrugged. "I don't like her because of my needs," he snapped at his mother. "Any common whore could help with those. Margaery is..."

Cersei swallowed, her eyes narrowing. "She's different," she surmised.

Joffrey nodded, looking somewhat relieved, and Cersei wondered when had been the last time that her son had truly attempted to confide something in her. Certainly before Margaery had come along and stolen his affections from her.

Perhaps when he had told her that he had no interest in marrying Sansa Stark, and wasn't that a horrifying thought. He hadn't confided in her about his plans to have Ned Stark killed regardless of his confession, hadn't confided in her when he decided to have all of Robert's bastards in King's Landing killed until it was too late for her to do anything about it, not that she would have done so.

It felt...good, to know that her son was looking to her for direction once more. It meant that the Highgarden Whore had not sunken her claws in him too deep to do any good at getting them out once more.

"Yes," Joffrey said, clearing his throat. "And I wish..." he shook his head, and Cersei stared at her son, who was hardly used to flights of fancy.

He shook his head. "She is...helpful, in these trying times. That's all. She ought to return soon. Her brother is hardly sick, if you're here, after all."

Cersei reached out, touching her son's arm. "The Queen should attend to the needs of the King before that of the family she left to join ours, my love," she said, and he shifted away from her once more, picking up a fork and stabbing at the meat on his plate once more.

"Yes, well," he said idly, "She's attending to all of her duties, after all." He shook his head. "Soon you'll have to return to see to your husband's wellbeing, as well." He eyed her. "Do you miss him?"

Cersei blinked at him, struggling against the urge to grind her teeth. "If...if it would please you, my dear, I would much rather stay here, at the very least until he is well. He may be my husband, but we do not have..." she cleared her throat. "There is no bond between us," she said finally.

Joffrey lifted his head, squinting at her. "Does your husband mistreat you, Mother?" he asked, and Cersei swallowed, remembered that her son had always idolized Robert as much as he had hated him. He had seen the way Robert had treated her throughout their marriage, and if she told Joffrey that Willas did indeed mistreat her, she knew enough of her son to know that the boy would kill him in an instant.

Still, it would not be believable, with Willas Tyrell's well known kindly temperament, and the fact that he was a cripple, hardly capable of getting out of bed on his own.

"Of course not, my love," she said, smiling coolly, keenly aware of how closely Joffrey was studying her. For a boy who was always so caught up in his own self, he could be terribly observant when he wanted to be. "He is only...I would much prefer to spend time with my children than with him. He is...very young, for a woman with three children already." She shook her head.

Joffrey nodded. "I see," he said, and Cersei nodded, turning back to her own food.

"He seems rather a poor match for the Queen Mother, even if he is Margaery's brother," Joffrey said. "She said that she was only going to visit him out of duty."

Cersei blinked in surprise, for her reports had told her that the Tyrell children held nothing but affection for each other. It was exactly this report she had been thinking of, when she thought to implicate Loras in Margaery's adultery against her husband. She supposed it hardly mattered now, of course.

"Then I suppose she is to be commended for that," she said grudgingly, for it would not do to attempt to pull her son's interest from the whore too quickly, not with the precarious position she now held in her son's eyes.

Joffrey shrugged. "She will not be gone long, I am sure. But she is a perfect lady," he said, and Cersei reached for her glass of wine.

"If only she could be a perfect wife and grant you a child, my love," she said, and Joffrey raised an eyebrow.

"What?" he demanded, and there was darkness to his tone which Cersei did not appreciate at all.

She cleared her throat. "I only meant...it has been some time since the two of you were wed, my love," she said, backtracking quickly. "It is high time that she give birth to an heir."

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "We are young yet," he said, though something shifted in his features which had Cersei raising a brow as she studied him.

Her son was not nearly so smart as he thought he was, and Cersei usually took pride in the fact that she could read him like an open book. No doubt this was what made it so easy for Margaery to manipulate him. He was hiding something now, though, and Cersei was annoyed that she could not guess what it was.

If Margaery was pregnant, then he would not have allowed her to take a ship to Highgarden, likely would not have allowed her to go at all, because horseback could have been just as damaging.

"Do you want another child?" Joffrey asked abruptly, and Cersei almost spat out the wine she was swallowing.

"My love?" she asked incredulously.

"You are married again," Joffrey said, and Cersei bit the inside of her cheek, hating how he kept coming back to that. "Perhaps you desire another child, one who wouldn't have a claim to the throne." He shrugged. "One you could love."

Cersei stared at her son, eyes going wide. "I love you," she said, setting her glass of wine down and turning to face her son fully. She reached out, taking his hand in both of hers and kissing it. "I love you, and I don't need another child. I...My only wish is to have Myrcella here once more."

Joffrey eyed her suspiciously. "Then you and Willas have not...discussed the possibility, either," he said.

Cersei swallowed, and regretted ever bringing up the thought of Margaery having a child. "It is not even a possibility, my love," she said, forcing a smile. "You have nothing to be worried about, there. I care only for you, my children, wherever you are, and wish that you weren’t so far.”

Joffrey grunted. "I am sure it would do the realm some good to have a child come out of such a union," he said, and, for a moment, Cersei saw red. She forced herself to calm, not to reach for the glass of wine in front of her.

"I applaud your love for me, my son," she said gamely, "but I think that I am aged yet, to be having children."

Joffrey raised a brow. "Perhaps it might ease the distance between us and Myrcella," he offered, and this time, Cersei didn't try to hide the fact that she was grinding her teeth.

"I hardly think a man like Lord Willas having a child will placate the realm," she said, and something in Joffrey's eyes shifted, as he leaned forward.

"Truly?" he asked, and Cersei found herself nodding.

"Indeed. We have quite a few heirs and spares, at the moment," she assured her son, and there was something about the look in his eyes that told her this was important, something that brought panic bubbling up in her throat, at the thought of being forced to have a child who didn't belong to Jaime.

For surely the Tyrells would never allow her to get away with the things she had done as Robert's wife. Those fucking power graspers would want to ensure their place in the realm by any means possible, and Cersei was not going to give them a child to use against her, no matter what her son might believe was for the good of the realm.

But finally, Joffrey shrugged. "I'm sure Jaime will return with her soon, Mother," he promised, abruptly changing the topic, and Cersei swallowed, absurdly relieved. She could not bear the thought of carrying a Tyrell child in her womb, even if that would not be a problem, with the state of her current sham of a marriage.

But the thought of Jaime, that was a far better one.

"I know he will, my love," she said. "I have complete faith in him."

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "I don't know why. He's just as crippled as your new husband." And then he shrugged, stabbing at his meal once more.

Cersei did grind her teeth, then. "You should...have more faith in your uncle," she said, and she wanted so much to say something else there, but then, Jaime had hardly ever been a father to their children.

Cersei had been father and mother both, and she would do what she had to, to continue to be that for her children.

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "Of course you would say that," he said. "I wish that you would have sent someone more capable of defending my sister from those brutish Martells," he said. "Though I suppose this is a lost cause, either way."

Cersei swallowed. "It is not," she said, voice a little harsher than she had intended, and Joffrey eyed her. "Jaime will not fail us, my love. You will see your sister again, soon."

Joffrey harrumphed. "Yes," he said. "My sister. Newly a princess twice over, and spreading her legs already for some-"

Cersei lifted her hand, the urge to slap him overcoming her before she could think about it, and then she realized what she had been about to do, and lowered it, swallowing hard.

Joffrey eyed her hand, eyes widening before they hardened, and Cersei swallowed hard, aborting the motion and reaching for her wine.


	266. MYRCELLA

"Do I have to go back?" she asked, and the hands at her collar stilled.

She knew the answer to the question even before she asked it. Her uncle would not have traveled all of this way if the question was in doubt, and though her uncle was a rash man, he had seemed almost panicked, in his attempt to kidnap her.

It had not been until after he was arrested that he took the time to explain that there was a threat against her, that it had originated here in Dorne, and carried her necklace in its mouth.

She supposed she understood his irritation, then, but even still, she wished there were some other way this could all be resolved.

Ser Arys, her loyal guard here in Dorne, had almost died when Uncle Jaime realized the man knew nothing of the threat.

She sighed, shaking her head as she looked at her reflection in the mirror, pursing her lips. It was not a reflection she was used to, these days.

The dress she wore now was far more conservative than the ones she had been wearing in Dorne for some time, cognizant of her uncle's reaction when he had seen her outfits, and what would no doubt be her mother's reaction, if Myrcella returned to King's Landing in any of the dresses she favored here in Dorne.

It was a drab brown and bright Dornish red, and Myrcella might have once thought it was beautiful, but now she looked at it and only saw plainness. Something meant to conceal beauty, not merely contain it.

She looked already like Myrcella Lannister once again, and no longer much like Myrcella Martell, looking at herself in the mirror of her bedchambers.

Myrcella sighed.

"Do you not wish to go back?"

Myrcella bit her lip, glancing at her reflection in the mirror.

Her uncle had explained, once things had calmed down, that her brother Joffrey insisted she return to King's Landing for a time, at least to present her new husband - and he had said the words with a hint of distaste, she saw - to the court, and that he would not accept no for an answer, not with things currently as they were, in war.

Arianne had accused Uncle Jaime of making up this threat against Myrcella in order to spirit her away from Dorne, and Uncle Jaime had looked angry enough to draw the sword that he had willingly surrendered when asked to do so.

His gold hand shown in the sunlight of Sunspear. Myrcella thought it a rather strange sight, though she noticed that her uncle used it sparingly.

Because Arianne was not technically ruler in Dorne, she had insisted that they wait a few days, at least until she could send a message to her father in the Water Gardens, that he could know where his son was going.

For she insisted on sending Trystane back with Myrcella, for which she was rather relieved.

She knew why she was going back. Joffrey may have sent for her in the missive Uncle Jaime had brought with him, demanded her return after he realized that she had been married to Prince Trystane, but he was not the reason she was going back. This was all her mother, no doubt terrified at the knowledge that her only daughter had been married off, for her mother had always been such a worrier about that sort of thing, especially while Robert still lived, and hardly Joffrey's concern at all. She doubted that, if he had his way, he would ever bother with seeing her again.

She knew that her mother would be furious, that she had not been the one to choose Myrcella's bride. She thought that sometimes, if her mother was in a particular mood, she might make sure that Myrcella never married.

And Myrcella was sad, of course, that her mother had not been at the wedding and had not been able to celebrate it with her, but she thought that her mother would like her husband very much, if only she got to know him.

Her husband.

Myrcella still mouthed the word in her reflection sometimes, shocked that it applied to her though it had been a couple of weeks now.

The wedding had been a strange affair, presided over by a septon dragged out of his sept in the middle of the night, with Myrcella wearing a gown not meant for her, and Trystane looking as bleary eyed as she felt.

Arianne had been sitting in Doran's throne, watching the whole affair with a smile quite unlike the ones she usually reserved for Myrcella, and Myrcella had been shaking.

Not because she was nervous about the bedding ceremony, for Arianne had already assured her that there was nothing to be nervous about, but because she knew, though no one would tell her why, that something was horribly wrong.

She was the Princess of Westeros, and she wouldn't have been marrying Trystane in the dead of night, without her brother present, if everything was well, as Tyene kept assuring her.

But then that part of the wedding had been over, and Arianne had insisted that the bedding ceremony didn't need to happen, because Trystane and Myrcella could handle things on their own, and Myrcella and Trystane had gone back to his chambers.

She had known there were guards outside her chambers, and that Ser Arys Oakheart had been arrested sometime during the wedding ceremony, but the moment she'd felt Trystane in her arms, felt him tilting her chin up and telling her to look at him, not at anyone else, Myrcella had known that things were going to be all right, no matter what all of this meant.

He was so kind, and gentle, and funny...

"Myrcella?"

Myrcella shook her head. "I don't know," she admitted. "It might be nice, to see King's Landing again."

Her uncle was so concerned that she wasn't safe here, guarded her door each night out of fear of that, and yet Myrcella felt safer here than she had normally felt in King's Landing, she couldn't help but think.

She knew that she could speak freely in front of Arianne Martell, who had insisted on helping her dress for the journey home so that they could speak together, but even still, Myrcella found herself glancing back at the other woman, watching for her reaction.

When Myrcella and Trystane had been married and the deed done, Myrcella happily going along with the marriage the next morning, she had realized that Arianne, whom she adored, was now her goodsister.

It was a strange feeling, to have a woman so her elder and so beautiful her goodsister, even if Myrcella was the Princess of Westeros.

Arianne had been nothing but kind to her since she had arrived in Dorne, and Myrcella, wary as she was about the reason for her hasty marriage, was glad to call the other woman her goodsister.

She would miss her, for however long her mother demanded that Myrcella remain in King's Landing.

A cold shiver ran down her back, though it was never cold in Dorne, at the thought that her mother might insist Myrcella remain in King's Landing indefinitely. Trystane would never inherit Dorne, as the third child in his family, and if the threat to Myrcella was not found out, her mother would have grounds not to return her at all.

It was a terrifying thought.

Arianne pointedly did not react, perhaps for that reason. "And your family," Arianne said, smiling as she tucked Myrcella's hair behind her ears.

Myrcella forced herself not to roll her eyes. She knew that her uncle Jaime meant well, in coming here to fetch her, especially if what he had said about the threat to her life was true, but he had embarrassed her, in threatening her young husband and trying to kidnap her away from the people who had become like a second family to her.

Had started a fight with the Sand Snakes, who simultaneously terrified Myrcella and fascinated her, and she knew that the only reason that fight had not devolved into something worse was because of Princess Arianne.

She thought her uncle understood that he had embarrassed her (and in front of her husband, too!), after he realized that she was unharmed, but even still, she was not looking forward to any time spent alone with him.

Her uncle had never lectured her as a child, and Myrcella knew why, but she could see that he was geared up to lecture her now that he knew she was in no danger from the Martells.

"Do you know who sent the threat?" Myrcella asked, cocking her head at Arianne in the mirror.

The older woman frowned, her plump lips pursing at the question. "We will find them," she promised Myrcella, squeezing her shoulder.

"I hate them," Myrcella whispered, ducking her head, and that garnered Arianne's full attention.

She reached out, taking Myrcella's chin with gentle fingers and turning the other girl around to face her. "Myrcella..."

"I do," Myrcella insisted. "It's because of them that I have to leave Dorne."

Arianne rolled her eyes. The expression was one that always startled Myrcella, because she couldn't imagine her mother making such an expression in public, in front of courtiers she had needed to impress, and yet Arianne did so all of the time, as the mistress of feasts and frolics in Sunspear, and as the unofficial regent.

Arianne and the Sand Snakes perhaps thought Myrcella did not know of that, but she did. She knew that while Prince Doran ruled Sunspear and the rest of Dorne from the Water Gardens, it was Arianne's word that was carried out in Sunspear.

And it had been Arianne's idea to have Trystane and Myrcella marry, though she had claimed it was Prince Doran who had decreed the marriage should happen.

"We will find them, Myrcella," she promised, smoothing the shoulders of Myrcella's gown. "And we will bring you and my brother home soon enough, from your sojourn to King's Landing, if that is what you wish."

Myrcella smiled up at her, and then swallowed hard, when there came a knock at the door.

"Come," Arianne called, and the door opened, Tyene stepping inside.

Tyene flashed a grin at Myrcella, the moment she laid eyes on her. "My," she said, voice rather high pitched, "Don't you look just like a lady."

Myrcella blushed, trying not to roll her eyes. "I thought this would be best, for my uncle's sake," she said, and Tyene glanced at Arianne, laughing.

"Yes, he does seem rather prudish for the rumors-"

Arianne elbowed her, hard.

Myrcella pretended not to hear, turning back to her already packed belongings and making sure that all of the dresses within them would be fit for King's Landing.

"Myrcella says she is concerned that we will not be able to find those spreading threats toward her," Arianne told Tyene, and Myrcella turned back.

"I didn't mean..."

Tyene's smile cooled. "You know that we will, my sun," she said, stepping forward and taking Myrcella's face into both of her hands. "You are my cousin now, as much as I am Trystane's and Arianne’s, and I will not allow anyone to threaten your life. Yes?"

Myrcella licked her lips, not meeting the other woman's eyes. "Of course," she agreed, and wondered why Tyene and Arianne had wanted her to return to King's Landing.

Myrcella had thought...

Tyene released her, exchanging a glance with Arianne. "I came because your uncle is getting very impatient, him and his man, the commoner," she said, and Myrcella's face darkened at the reminder of what the common soldier had done to Trystane.

"Do you have everything?" Arianne asked, turning fully to Myrcella.

Myrcella nodded, picking up one of her bags, and Arianne waved a hand.

"Nonsense," she said, "We will get one of the servants to attend to that."

Rosamund Lannister, Myrcella's lady in waiting since she had come to Dorne, was no longer allowed to handle Myrcella's things. Arianne had ordered that only several weeks into Myrcella's life here in Dorne, claiming that the other girl had sticky fingers and would no doubt be wed soon after Myrcella was married to Trystane.

Myrcella was very close with the other girl, and they remained companions in this kingdom so different from their own, but she understood, and it was Dornish serving women who attended to Myrcella now, alone.

Myrcella dipped her head. "Of course," she said, and wished the nervousness she felt would stop manifesting itself in such silly ways. "I suppose I'm just...it's been a while since I was last in King's Landing."

Arianne nodded. "But I have every confidence that you will find it little changed since you left it, my dear girl," she said.

"And if you don't," Tyene went on, at Myrcella's other side as they left Myrcella's chambers since she had arrived in Sunspear, "We can always come and rescue you."

She said the words just as they entered the hall where Myrcella's Uncle Jaime was waiting impatiently, and she wondered whether they were for her benefit, or his.


	267. SANSA

_Dearest love,_

_I dreamt about you last night. Hells, I think about you every night. About touching you, all over. I wanted to wake up and feel your arms around me, but I suppose the dream will have to suffice, for now._

_I'm sorry. I know that this is the sort of thing that makes you blush, and I can imagine your whole body turning pink now, even as you read this. I want..._

_I wish you could have come with me, but then I suppose there is time for that when I return..._

Sansa leaned back, staring at the letter that she'd read half a dozen times, since Megga had slipped it to her, in the hallway.

It wasn't even encoded. She didn't know how Margaery might have encoded it, but then, she supposed she was glad that she had not.

She was tired of guessing about how Margaery felt, and, however ill advised she might think it had been to send this sort of letter in a raven to Megga, when it could never be mistaken as meant for Joffrey, Sansa was glad that she at least did not have to guess at what the other woman was thinking.

 _I love you_ , the letter ended with, and it reminded Sansa of Margaery's quiet calm in the Black Cells, when she had admitted as much to Sansa.

A part of Sansa wanted to write a response, wanted to let Margaery know how much this letter meant to her, in the quiet boredom of King's Landing where the only thing she could be glad of was that lack of attention all the while hating it, but she wasn't certain if it was worth it.

Megga had said Margaery would be back soon enough, and in any case, she wasn't certain she wanted to hand a letter like this over to Megga Tyrell to send to her lover, anyway.

Sansa swallowed hard, the words Megga had spoken to her in that hallway still stinging, no matter how silly she told herself she was acting, over it.

"What are you looking at?" Shae asked, and Sansa's head jerked up from where she lay on her stomach on her bed, tucking the letter under her.

"N-Nothing," Sansa stammered out, and then grimaced. "I mean...What are you doing here?" she asked. "I thought that you were...seeing to Tyrion's chambers, before he returned."

As if that was what it was called, she thought a bit snidely, and instantly chastised herself for the thought, sitting up.

Shae had been nothing but kind to her, and what she and Tyrion did was nothing more or less than what Sansa and Margaery might have been doing, just now, if Margaery were here.

Perhaps that was all it was. A burning jealousy, that Shae could more easily get away wth what Sansa could not, these days.

Shae raised a skeptical brow at her, and then shrugged. "There's a messenger boy, here to see you," she said, and then grimaced. "From the King."

Sansa felt herself pale, as she tried to surreptitiously tuck the letter under the blankets of her bed. Shae said nothing, merely led her out into the parlor where the boy was waiting.

His message was short enough, and had Sansa shaking the moment she heard it.

The King had asked for Sansa to come to his private rooms.

All at once, the letter she'd made a feeble attempt to hide from Shae was forgotten, in lieu of a much more immediate threat.

Sansa forgot to breathe.

_No. Not this, not again._

Sansa closed her eyes, breathing in a harsh breath. "Did he say why?" she asked, and the boy just shrugged.

"He said as soon as possible, my lady," the boy said, not seeming to understand the fuss Sansa was putting up, over this news.

Sansa swallowed hard, remembered the feeling of Margaery, hitting her, in a feeble chance to protect her from a worse fate.

 _Gods_. Gods, she couldn't do this, not without Margaery here for her. Not without someone...

Shae sent a desperate look back at Sansa, when the servant delivered that news. Tyrion was in what was turning into a daylong meeting with the Small Council, and it was not as if Sansa could disobey a direct order from her king without her husband’s permission to do so.

Sansa closed her eyes, felt that she was shaking even before Shae reached out and touched her hand.

But then Sansa opened her eyes again, because it would hardly do for servants to be spreading rumors about the way Sansa interacted with her female servants.

“Tell the King I will just be on my way,” she assured the servant, who glanced between them before dipping into a bow and hurrying out of Sansa’s parlor.

Sansa snatched her hand away from Shae. “You can’t be doing things like that,” she hissed at Shae, annoyance bleeding into her tone. “Not when people can see you and judge me for it.”

Shae blinked at her, and then bowed her head. “If that is what my lady commands,” she said, tone dry, but Sansa wasn’t in the mood to decipher Shae’s feelings, today.

Sansa closed her eyes. “Don’t tell Tyrion about this,” she said, and Shae’s head jerked up.

“My lady?” she asked, and Sansa gave her a hard look.

Shae knew, of course, about her and Margaery. That had been difficult to hide, from a servant, but she had not told Tyrion, and Sansa very much appreciated that.

But she was beginning to feel as if the walls of the Keep were closing in around her again, what with Megga, and now the thought that Shae might have damned her for touching her in front of a serving boy.

Sansa needed to know who she could trust, and she needed to know that immediately.

She moved closer, aware of the open door at the edge of her parlor, but the servant was long gone, now.

Shae raised an eyebrow at her, and Sansa knew that she was being rather foolish, for, out of the two of them, Shae knew how to use her body much better than Sansa, but Sansa had had a rather good teacher about that, recently.

She moved until they were nearly touching, and then murmured, “I care about you, Shae. You...You’ve been a good friend to me. But you are also my servant, and you need to understand that. Tyrion may have been the one to give you this position, but you are my servant, not his. Do you understand?”

Shae looked more bemused than anything, but she nodded her head. “If it is what you wish, my lady, I won’t tell him.”

Sansa lifted her chin. “Good,” she said, stepping back. “He has enough to worry about, at the moment, and this would only make him angry.”

Shae cocked her head at Sansa, but said nothing, and Sansa, flushing a little, moved to grab her shawl where it sat over the edge of a chair head.

“I’ll be back soon,” she told Shae, and then left, with far more confidence in her steps than she actually felt.

The moment she was outside of the Tower, Sansa sagged against the wall.

Joffrey wanted to see her. She didn’t know what that meant, but it terrified her, all the same.

Because the last time Joffrey had called her to his chambers, had expressed any sort of real interest in her, she had narrowly avoided a rape merely because Margaery was present, because she’d called for Jaime Lannister.

Sansa swallowed, fingering the knife inside of her gown, the one Margaery had given her and which she carried everywhere, now.

In a way, it almost felt like Margaery was here with her, holding that knife.

Then again, Sansa thought, heart pounding as she walked to the King’s private suites, this could also be about the plans she had made with Megga. They had done nothing to enact them, just yet, for Megga didn’t seem to have the time for it, what with Alla, and did seem to feel a bit guilty about the way she had spoken to Sansa, but the King could have found out, somehow.

She could be walking into an interrogation, and Sansa tried to comfort herself in the knowledge that she didn’t know anything, not truly.

Somehow, it didn’t help, and by the time she made it to Joffrey’s chambers, Sansa was shaking.

Ser Meryn Trant was waiting outside, and he sent Sansa a smirk, when she arrived, still trembling. No help from that quarter then, the way that Ser Jaime had once been a help to her.

Ser Meryn knocked, then opened the door and announced her, mockingly holding out a hand for her to enter when Joffrey called for her to do so.

Sansa swallowed hard, squared her shoulders, ignoring the look of amusement Ser Meryn sent her, and stepped inside.

She had thought, after all of this time, that perhaps Joffrey had forgotten about her. It had been wishful thinking, she knew that, but she had hoped, nonetheless. Her husband was the Hand of the King now, and she had hoped that offered her some small amount of protection.

But here she was, standing in Joffrey's chambers as she had once far too recently, except there was no one here to protect her, now. Margaery was leagues away, in Highgarden, and Ser Jaime was in Dragonstone.

Sansa was alone. And Joffrey smelled blood from leagues away, she knew. This had always only been a matter of time, just as she had warned Margaery, when the other girl told her that she was heading to Highgarden.

That thought sparked another in her mind, and Sansa blinked, remembered the knife Margaery had given her, insisted on "training" Sansa in how to use, and reached down as inconspicuously as she could, felt the cool metal against her skin.

It almost made her feel better.

She swallowed hard, meeting Joffrey's gaze. His eyes were dilated, and he leaned back on his bed, his intentions clear enough.

Sansa didn't dare close her eyes and pretend this was nothing but a dream.

"Your Grace," she murmured, dipping into a curtsey. "You wanted to see me?"

"Lady Sansa," Joffrey said, pausing at the sight of her with a smirk, eyes roving her form once more. "You're often rather close to the royal apartments, I noticed. Did your husband not move you into the Tower as well, when he received his position?"

Sansa blinked, folded her hands in front of her in an effort to hide her form a bit more from him. Was the King employing someone to spy on her? That thought had her heart pounding. "I...have been asked lately to come attend to Prince Tommen, Your Grace," she said calmly, meeting his eyes.

Whatever he saw there had Joffrey blanching, and he took a step forward as if to recover himself.

"I...see," he said calmly, and then he was taking another step forward, until their bodies were nearly touching. "Tell me, Lady Aunt. Do you come to visit my brother often?"

And Sansa did flush, then, at the implication in those words. "Not often, Your Grace," she said, staring straight ahead rather than at him, forcing her limbs not to shake with them standing so close. “He...often likes a companion, when playing with his cats.”

And she felt a bit badly, telling Joffrey about the cats. Oh, she was sure he already knew, but directing his attention to them, that felt...wrong. As if tomorrow she was going to wake up and find that he had gutted every single one of them.

Margaery did this often. Endured her husband. Sansa could do the same, she was certain. Had once been certain.

Joffrey hummed, low in his throat. "My lady wife told me that you were becoming fast friends, before she left for Highgarden," he said calmly, abruptly changing the subject, and Sansa blinked at him.

"I...we were, Your Grace," she said, remembering the lie Margaery had dragged her into, wanting to curse the other girl when she remembered her own resolve not to be dragged into this sort of thing again.

"Perhaps, then, you might be a friend to her today, as you are to my brother," Joffrey continued, and his eyes were dark now, and Sansa did shiver. "I...rather miss her."

Sansa raised a brow. "Your Grace?"

"We never did get to continue the events we wished to enact when my uncle walked in on you ladies and I," Joffrey said. "And my lady intimated to me that we could not continue the...fun we'd had afterwards, her and I, on account of her family. But..." his gaze considered Sansa. "A man has needs."

 _You are not a man_ , Sansa thought, startled by how vehement that thought was.

"I...I am afraid I don't understand, Your Grace," she said calmly. She reached to the inner lining of her gown, touched at the knife she had sewn in there, the knife Margaery had given her for such a time as this.

She had not thought she would actually use it, even as Margaery tried to placate her with it.

Now, she thought she just might.

Joffrey reached out then, running his fingers along Sansa's throat, and she forgot to breathe. "My lady wife assures me," he said, voice far too even as his index finger trailed along her collar, down along the collar of her gown, "that ladies' needs are much the same as men's, though we are never told as much."

Sansa bit her lip, then swallowed when she realized how that might appear. "Your Grace," she reminded him, taking a step back, "I am a dear friend of Queen Margaery, and I do not think she would appreciate me...betraying our friendship in such a way, and I am wed to your lord uncle. If you will excuse me."

Joffrey took another step forward. “But I didn’t excuse you,” he said, and that was when Sansa smelt it, the scent of alcohol upon his lips.

She bit the inside of her cheek. “Your Grace, Have you been drinking?”

The slap, when it came, shocked her. Not because the question she had asked wasn’t impertinent, not because she didn’t think Joffrey was cruel, but because he had never physically lain a hand on her, himself.

He preferred to watch that sort of thing, she knew.

Sansa reached up, rubbing at her sore cheek, and stared with wide eyes at the King.

Joffrey’s face was crimson. “How dare you,” he hissed out, and Sansa lowered her eyes, tried to look harmless. Swallowed hard.

“My apologies, Your Grace,” she said, dipping into a curtsey. “I’ll just be going.”

She turned towards the door.

“I didn’t excuse you!” Joffrey shouted after him, but Sansa...didn’t care.

She kept walking, kept fingering the knife in her gown, wrapping her hand around it in case Joffrey came at her.

The moment the door shut behind her, Sansa remembered to breathe again.

And, as she stood there in the hallway, Sansa realized something rather abruptly. Realized something she hadn’t been able to realize, all this time, with Margaery protecting her as avidly as she was able.

Megga was right.

Because walking out on a King, even if she would likely pay for it later?

It felt empowering.

At least it did, until she returned to her chambers in the Tower of the Hand, and found Shae standing over Sansa's roaring fireplace, steadily watching the letter that Megga had slipped to Sansa burn into ashes.

"What are you doing?" Sansa demanded, rushing forward to grab it, to save the last corners of it from the flames, but Shae merely wrapped her arms around Sansa's shoulders, pulling her back.

Sansa glared at her in betrayal. "Let go of me!" she snapped, but Shae held her back, as the smell of burnt papyrus filled the room, as the words that Sansa had burned into her thoughts melted away into nothingness.

And only then did Shae release her.

The moment she did, Sansa fell to her knees in front of the fireplace, almost forgetting to breathe. She watched as the ashes became indistinguishable from the fire itself, and then turned her furious gaze on Shae, standing still above her.

"How. How dare you?" Sansa breathed out, aware that her face was red as a cherry and not caring at all.

Shae took a slight step back. "Sansa..."

Sansa stood to her feet, shaking. Furious. At Shae, for burning those words, even if she had memorized them. At Joffrey, for calling her to his chambers and assuming that he could use her like a common whore.

At Margaery, for leaving her a keeper who could not even pretend to be her friend, lest Margaery send her a letter Sansa felt safe enough to respond to.

Sansa took a step forward, until she was standing in front of Shae. "How dare you," she breathed again. "I gave you no orders to burn this. You are my lady, not my..."

Mother.

Sansa closed her eyes, breathing in and out deeply. She was shaking, but this time, it wasn't in fear.

Shae gave her a sympathetic glance. "A good lady knows when to care for her mistress' needs, even when she hasn't been asked to," she said calmly, not at all looking guilty for what she had done. "If Cersei had seen that letter, do you imagine you would be walking free of the Black Cells, even now?"

Sansa gritted her teeth so hard she could hear them grinding against each other. "You're not my lady," she snapped at Shae. "You're..."

Tyrion's whore.

The words hung in the air, even as she didn't say them.

Sansa looked away, sagging and hugging herself.

Shae reached out, touching Sansa's hand again. This time, Sansa didn't reprimand her for it.

"I'm sorry, Sansa," Shae said, and Sansa glanced up at her, aware that her own eyes were filling with tears. "But I would do it again, even with you ordering me not to. That letter was just sitting on your bed, and if anyone else had read it..."

Sansa breathed in deeply again. "I...I know," she whispered shakily. "I know."

She pulled away from Shae, and this time, the other woman didn't reach out to her again. Sansa swallowed hard, forced herself to walk over to the bed and sit on it.

A moment later, Shae sat down beside her on the bed. "What did the King want?" she asked, glancing at Sansa out of the corner of her eyes.

Sansa hugged herself a little more tightly, staring into the fire as she answered. "Nothing," she murmured. "He wanted nothing, and I didn't give anything to him."

 


	268. MARGAERY

She came to Willas' chambers to ask him if he wanted to go riding, for she dearly wanted to try out Edgor, wild and free though she thought he ought to be.

In some ways, she envied that horse.

It was late in the morning, and she thought Willas would normally be up by now, but Leonette had assured her that he slept in later these days, that it was actually for the best, for the maesters insisted that he get as much rest as he needed, after everything he had been through, recently.

So she did not go to find her brother until after a late brunch with Leonette and Olene, stepping into her brothers rooms with a grin to the young maid walking past, the one who always looked so longingly after Willas.

The poor girl knew he wasn't for her, though, and so she and Margaery got on rather well.

Margaery paused outside the closed doors to her brother's chambers, knocking gently against it as the only warning she gave before stepping into them.

"Willas?" She called. "I was wondering if you-"

She froze.

The figure, dressed all in tight, black robes and a black cloth that covered their face, and black boots, froze as well, balancing precariously on the window ledge of her brother's chambers with a loaded crossbow in both hands, while managing to make the stance look easy.

Margaery's mouth went dry. Her heart skipped a beat.

For several moments, her mind stuttered to a stop, would not let her understand what was happening.

Because surely, surely...

Willas was still half sitting up in the bed, reaching for his cane, and she wondered how long the assassin had been there, before Margaery walked in. Wondered why the assassin hadn't-

 _No_. No, she couldn’t even think such thoughts.

Her brother was sitting up in bed, blood staining a slow, uneven circle around his bare, too pale chest. The arrow, lodged in her brother's chest, was sunken deep, and even as she looked at it, Margaery found her breaths quickening.

No. No, no, no.

"Willas!" she screamed, the name tumbling desperately out of her mouth before she even knew that she was screaming, and Margaery sucked in a ragged breath, and then another, tears staining her vision as she stared at the blood.

So much blood.

The assassin moved, just one simple movement, and Margaery rushed to the wall, felt rather than saw the crossbow turned on her, now.

She saw the broken lance, hanging against the wall nearer to her than to the assassin or Willas, the first thing hanging in Willas' chambers that looked like a weapon. It had been the lance that Willas had used in his first and only tourney, a humorous gift from Oberyn years later which her father had taken as an insult and which Willas seemed to cherish.

He insisted on keeping the damn thing.

She ripped the lance from its hook on the wall, heard the thunk of an arrow lodging itself into the wall behind her.

She glanced up. The assassin hadn't been aiming to kill, and suddenly, she was furious, wielding the lance like a sword as she brought the heavy wood up in front of her, moving toward her brother, aware that she was shaking all over. She rushed forward as she reached out to the wall, to the first thing she found that might be used as a weapon, the broken lance hanging from the wall that Willas had used in his first tourney.

She swallowed hard, uncertain what she was to do with it. She may have been trained by her brothers in how to defend herself, but she-

"Margaery, no!" she heard Willas call, and then the second arrow from the assasin's crossbow flew through the air, and Margaery heard herself screaming before she even knew that she had opened her mouth again, because this time, the crossbow wasn't aimed at her at all, and a part of her very much wished that it was.

The loud thud of the arrow hitting its mark a second time sounded like a roar in Margaery's ears, and she was running forward, feet stumbling over themselves as she moved.

She dropped the lance before she made it to her brother's bed, throwing herself half down on top of it, hearing her knees thud against the floor, not feeling the pain at all.

Behind her, the assassin fell from the ledge, disappearing, and Margaery didn't dare run to the ledge, didn't dare call for the guard.

Her brother groaned, and oh gods, there was so much blood, staining his shirt, his trousers, the white sheets of his bed. The cane he'd been holding had fallen to the ground, and Margaery could feel it beneath one knobby knee.

"Willas," she breathed, swallowing hard, feeling cold over. "Willas, please..." He didn't answer, didn't look half there. No, fuck no, gods..."Willas!"

She threw herself down on her brother's bed, felt the great, wrenching sobs coming from her as she hurried to his side, pushed her hands through the gushing blood to touch her brother's injuries.

Her brother's eyes were beginning to roll up into his head. His skin was clammy to the touch, beneath the hot, wet blood, his face paler than she had ever seen it, even sick as he had always been.

When...how long had the assassin been there? When had he used that first arrow?

Gods, she didn't know what to do about it, in any case, and gods, there was so much blood. Too much blood.

She knew that the maesters had been giving her brother something to thin his blood, something to make it easier for them to purge him of the bad blood, but this...

Her hands, where she was touching her brother, were stained in blood. Too much fucking blood.

"No," she breathed, breaths catching as snot and tears fell from her face. "No, no, no! Willas?" she pulled him to look at her, wondered if she should lay him down or if that would only make things worse, in his condition. "Willas," she breathed, sobbing, barely able to see him through the tears. "Willas, look at me, look at me, please."

Her brother's eyes rolled in her direction, and Margaery let out another great, gasping sob.

"Willas, look at me," she breathed, and didn't realize she was screaming it until the words started to ring in her head.

She half-turned, desperately, toward the door. "Guards!" she screamed, wondered where the fuck everyone was, that they hadn't heard her screaming before, and then she was turning back to her brother.

"Willas," she whispered again. "Willas, look at me. Look at me, please. Willas!" she slapped her brother's cheek, and he opened his eyes once more.

"Margy..."

She laid her head down on his lap, felt the gasping sobs shaking at her shoulders, because she didn't know what to do, didn't know how to fix this, didn't-

"Margaery," her brother said, and she could hear the strain of how difficult it was to speak, lifted her head with an angry flush, at the realization that her half leaning on him was no doubt making his condition worse.

"It's going to be all right," she assured him, hating herself for not sounding nearly half as convincing as she wanted to. "It's going to be all right, Willas, the maesters will be here soon. It'll be all right." She turned desperately to the door. "Guards!"

Willas grunted, his eyes glassy as they met hers.

And then the guards were streaming into the room, their green cloaks flapping through the warm light of noonday, too late. Far too fucking late!

"Get a fucking maester!" she screamed at one of them. She was aware of one of them backing away, but she couldn't think about that right now.

Couldn't think about anything, except her older brother, covered in his own blood, and oh gods, there was too much of it.

"Margaery..."

Margaery turned her attention back to her brother, a blur before her eyes. "Willas, I'm here," she whispered hoarsely, wanting to move closer and away to give him space at the same time. She felt, as she leaned against him, as if she were crushing his lungs, but at the same time, she didn't dare to move away from him.

He reached out, brushing a bloody finger along her cheek, the motion strong enough, and Margaery's heart skipped a beat.

"It's going to be all right," he told her, and Margaery closed her eyes, hated how final those words sounded.

"No," she whispered, because godsdamnit, she should be the one comforting him, just now. "No, Willas, the maester is coming, just give him-"

Too slow. The maester was too slow, and she reached for the sheets, wondering why she hadn't thought of them before, tearing at them until they ripped beneath her shaking hands, reaching out to wrap them around Willas, and then wondering if she was supposed to take the arrows out, first.

Behind them, the guards had gone very quiet.

Willas reached out, placing a bloodied hand over Margaery's, and she looked up into his eyes, saw the finality in them.

"Margy," he whispered, coughing painfully, and then, then there was blood coming out of his mouth, and Margaery couldn't breathe at all, as she watched her brother choke on his own blood. "Margy, promise me..."

She moved closer, barely able to hear him. Tried to lean him back against the bed so that he was no longer sitting upright, but he resisted her, muscles straining, and she didn’t have the heart to force him.

"I'm right here," she whispered. "Willas, please," she reached out, squeezing his hand hardly enough to pain him, though neither of them felt it. "Willas, please."

Willas shook his head, squeezing her hand again. She felt it going numb, which was strange, for she could feel nothing else, in this moment.

"Take care of yourself," he whispered, and Margaery choked out a laugh.

"No," she whispered. "No, you need to do that," she whispered hoarsely, laying her head back down on his lap. "You've always been there, always taken care of us. Willas, gods, please!"

And then she felt it.

"No," she breathed, barely able to choke out the words. "No, Willas, don't leave me. Please don't me."

She could feel arms wrapping around her shoulders, pulling her away, and she resisted them, because gods, her brother's body was still warm.

"Margaery," Loras was saying, and she could barely hear him above the sound of her own screams, could barely make sense of anything as Loras pulled her away from the bloodied bed, as she got Willas' blood on her brother's green clothes.

"Willas!" Margaery screamed, even as Loras yanked her back, his strong arms wrapping around her waist and dragging her away. She fought against him, but her brother didn't loosen his hold, forced her back.

"Let go of me," she rasped out, but her brother's arms dug painfully into her sides, holding her down when she attempted to pull free, and she could feel her tears staining both of their cheeks. "Loras, let go of me."

"Margaery..."

She was frantic, all of the sudden, unable to breathe and wanting to just touch her brother again, but Loras' grip around her was like iron, and suddenly the maester was moving forward, darting around Margaery as Loras held her firm, as she wanted nothing more than to attack the bastard, for where in the seven hells had he been when Willas needed him?

It took her a moment to realize that she was saying those words out loud, that everyone was staring at her.

"Margaery," Loras said, shaking her shoulders, and she could hear him, but only as if from a long ways off. "Margaery, he's already dead. Do you hear me? He's already dead."

Her gown was red now. It had been purple when she walked into these rooms. Gods, she could see the blood dripping in slow drops down onto the marble floor.

"Save him," Margaery snapped at the maester who had treated her brother since he was a child, and the old man glanced up at her. "Save him."

She could feel her brother's grip around her tightening at the words, but Margaery could not hold her next words back, even if she knew it was too late, too fucking late.

"If he dies, so will you."

"Margaery," Loras whispered, sounding scandalized. She wanted to hit him. Wanted to punch him for holding her back from her brother, wanted to-

There was a scream from the doorway, and there was her mother, collapsing in the doorway, her ladies huddled worriedly around her, the scream wrenching from her throat and into a wail that echoed through the room.

Margaery swallowed hard, fought against her brother once more, because the fucking maester hadn't answered her, he hadn't-

The maester wasn't looking at her mother at all, wasn't even looking at Willas. He merely met Margaery's eyes, and she could see the tears in those eyes, old and wet as they always were.

The maester dipped his head, not at all phased by her words. "Yes, my lady," he told her, and returned his attention to her brother.

"Margaery, this isn't helping," Loras chided.

Margaery turned on him, because godsdamnit, Loras, she knew that!

Her brother's eyes were filled with tears. Willas' eyes would never fill with tears again. Not for her, not for Oberyn Martell, whom he had gone to his grave knowing that Margaery had killed.

Gods.

"Margaery, he's gone," Loras whispered, but Margaery shook her head, the motion almost frantic.

"No," she whispered. "No."

"He's gone," Loras repeated, and Margaery shook her head, burying her face in Loras' shoulder.

She could feel herself straining against him, wanted nothing more than for him to let go of her, but her brother held her firm.

"Margaery, look at him," she heard Willas say. "He's gone."

Margaery swallowed hard, choked on the bile rising in her throat as she glanced toward the bed for the first time since she had felt her brother's last breath leave his body.

"No," she whispered, the word coming out shakily. "No, he's not, he's..." she sniffed. Hard.

"He's gone," Loras repeated, pressing a kiss against her forehead, and Margaery sagged against her brother, the fight going out of her at the sight of her pale brother, laying out on the bed.

The maester was already setting about removing the arrows.

Margaery laid her head against her brother's chest, and closed her eyes, felt her tears wetting her brother's shirt alongside the blood she was covered in, as she clung to him.

Willas was dead. Willas, her sweet sweet brother, who had always been the one to comfort her before Loras, because he always knew what she needed.

Loras' arms felt cold, around her shoulders, and she thought that he was clinging to her almost as much as she was clinging to him.

From a long ways off, she could hear her brother speaking to the guards, and it was difficult for her to understand what they were saying, but she strained, not daring to look up from where she had buried her face in her brother's clothes.

"Did the assassin get away?" Loras asked, and Margaery felt the muscles in her jaw spasming.

Assassin. Not attacker, because he'd really killed-

"We found him trying to sneak out of the palace, my lord," one of the guards was saying, and Margaery's eyes narrowed at those words, even as she felt her breaths leaving her again. "He impaled himself on his own knife before we could arrest him."

Margaery felt her knees give out beneath her.

"How did he even get in here?" Loras demanded, and there was the anger in her brother, the anger he was trying to hide, she knew, for her own sake.

"We don't know, my lord-"

"Then find out, for fuck's sake! What the fuck are you doing, standing around here?" her brother snapped, pulling Margaery a little more tightly into his embrace.

Somewhere behind her, her mother was still wailing.

When she finally pulled herself away from her brother, all she could see was the broken lance, lying on the floor of her brother's chambers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter begins what I am unfortunately terming "The Culling." This won't be the last death in this next arc, so please don't kill me yet.


	269. MARGAERY

Margaery stared up at the image of the Maiden hanging above her bedpost, eyes darkening in disgust at the sight of it, an anger filling her that she couldn't quite understand, beyond the anger thrumming through her blood, in three horrible words that had spiraled through her mind since the moment it happened.

Willas was dead. Willas was dead. Willas was dead.

She couldn't breathe, couldn't speak, and her brother was dead.

And the Maiden kept smiling down at her, here where she sat in her chambers, trying for the life of her to think about how the fuck this had happened, how her brother could have possibly died under the safety of his own roof, how...

"Why him!" she screamed at the smiling Maiden, watched as it stared blankly down at her. "He was good! He was good, and he was the best out of all of us. Why him?"

She didn't mean the words to come out in a raspy whimper.

Loras had left her here hours ago, because he could sense, no doubt, that she would be a burden anywhere else, that she needed to be alone where she could mourn her brother in peace.

And she knew that there was a part of Loras which resented her for that, that she could go off in isolation to mourn their brother while, as the oldest male Tyrell here, Kingsguard or not, Loras needed to figure out how they were going to address all of this.

If they were going to tell the people of Oldtown before they sent word to their father and to Garlan, in the Iron Islands. What to do about the assassin who didn't have a mark of identification on him. The funeral arrangements.

Gods, the funeral arrangements.

And Margaery knew that she should not be leaving that responsibility with her brother, that her mother would not be able to take care of it and thus it was her responsibility, but she was numb, now. She didn't think she could speak her brother's name, much less decide what sort of coffin they would be placing him in.

Gods, Loras had always been terrible at this sort of thing. He was going to fail at it, and Garlan...Garlan would wonder why Margaery wasn't seeing to these preparations, herself.

The Maiden, hanging above Margaery's bed, was the only thing in the room she had left untouched, in her rage. When Loras brought her here, hours ago, he had ordered Meredyth out, kissed Margaery on the forehead, and latched the door behind him.

Willas was dead. Willas was dead.

The Maiden kept smiling at her, so sweet.

A mockery of what Margaery had always yearned to be, when she was a little girl and knew nothing about the true ways of the world.

She stalked forward, climbing up onto her bed awkwardly, and reached up, ripping the canvas from its frame with a guttural scream that tore its way past her throat before she knew what she was doing.

"Margaery!" she heard Meredyth's call as the door to the chambers Margaery had used before she was ever married burst open.

Margaery ignored the girl, pulled at the pieces of the canvas which had remained in the frame, the scream gone now, but the tears she had not been able to let fall as she watched the arrow rip through her sweet brother came to her now. The pieces fluttered down onto Margaery's bed, but she didn't care, took the bulk of the canvas still in her hands and folded it in half.

She ripped it in half, folded it again, and ripped that in half.

Ripped and ripped and ripped at it, until the entire canvas was nothing more than a pile of shredded pieces of paper, in her hands and fluttering around onto the bed beneath her.

"Margaery, please, stop," Meredyth climbed onto the bed beside her, though she sat on it where Margaery still stood, reaching out to touch Margaery's leg. "Please, stop. You're going to hurt yourself."

Margaery gazed down dispassionately at her, tears still spilling down her cheeks. She let the ruined pieces of the canvas fall onto the sheets, but shook her head, swallowing hard. She hadn't realized she was squeezing at her hands, once she ran out of canvas to rip.

She had thought, the moment she walked back into these chambers, so carefully preserved for the girl she once was, that that woman was dead. That she didn't belong in these chambers, and Margaery Tyrell was a different woman than she had ever been.

She should never have come back here.

Margaery Tyrell hadn't yet died, before she returned to Highgarden, and now here she was, and she had taken her brother with her.

Margaery's legs trembled beneath her, and it occurred to her that they could not hold her up any longer just as she fell down onto the bed, another cry leaving her.

"I..." she felt Meredyth reach out to her, and flinched away from the other girl, pretended that in her grief she did not notice the hurt expression on Meredyth's face, too. Everyone in Highgarden had loved Willas, after all.

Margaery was not the only one who has lost him.

Another feeling of anger rushed through her. Willas was her brother, not Meredyth's, after all.

"I should not have come back here," Margaery whispered hoarsely, a dawning realization growing larger in her mind. "I should never have come back here."

Meredyth reached out to her again. "Margaery, this isn't your fault."

Margaery swallowed hard, shaking her head. "I..."

Oh, but it was. The moment Meredyth said those words, she suddenly remembered, and Margaery sagged back down onto the bed, horror filling her.

She thought of what the guards had said, that the assassin had killed himself with a knife before being caught. That they hadn't been able to arrest him.

Thought of the crossbow he had used to kill her brother.

Gods, this was all her fault. All because she couldn't keep her fucking mouth shut, because she had to keep manipulating her shit of a husband, always thinking she was one step ahead of him when really she was two steps behind.

"Oh, gods," she whispered hoarsely, the first words she said that didn't taste like cotton.

"Margaery," she could hear Meredyth's voice, from so far away. "Margaery, do you need anything? Please, tell me what you need. Tell me how I can help you."

_"Yes, yes. Only...Perhaps the High Septon can be persuaded to annul the marriage, in light of everything that has happened. She ought to be here, with her family, after my grandfather's death, and she has led me to believe that the marriage was never consummated."_

_"Only...I am only your wife, and do not understand all of these...such matters, but the people should not be put through too much instability, surely?"_

Margaery reached up, covering her mouth with her hands.

Gods.

Gods, he had done this.

Her fucking husband had killed Willas, and all because Margaery had told him that an annulment might not sit well with the people.

What the fuck was wrong with that little shit?

What the fuck was wrong with her, thinking she had any prayer of controlling him?

When she screamed, it took Margaery a moment to realize that she was the one doing the screaming. It sounded as if she were the one dying, too.

"Margaery?" a hand, brushing through her hair. "What is it?"

Margaery shook her head. "I..."

And then she was sick, all over the blankets of the bed, and Meredyth yelped, narrowly avoiding being sprayed herself as she moved to pull Margaery's hair out of her eyes.

For a moment, she almost understood why this feeling, of purging herself like this, appealed to Sansa.

And then Margaery was climbing off the bed, pulling away from Meredyth and standing to her feet.

"Margaery?" she heard Meredyth ask, hesitant. She had never been the closest of Margaery's ladies.

"I need to speak with the guard," Margaery said, clearing her throat and wiping at her mouth. "The one who tried to arrest the assassin."

Meredyth raised a brow. Everyone had heard of her threats to the maester now, and Margaery almost felt guilty for them, but she also knew that her mother would never allow them to come to pass, not here, in Highgarden.

She squeezed her eyes shut. "Where is he?" she finally asked, opening her eyes and staring hard at Meredyth.

The girl glanced away. "He's...taking care of the body, Your Grace," she said, voice stilted. "Ser Loras ordered that it be hung outside the palace, for crimes against your House."

Margaery paled, pushing past the other girl, forcing her way out of the room.

"Margaery?" she heard the other girl call desperately behind her, but then Margaery was running, through the palace, ignoring the startled looks of the servants, their pity when the surprise vanished, for surely they all knew, by now.

She knew it would be best to keep this from the people until they had devised an explanation, for how some random assassin had gotten through their walls, but surely, the servants knew already what had happened.

She made it all of the way out of the palace, down into the courtyard outside of her brother's chambers, where she knew the assassin would have fallen.

There was a splotch of blood, lying on the ground, no doubt from the fall, before he had impaled himself.

Not nearly enough. Not nearly as much as there had been on her hands, as Margaery tried to hold the life inside of her brother.

"Your Grace?" one of the guards was still standing there, and she could see, a little ways off, the rest of them, impaling the dead body of the assassin on the walls of Highgarden.

Margaery stalked forward with purpose, aware of the trail she was leaving behind her, of worried guards and ladies, and she glanced down at her gown, realized that she had not yet changed and that her gown was covered in blood.

"Your Grace..." the guards exchanged glances, as she neared, staring at the body of the assassin, which had been mangled in the fall.

She barely glanced at it. "Where is the knife?" she demanded, and was only then aware of how cold her own voice sounded.

"Your Grace?" one of the guards stepped forward. "Perhaps you should go and be with your brother-"

"My brother," Margaery said, and now her voice was shaking, "Is dead. Where is the knife the assassin used to kill himself?"

The guards exchanged glanced again, but then one of them was moving forward, placing a bloodied knife into her hands.

She glanced up at him, and he swallowed thickly, bowing to her. "Your brother, Ser Loras, demanded that the knife be used to slit his throat, to show that he was a coward in taking his own life," the guard told her. "But this is it, before we do so."

Margaery licked her lips, staring down at the red sun wrapped around the handle of the knife, and closed her eyes.

She supposed it made sense, in their minds. A life for a life.

She wanted to scream.

She didn't.

Handed it back to the guard, without opening her eyes. Took a deep breath, let it out slowly.

She could feel Meredyth reach tentatively out to her, and flinched away from the other girl.

"I am your Queen," she said finally, opening her eyes and staring at the guard. "I want the body dismembered. It is a crime of the highest order to kill a noble lord. And that's an order."

She could still feel the imprint of the knife, in her hands, glanced down and saw that there was no blood on her hands, anymore. Meredyth had washed it off, earlier, though Margaery had very little memory of that.

The guards stared at her, perhaps surprised by her bloodlust. They all remembered the sweet young girl she had been, before she became a queen.

That girl was dead. She had been for a long time.


	270. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am loving all of the theories!

"We were pulled from the fighting," Garlan said, pulling off his gloves and running a hand through his long hair. "Willas, he...?"

Margaery looked away, biting her lip and glancing out at the courtyard, empty save for her brother's squire and his horse and their family, in lieu of her brother.

She could still feel the scream, settled at the back of her throat, not letting itself out since the day she'd held that Dornish knife in her hands.

Garlan crumpled. "Gods," he whispered hoarsely, swallowing. "How?" he asked, and there was a hoarse desperation in that tone that Margaery couldn’t' bring herself to answer.

It was my fault, her lips should have moved to say, but she found that she couldn’t' speak at all.

Loras cleared his throat, and she could hear the clog of tears in her brother's voice when he finally spoke. "Assassin," he whispered, and even that word was horrible enough. "He got past the gate by pretending to be a servant, and snuck up to the palace. We...we only figured out what was happening after, when we found a stash of weapons."

Margaery glanced sharply at her brother. He hadn't mentioned that, not to her.

Loras didn't meet her eyes.

Garlan sagged. "Gods," he whispered, and it was then that Margaery noticed her brother's eyes were shining with tears. He squeezed them both to him, and Margaery moved, clinging to her brother with all of the desperation of one who had lost everything.

Her throat closed at the thought.

Beside her, Loras wrapped his arms around the both of them.

And then Garlan was moving back, the oldest of them, and, in some ways, the oldest out of all of them, before.

"Where's mother?" he asked them.

Margaery looked away; it was Loras who answered.

"She's in confinement," he told their brother. "She didn't want...she said you were welcome to come and visit her, but as long as any one of those servants or guards in the palace might have let that man into Highgarden, she doesn't want to look at any of them."

She'd been very vocal about that fact, the times when Margaery had gone to visit her. Handed Margaery a tea cup with shaking hand, because even if she had just lost her son, she was married into the Tyrell family, and while that meant something different to Alerie than it did to the rest of their family, it meant something, and asked her how she was holding up.

Margaery had lied, of course, and said that she was holding herself together, and then her mother had once again said how none of the servants could be trusted, how that was why she had doubled the guards outside of Margaery's chambers, of course.

_"My gods, you don't think they were really looking for you, do you?"_

" _Mother_!" Loras had snapped, walking in just as Alerie was asking the question, as Margaery's shoulders hunched and she didn't meet the woman's eyes.

" _Well, why would anyone want to kill Willas_?" Alerie had asked, reaching up and brushing at her forehead. "I don't understand. He's not...he isn't...he hasn't hurt anyone."

She'd stood, had let Loras follow her out of those rooms, all the while knowing she didn't deserve his comfort.

" _She didn't mean that_ ," Loras said.

Margaery shrugged, wrapping her arms around her thin shoulders and not meeting his eyes. " _It doesn't matter_ ," she said.

Loras turned her around to face him, and Margaery didn't really know how to respond to the fact that it was her brother comforting her, now. Usually, it was the other way around, after all.

" _It does_ ," he'd snapped. " _I'll talk to her, and she won't say that sort of thing again_."

"I'll find who did this," Garlan promised the both of them fiercely, and Margaery swallowed hard at the resolution in his tone. "I'll find them, and they'll pay for this."

Margaery hugged herself, without her brother's arms around her anymore. Because she had known that this would come up. She hadn't talked to Loras enough for the topic to come up, but she knew he had thought it strange, the way she had ordered the assassin's body displayed, all the same.

"I need to speak with you," Margaery whispered into her brother's ear. "And Loras. Alone, later."

Garlan pulled back, eying her for a moment before he nodded.

And then he was walking forward, going to find their mother, and Loras turned to her.

"Are you all right?" he asked her, and she supposed that it was fortunate that they did not see much of each other recently, because while she could hide just about anything from most people, Loras was not one of them.

She shrugged. "My chambers, Garlan will find us," she said, Loras raised an eyebrow at her, before nodding once, turning back to the guards.

"Accompany the Queen back to her chambers," he told them, and Margaery shivered, thought about the fact that she had grown up with these guards, that of course she could trust them. Loras turned back to her, features drawn.

He looked so much older, these past few days.

She blamed herself for that, too.

"I'm just going to speak with the servants," he told her, and there was dark intent in that tone that had Margaery shivering.

She knew, of course, that if one of the servants had let the assassin into the palace, their lives were all forfeit. If there was one thing the Tyrells and the Lannisters had in common besides their wealth, it was that neither suffered traitors.

Margaery ran her fingers along the inside of her arms, and wondered if that wasn't what Joffrey might think of her, if he knew how she felt about someone who wasn't him.

She made it back to her chambers, and the guards posted outside made an exaggerated attempt at looking through her disheveled chambers for any threats before allowing her to be alone in them.

Meredyth was not inside, which was a relief. Yesterday, she'd told the girl she wanted her to spend the rest of their time in Highgarden in her mother's chambers, not in Margaery's.

Meredyth had almost looked relieved, but Margaery couldn't bring herself to care about that one way or the other.

Instead, she sat, feeling empty, on the edge of her bed, one of the only things in her room that could still be sat upon, and waited for her brothers to come.

It took them some time. It was almost a relief, that they arrived together, both of them looking grim and worried as the guards opened the doors for them. She didn't think she could bear sitting in here alone with only one of them.

Loras whistled, as he stepped inside of her chambers, surveying the wreckage she had done to it earlier. It took her a moment to realize that he had not been in her chambers since-

Garlan didn't even react, just came forward and sat on the edge of the bed, glancing at Margaery. "What is this about, Margaery?" he asked tiredly.

He hadn't even had the chance to change out of his armor, she saw, but Margaery made no move to speak. Was too anxious to do so.

She couldn't imagine how seeing their mother had been, if he hadn't seen her in recent days, and she felt a stab of pity for her brother, that he'd just come from a war abroad to face this hell at home.

"I know who did this," she said, and gods, did it hurt to say those words. To look up into her brothers' faces and see their shock and fury.

Loras moved forward, towering over her, and it was Garlan who reached out an arm, motioning their brother back. Loras paused, looking shamefaced.

"What are you talking about?" he demanded, still, and Margaery supposed she owed him that much, after what she had just said.

She was finding it difficult to speak. She glanced down at her trembling hands in lieu of both of them, these two men whom she had never feared in her life, both towering over her even with Garlan sitting beside her.

"It...it was Joffrey," she whispered, and hated how already she was near tears. Her brothers deserved the full story before she started sobbing about how foolish she'd been. "Joffrey did this."

She waited, not looking up.

"What."

Her brother did not come up with a more eloquent response, but Margaery could feel the anger radiating through him, just waiting to come through.

Garlan hesitated, and then reached out, taking her hands in his, forcing her to look up. It was at that moment that Margaery realized Leonette had not been out to greet him, with the rest of them.

She swallowed, glancing up.

"Margaery, what are you talking about?" he asked. "Why would your husband want to..." he shook his head, falling silent, unable to say the words.

Gods, he hadn't even seen the body.

Margaery had been to see it precisely a dozen times now, going down to his rooms where it still was because their mother refused to move him to the Starry Sept, since that horrible day when some unnamed assassin had destroyed her life. Had seen his body, pale and grey, mended as best as the Silent Sisters of Oldtown were able, after what that assassin had done to it.

They were able to make him look as if he were sleeping, so long as one did not think about what was beneath his shirt. Margaery, though, had insisted, lifting the shirt, looking at the holes marring her brother's body.

She would never forget that. Would never forget what her brother looked like, with holes in his skin where they shouldn't be.

"I...I told him..." Margaery shook her head, rubbing at her face. Gods, she was a wreck, but she needed to get through this. Needed to say the words.

"What is it?" Garlan asked, voice gentle. She thought, at any other time, he might have reached out to comfort her, but he didn't, now.

"Joffrey wanted to annul the marriage," she said softly. "For his mother's sake. She'd obviously influenced him, said she didn't want it, or...or she was unhappy, or he was unhappy without her in King's Landing." She shook her head. "I told him it would be unwise, that it might destabilize the realm, having the last marriage the Hand of the King presided over annulled because it hadn't born fruit."

Her brothers stared at her, uncomprehending.

She hated having to explain to them how her husband thought. But gods, she had turned this over and over in her mind, and it was the only explanation.

She wished she could be wrong.

"It would be far less of a troublesome, drawn out problem for our alliance if he just...di..." she couldn't finish the thought, not with the way Garlan's eyes were widening at her words, not with the fury seeping into Loras' gaze.

She hugged herself again.

But she could see that while Garlan was still staring at her, still looking confused, Loras understood all too well. After all, he'd spent the last few months at Joffrey's side as much as she had.

He spun away from her. "That little shit! How does he think an assassination attempt is going to keep the realm stable?"

He kicked at the chair Margaery had already partially broken, one of its legs flying out under it and across the room with a loud crash that had Margaery flinching.

She told herself that was foolish, too, that she shouldn't be flinching at her brother, of all people, when he deserved to feel this anger without worrying about her.

Garlan stiffened, a sudden thought occurring to him, and Margaery bit hard on the inside of her cheek as he came to the inevitable conclusion she had when she'd found that knife.

"Because he doesn't want the realm stable." His two siblings turned, and he sighed, seeing from the look on Margaery's face that no doubt she'd already realized this. "Think about it. Who is the logical one to blame for Willas' death, these days?"

Margaery swallowed hard.

"Cersei," Loras admitted, grudgingly, and Margaery wondered what that said about any of them, Loras or Margaery or her goodmother, that Cersei was the first person they thought of. Then he shook his head. "But...why would anyone want to? It's not as if the King will let us kill his fucking mother, even if she is guilty. Just to piss off? Because mission fucking accomplished."

Garlan shook his head, looking sad and very much like an old man. His eyes didn't leave Margaery's.

"The other logical one, I suppose," he muttered, but Loras only stared blankly at him.

"Dorne," Margaery whispered when Loras did not come to the conclusion she and Garlan had. "The logical ones to kill Willas would be the Martells, now that Oberyn is dead and both Houses have lost a member due to the other. The Martells." She hugged herself. "The knife that the assassin used to kill himself. It had a Dornish sun on it."

Loras closed his eyes. She had a feeling he hadn't looked at the knife when he'd ordered it used to slit the assassin's throat. "He's not that smart," he breathed out. "Joffrey's not that smart. He wouldn't...where would he have gotten a Dornish knife?"

Margaery shook her head, still hugging herself, unable to answer her brother.

All this time, she'd thought she had a handle on her bastard of a husband. And now, she realized just how foolish she had been, all of this time. Because while she might be able to understand how he thought, she could never control how he thought, and that meant she didn't understand him, not really.

She'd never understood her husband at all. Had underestimated him from the beginning, because gods, he had done this. He had killed her brother, on a throwaway comment Margaery had made during a meal she hadn't even thought was important.

He had killed her brother because Margaery had asked him not to annul his mother's marriage. Had killed her brother without remorse, in a horrible way, because of one comment.

Had done it knowing that Margaery was going to Highgarden to see her brother, that she would be returning to his bed when it was all over.

She was shaking, and it wasn't because she wanted to cry, suddenly.

"What if...what if it really was the Martells?" Garlan asked, a hesitancy seeping into his voice when he saw the expression on Loras' face, and Margaery whipped around to face him.

Loras blinked at their older brother. "You really think it was the Martells? Why the fuck would they want to kill our brother when Margaery's married to a madman who doesn't need a reason to kill anyone?" he asked.

Garlan glanced at Margaery, furrowing his brows, and Margaery looked away. Garlan sighed.

Loras glanced between them, eyes widening. "What is it?" he demanded, voice low with anger. Margaery closed her eyes. "What?"

"Loras..." Garlan cleared his throat.

Loras squeezed his hands into fists. "I'm sick of this," he snapped, turning to Margaery. "I know Grandmother thinks I'm a fucking idiot who can't keep my mouth shut, but Margaery..." he let out a shuddering breath, forehead wrinkling. "He's...He was my brother. Please. What is going on, for once?"

Margaery swallowed hard, ignoring Garlan's voice as she spoke, wondering even as she did how her older brother even knew. Wondered who else Olenna spoke with.

"I told Sansa Stark to say Oberyn had killed Tywin Lannister," she said lowly, swallowing and avoiding her brother's gaze. "I...I don't know if it was true or he just wanted to fight the Mountain, but if it wasn't and the Martells found out that he died because of my words, because of me..."

She could feel the hot heat of her brother's eyes on her. He didn't say anything, just waited, and then turned to Garlan. "And you knew?" he asked hoarsely, obviously putting the pieces together.

If Garlan, all the way in the Iron Islands, knew about this, then no doubt others did, as well.

Garlan dipped his head.

"Fuck's sake, Margaery!" Loras yelled, and Margaery winced, looking away. "What the fuck were you thinking?"

Margaery turned her scalding eyes on him, wanted to explain herself, the way she had wanted to with Willas, both couldn't force the words past her lips.

Because she hadn't been thinking. Not about Willas. At the time, she'd thought he was going to die. At the time, she'd thought this, killing Oberyn, could save Sansa and get her revenge for her brother at the same time.

She hadn't been thinking about whether Willas might actually live. She hadn't been thinking about whether Willas would have wanted that, because they all knew he wouldn't have.

She'd been thinking about Sansa, and if she dared say that now, she knew her brother, who had thrown away their family's integrity and trustworthiness for the one he'd loved, would have a few choice words to say about that.

She could feel tears coursing down her cheeks, couldn't bring herself to look in her brother's direction. She knew what he would say, could hear the accusation in his voice already.

"She didn't know-" Garlan started, but Loras spun on him.

"What the fuck, Garlan?" he demanded. "You knew, all of the way on the fucking other side of Westeros! Did you really think the Martells wouldn’t find out?" That last bit was directed at Margaery.

Margaery hugged herself again.

Because the truth was, she hadn't.

But if Garlan already knew...

Garlan turned to Margaery, ignoring their brother, for the moment. "Do you really think it was Joffrey?" he asked, and there was a quiet intensity in Garlan's voice that she hated.

Because while the rest of them blew hot, her brother only blew cold when he was furious.

Margaery swallowed, looking away. “I don’t know what I think,” she said, which was an admission, they all knew. "But I don't think Ellaria Sand would be stupid enough to send her assassin into the heart of the Reach with a knife baring the Martell family crest unless she truly wanted a war."

Garlan swore under his breath, and she knew that he did believe her. Loras fell silent, for several agonizing moments.

When Margaery glanced up at him, she could see the angry tears in her brother's eyes. He still wouldn’t quite meet her gaze.

“He can’t have his fucking war with the Martells because he can’t defeat them, but if the Reach is doing the fighting for him? Fucking piece of shit.”

Margaery closed her eyes, felt sick again.

"Loras..." Garlan started, but Loras pushed away from their brother, holding up a hand lest either of them come closer.

"I...I need to..." and then he was gone, rushing away from both of them and slamming the doors to Margaery's chambers behind him.

Margaery sagged, where she stood, saw Garlan glance her way.

"He just needs some time," Garlan said gently, but Margaery just shrugged a thin shoulder, not pulling away when her brother pulled her into an embrace. She didn't know if she would ever feel the touch of her other two brothers against her, again.

Garlan rested his chin on Margaery's forehead.

"Can you forgive me?" she whispered, because it didn't matter, either way. Didn't matter if it had been the Martells, or her fuck of a husband.

Either way, Willas was dead because of her.

Garlan squeezed her tightly. "Margaery," he said finally, voice hoarse, and she could hear the tears clogging her brother's throat. "Do you really think I could blame you for that?"

She glanced up at her brother, swallowing hard. "Wh-what?" she stammered out.

Garlan sighed, squeezing her again. It wasn't quite an embrace. "My brother is dead, Margaery. I can't afford to lose another sibling." And then he bent down, kissing her on the forehead.

Margaery closed her eyes, felt the tears falling down her cheeks in silence.


	271. MARGAERY

Margaery could remember when she was younger, how she had dreamed about her brother Loras. She hadn't known him well. He had gone to live as a squire for Renly, the punishment to House Tyrell for siding with the Targaryens during the war, though it hadn't been called such, when she was just a child. They had grown up together, somewhat, but then he had been gone, at the tender age of eleven summers, and Margaery had grown up with her two older siblings.

She hadn't had much opportunity to talk to her brother, after that. He remained at Storm's End with Renly for many years, until he achieved his knighthood, and then traveled with the man. And while Renly traveled a lot, he did not often travel to Highgarden.

So it was that when she was finally reunited with her brother, Margaery had not wanted to waste any time fighting with him. They had fought, of course, because they were both stubborn and wild children, but they had always made up by the end of the day.

It had killed her, the silence she had gotten from her brother in the months after Renly's death, too tired to even fight her.

And yet, here they were again, and Margaery knew that she deserved his anger, but she couldn't stand this, nonetheless. The cold looks, the silence, the loss of more than one brother, just as Garlan had said.

Garlan was more understanding, and yet Margaery found that she hated that, as well. Hated that her brother looked at her with that pity, the sort of pity he had never sent her way before.

So she did the foolish thing, and avoided both of them as much as she was able. It wasn't hard. They were all grieving Willas in their own ways, if Margaery's were a slight bit more self-incriminating than her brothers', and none of them really wanted to do so together, no matter how much it was what their mother wanted.

Their mother, of course, didn't know the truth of it. Margaery couldn't bring herself to tell her, and her brothers had not done so, either.

Margaery hated sitting with her in her chambers, mourning as if she had a right to do so, when all of this was her fault.

And she hated that, now that her brothers knew the truth, neither of them rose to defend her, when her mother innocently asked why anyone would want to kill her sweet, eldest boy, when her daughter was the one married to the King.

Margaery tried to pretend the words didn't hurt.

Mostly, she spent her time at the Starry Sept, where the Silent Sisters had taken her brother into confinement, to prepare his body for the burial. According to the law, Margaery was not allowed to lay eyes on him until the Silent Sisters had finished their preparations, but she supposed being Queen was useful for some things.

Her brother's body didn't stink, the way Tywin Lannister's had. She looked at his corpse and still recognized it as her brother's.

"Your Grace?" a voice asked, and Margaery lifted her head, blinking in surprise at the septon standing on the other side of her brother's body, on the raised platform it lay on.

It.

She closed her eyes.

"Septon Morren," she said, after a long beat, opening her eyes. "I did not expect to see you here."

Indeed, if the Queen herself was not allowed in this room after the Silent Sisters had begun their project, surely a septon was not.

The septon dipped his head, face grim. "You will forgive me, my lady, if I say that it is difficult to find you alone in any other circumstances. The gods, I pray, forgive me."

Margaery raised an eyebrow. She knew Septon Morren very little; remembered only that he had been the one to marry she and Renly, a lifetime ago. He was not old, for a septon, and she wondered how he had gained that coveted role.

Wondered now where his allegiances lay, that he would marry a man in open rebellion to the King.

She stepped away from her brother's body, thought that for a moment, she could breathe, once she had done so. "What is it that you require, Septon?" she asked him calmly, not meeting his eyes.

The septon hesitated, then spoke. "Your Grace, I hesitate to even mention this in the presence of one seeking solace from the gods, but it has come to our attention that your father will not have arrived in Highgarden before the requisite Days of Preparation have been completed by the Silent Sisters."

Margaery blinked owlishly at him. "And?" she asked, ice dripping into her tone.

The septon cleared his throat. "If your lord father is not present within the requisite number of days, burying Lord Willas beyond those days would be..." he grimaced. "It would be a departure from our laws and customs."

Margaery stared at him. "Lord Tywin was not buried for some time," she reminded him.

"Yes," the man said, patiently enough, "but he was the victim of an ongoing murder, I'm afraid."

Margaery closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. "I see," she said, then sniffed. "My father has been sent for. It will take time for a raven to reach King's Landing." She looked down her nose at him. "I am your Queen. If I tell you to wait, then you will."

The man gave her a long look. For a moment, she expected him to act as those fanatics in King's Landing might, telling her that she was not above the gods, and that they followed the law of the gods, and not hers.

He didn't.

"As you wish, Your Grace. I am only telling you that there will be...dissenters."

Margaery nodded. "My father will take the Kingsroad, and not a ship," she reminded the septon. "He will be here within enough time to..." she looked to where her brother lay, and pinched herself beneath her clothes. "To bury my brother."

The septon grimaced. "I am sorry for your loss, Your Grace," he said, and Margaery stared at him for a moment, before she whispered, "Thank you."

And then she hurried away, because there was a part of Margaery that didn't just hide her emotions because she was playing a part.

She made it all of the way out of the Starry Sept before she ran into Leonette, who was standing outside the building, two guards on either side of her, one of whom, Margaery recognized blearily, was meant to be hers, and looking as though she was trying to work up the courage to go inside.

Leonette blinked at the sight of Margaery, alone. "Margaery," she said, raising an eyebrow towards Margaery's guard, "I was just having an interesting conversation with Ser Ilik here." She nodded to the man. "He says you told him to wait outside."

Margaery grimaced. She'd thought she would return to her guard before anyone from her family came to chastise her for it.

"I..."

No, she couldn't think of a good excuse. Only that she was tired of being followed around by guards all the time when it had been her brother who had needed the protection, in the end.

Leonette saw the look on her face, and her expression softened. She reached out, taking Margaery's hands in her own and squeezing them gently. "I was just going in to pray," she said. "Is anyone within?"

Margaery bit the inside of her cheek. "Just an annoyingly talkative septon," she said, and Leonette smirked, before burying the expression beneath a mask of sadness.

"I see," she said. "Well, then, perhaps I'll wait out here with you, until the man goes away."

Margaery wondered what it was about her face giving it away. "You don't have to-"

"I insist."

Margaery sagged a little, and suddenly it was as if the guards surrounding them didn't even exist, and it was only her and Leonette standing out here in the warm summer weather. Margaery extracted her hands from Leonette, hugging herself.

"How are you doing?" Leonette asked abruptly, and Margaery flinched. The other woman's face softened. "Oh, Margaery."

Margaery closed her eyes. "I'll survive," she said. "I assume...Garlan and you must have spoken?"

Leonette's smile was sad. "Yes, we did. About everything except..." she glanced down at her stomach.

Margaery grimaced. "Then you must hate me, too." She felt rather guilty, suddenly, for feeling so relieved to see the other woman, moments ago.

Leonette's eyes widened. She reached out for Margaery and then hesitated, letting her hands fall by her sides. "I don't," she said, and Margaery's head jerked up. "They're men, Margaery. They don't...they can't understand what it's like, for us women, to be married to a man we hardly know and expected to make him happy for the rest of our lives. And I don't know, beyond that, what it is like to know that your life is expectant on that happiness."

Behind them, the guards shifted uncomfortably, but Margaery barely noticed. "I..."

"It wasn't your fault," Leonette said, and Margaery sucked in a shuddering breath. "And I think you know that, or at least, a part of you must."

Margaery licked her lips. "I wish...I just wish I knew for certain, if that's what happened or if it really was the Martells..." she shook her head. "I just want to know. And I know that I can never ask my husband upfront, that any suspicion lobbied at him..." she cut herself off. "Gods, Leonette, you may understand, but if I am the reason my brother is dead, I will never forgive myself. And I can't understand why you could."

There was a long pause, and this time, when Leonette reached out for her, Margaery didn't flinch away from the movement.

"It's different, for me," Leonette said. "He was a good man, and I loved him, but...he was not my brother. Not my son."

Her hand reached down to rub at her stomach, and Margaery found her eyes following the gesture.

"Have you told him yet?" she asked, a bone deep tiredness filling her.

Leonette glanced at her, and it occurred to Margaery then that she should have been the one in charge of things of late, not Loras, and certainly not Margaery. Out of all of them, she might have been the only one able to do so.

But their family had ever underestimated Leonette, treated her as they did Margaery's mother, an outsider in the important parts of the Tyrells' lives, and perhaps that had been a failing.

Margaery couldn't say, for certain.

Leonette pursed her lips, and that was answer enough. Still, Margaery found herself sayig, "I'm sorry."

Leonette blinked over at her. "For what?" she asked, voice hoarse, and Margaery found herself explaining where she thought she would normally have stayed silent.

"This can't be an easy conversation to have, in light of..." she felt her jaw trembling, and Margaery fell abruptly silent.

Leonette let out a slow breath. "I haven't thought of a way to bring it up yet," she said, hugging herself, and Margaery found herself mirroring the gesture. "I don't want...I don't want his first understanding that he is bringing a child into the world to be marred by his brother's death."

Margaery nodded, understanding the sentiment well enough. "I understand," she said. "But I think you should tell him, all the same. Before he finds out from Loras, or, gods forbid, my mother."

Leonette chuckled, and instantly looked guilty for doing so, glancing at Margaery out of the corner of her eye. Margaery didn't meet her gaze.

She wasn't going to be the one to tell Leonette that she couldn't laugh, now that Willas was dead.

Even if Margaery found herself wondering if she would ever laugh again.

But...no. She couldn't think about Willas. She couldn't think about him, because if she did, she was going to break down, right here, outside the doors of the Sept, and she couldn't have that.

She was the Queen of Westeros, and they couldn't have that.

"How did Garlan manage to get away from the front?" Margaery asked idly, sweeping her hair behind her neck. Anything to stop thinking about what had happened to her poor brother. "I...I don't think Joffrey will be pleased to hear it."

"There are rumors," Leonette said softly, pulling the black coil a little closer around her throat. "Crazed, foolish rumors, but Garlan will tell me nothing."

Margaery blinked at her. "What rumors?" she asked.

Leonette bit her lip. "They're saying that they've beaten the Greyjoys still in the Iron Islands back far enough. That the only ones to worry about are the ones who went to Dragonstone. But..."

"Leonette," Margaery whispered, and the other girl blinked at her. "Please."

She needed a distraction, anything, and crazy rumors sounded wonderful, just about now.

Leonette sighed. "Keep in mind that Garlan has told me nothing of this." She shook her head. "They're saying that the army was actually beat back by some...some sort of sea monster who killed many of them. That Euron Greyjoy has taken control of the Iron Islands and is able to call some sort of...creature out of the sea." She shook her head, laughing self-deprecatingly. "Of course, it's hardly true. Sea monsters."

Margaery bit her lip, swallowing hard. "And Garlan has said nothing of it?"

That wasn't like him. She knew that the loss of Willas was, of course, hard for all of them, but she would have at least expected her brother to tell his wife about what had happened in the battle.

He hadn't even told Loras, for all that Margaery knew.

She shook her head. Sea monsters.

"He seemed...changed," Leonette said. "I thought perhaps it was just the knowledge that he was not here when Willas...but perhaps that is not all of it." She glanced at Margaery. "Does that...Is that helping?"

Margaery shook her head, breathing shaky once more. "I...no," she said. "I wish that it was."

Leonette heaved a great sigh, reaching out and squeezing Margaery's hands in her own. "I wish that I could do more," she told Margaery, and Margaery felt her throat closing.

"I...I should return to Highgarden," she said, abruptly, swatting at her eyes quickly. "Are you coming or staying?"

Leonette gave her a long look, and then shrugged. "I suppose I'll come back with you," she said, and Margaery felt something warm in her stomach for the first time since her brother had died, at those words.


	272. SANSA

The news of Lord Willas' death reached the capitol mere days after it had happened. Sansa covered her mouth when she learned, horrified for Margaery's sake, though she had never met the man.

The man that, once upon a time, Margaery had plotted for her to marry.

And now he was dead, killed by an assassin’s mark.

Sansa could barely comprehend the information, a sorrow filling her even though she had never even met the man. She could only imagine what Margaery must be feeling.

Well, that wasn't quite right. Sansa had seen the loss of her brothers. Bran, Rickon, Robb. All of them dead by the hands of enemies who hadn't had the decency to show their faces when they did the deed, and she pitied Margaery, that the other girl must now suffer the same fate.

She had never wanted Margaery to experience the grievances that she had.

Sansa was pulled from her musings by the sight of her husband, stalking through the main parlor of their shared chambers, pulling on a thin, deerskin jacket. She stood to her feet, untucking her legs from under her.

"Where are you going, my lord?"

Tyrion blinked at her, looking surprised. That she was there, or that she didn't know the answer already, Sansa wasn't sure. "Where is Shae?" he asked, rather than answering her question.

Sansa stiffened. She felt a small wave of guilt fill her, at the thought of the other woman. She hadn't wanted to create this distance that now lay between them, when she had chastised the other woman about touching her in front of that serving boy.

It had been foolish, and she regretted pushing the other woman away, now.

She just...wished that she could tell that to Shae. It seemed that every time they did interact, the words clogged in Sansa's throat.

"I...She went to find fresh linens, my lord," Sansa said, blushing and not meeting his gaze.

He seemed to understand, and closed his eyes for a moment. "I see," he said, finally. "The King has called the nobles into the throne room," he said. "Apparently, Lord Mace has a public request."

Sansa blinked at that, thought of a dozen things the man might ask. "Did he say why?" she couldn't help but ask.

If it had been her, she wouldn't have wanted to interact with the King at all.

Tyrion's face was grim. "Most likely, he seeks permission to return to Highgarden for his son's funeral, and doesn't want to chance the King refusing him in private."

Sansa stared. She knew Joffrey was cruel, but... "Why would the King refuse him?" she asked.

Tyrion's eyes were tired as he held out his arm for her. She took it, allowing him to lead her out of the room. "Because he is the Master of Ships, still, Sansa," he said. "And generally, that requires him to be here, especially when we are at war with a people who fight predominately by ships."

The Iron Islanders. Still, she hated the condescending tone of her husband’s voice.

"I see," she said finally, nodding, even if she didn't. It seemed to her that anyone else on the Small Council could have taken over that responsibility for the time it took to bury his son. Then, "Do you think Joffrey will let him go?"

Tyrion hesitated, and then nodded. "If he knows what's good for him," he said, rather darkly, and she blinked at her husband.

Joffrey didn't have the best track record with that, Sansa thought bitterly.

They made their way into the throne room, and Sansa found herself staring up at the seat beside the Iron Throne instinctively. To the chair Margaery was often sitting in.

Cersei was sitting in, sitting tall and proud, her hair pulled into an elaborate bun the likes of which Sansa had not seen from the woman in some time. She smiled when she caught sight of Sansa and Tyrion entering the room.

It was not a nice smile.

Sansa dutifully followed Tyrion to the crowd of people waiting for their King to begin...whatever it was he planned to do. Waited as Joffrey asked Lord Mace to come forward with his request, from where he stood in a sea of Tyrells.

"Lord Mace," he said. "What is it you would ask of the Crown?"

"I seek permission to return to Highgarden to be with my family in this, our time of grief," Mace said, and his face was ashen for the first time since Sansa had met him. The man always had a smile.

Now, he looked worn down, defeated. Old.

She felt a stab of pity for him, but could not help but think of Margaery, leagues away from her, mourning her brother, as well.

And she was not here in King's Landing, for Sansa to comfort as she wished to.

"Of course," Cersei said, leaning forward in the chair usually reserved for her son's wife, face twisting in sympathy. "That is only to be expected, Lord Mace. You have lost your son, and suffered a great loss. Our shared loss, for he was my husband, and though I knew him for only a short time, he seemed a kind and gentle soul. Though I cannot go myself, I beg you carry my grief with you. And let it be known that our sympathies and prayers go with you."

Joffrey tapped his fingers on the arms of the Iron Throne. "Yes, yes," he said, a bit too quickly, and Sansa blinked at the lack of concern in his voice.

Not that it was surprising that Joffrey didn't care about something, just that...

This was his goodbrother he was speaking of.

"You have suffered a great loss," he said, glancing sideways at his mother and speaking only when she cleared her throat. "You may have all of the time you need." Then he nodded. "In your absence, the Small Council will absorb the position of Master of Ships."

Mace dipped his head, clearly uncaring, and stepped back.

And then Sansa remembered Olenna, stepping forward to stand beside her son, a hand on his arm and a look in her eyes so gentle that for a moment, Sansa thought surely it couldn’t belong to the Queen of Thorns.

"And what about you, Lady Olenna?" Cersei asked, and she sounded far too gleeful, for someone mourning the loss of a dearly departed husband. "Will you be returning to Highgarden, as well?"

Olenna frowned at her, turning away from her son after giving his arm a final squeeze. Her gaze was cold as it traveled from Cersei to Joffrey, and then back again.

"I will not," she said, and Cersei blinked at her, looking discomfited for the first time since the courtiers had been called to the throne room. "I am afraid that while my grief for my favorite grandson is great, duty compels me to remain here."

Cersei blinked at her again. "Duty, my lady?" she asked, tone lightly mocking, and Sansa thought she heard the question within that one. For what official duties did the Queen of Thorns have, in King’s Landing?

Olenna's gaze was cold; more fitting of the woman Sansa had come to know, when she responded. "Indeed. One Tyrell must remain in King's Landing, after all."

Cersei raised a brow, leaning back in her chair. "Truly?" she questioned. "Surely we could make an exception, this once."

Olenna lifted her chin. "I wouldn't dare to ask for it," she said, and something about the way she said those words made Sansa shiver. "And if Your Grace can remain in King's Landing despite her grief, so can I."

Beside her, she noticed how her husband straightened, paling for a moment, before the look vanished behind the facade he often wore at court.

Joffrey glanced sideways at his mother, looking confused, before he clapped his hands and said that the court would see no more requests for the rest of the day, to honor the mourning of House Tyrell.

He still didn’t manage to sound sorry about it, and Sansa narrowed her eyes at him even as her husband took her arm and led her away, back to their chambers.

She wasn't quite certain why they had needed to be present at that request, but Tyrion walked quickly, silent, and there was a somber note to him that had Sansa worried.

Because her husband was usually better at concealing his fears than this, and she could see that her husband was afraid. Had been afraid since the moment Olenna Tyrell had insisted on remaining in King's Landing, though she didn't know why.

Yes, that was...strange, and she could not understand the woman's desire to remain here, but it hadn't been the fear inducement Tyrion seemed to think it was.

His grip on her arm was punishing. She pulled away abruptly, and he grimaced, but let her go, slowed a little.

They didn't speak the rest of the way back to the Tower of the Hand, and the moment they arrived, Tyrion made a beeline for the wine sitting on his table in the parlor.

Sansa hesitated in the doorway, uncertain of her place in his worries. It wasn't as if her husband often confided in her, or looked like he was about to do so now.

He didn't speak, just poured himself some wine and began drinking, and Sansa watched him, not speaking, before walking to the other end of the room and picking up the needlework she had cast aside earlier.

At this point, she had created enough fabric to actually make a dress. She only wished she could gain permission from the King to do so.

"The King doesn't seem much affected by his goodfather's death," Tyrion murmured into the silence that followed, and Sansa glanced up from the needlework she was barely paying attention to.

She shrugged. "He never seems much affected by any death he hasn't caused and celebrated in," she muttered, before reaching for her needle once more.

Her heart ached for Margaery. She knew what it was to lose a brother, and could not imagine sitting and watching while they died in front of her. Hearing it from afar had been horrible enough.

She remembered when Bran had fallen from the tower, how hurt he had been, and her own worry over what would happen to him. She had been far too concerned with her impending betrothal to Joffrey, at the time, and she was ashamed of that now, but she could not imagine remaining there and watching as he...

"Yes," Tyrion agreed, but there was a thoughtfulness to his tone that had Sansa worried.

Worried because Joffrey wasn't concerned about his wife at all. Worried because Margaery was going to return to the capitol soon enough and it would be to find that her husband didn't feel the least bit sorry for her situation.

Married to a monster or not, Margaery didn't deserve that, surely.

"Do you think the Queen will forgive her husband for everything he does?" Tyrion asked finally, placidly, and Sansa blinked at him.

"My lord?" she asked, bemusement filling her tone.

Tyrion didn't look her way, merely took another sip of alcohol. "I will order a Tyrell flag to be placed in the Keep," he said finally, after another protracted silence which Sansa didn't understand but thought she ought to. "And there will be an observed mourning period in the capitol. Joffrey will have to be seen signing off on this."

Sansa blinked again. "You don't think he will?" she asked, confused about why her husband was discussing this sort of thing with her.

Sure, she knew Margaery, was dear friends with the girl, but surely the rest of this was none of her concern.

Tyrion gave her a long look now, finally meeting her eyes. "But you know them better than I. Do you think that will suffice?" he asked her, and Sansa licked her lips, for she had a feeling her husband was asking her something else entirely.

"Suffice?" she asked, still lost.

Tyrion bit his tongue, then, in a too calm voice, "To appease the Tyrells?"

Her stomach dropped, and she shivered. No.

No, surely not. Surely Joffrey wouldn't have done something like this. Surely...

Abruptly she thought of a conversation she'd overheard between two serving women, on her way to another annoying meal with Cersei Lannister.

_"Do you think the Queen Mother will ever be expected to return to her husband's side?"_

_"Do you think the King will want to see his mother back in the arms of a cripple anytime soon?"_

"I..." she shook her head, horror filling her. "Do you think...?"

Tyrion glanced toward the door, and she fell silent, going pale.

"Gods," she whispered, and Tyrion grimaced.

"Indeed," he said, taking another gulp of his wine. For the first time, Sansa found herself wishing she might develop a taste for the stuff.

"The Tyrells..."

She thought of how Olenna had insisted on staying behind, despite the fact that she knew she would be missing her grandson's funeral, the shrewd look in her eyes as she stared at the far too sympathetic Cersei Lannister.

They knew. Or, at least, Olenna knew, and Sansa could not imagine that the woman's wrath would be something easily borne.

She thought of Margaery, kneeling in a Black Cell at her side, telling her that Oberyn had all but killed her brother, and that she needed Sansa to damn him to death.

"No," she said, because it was the truth, and her husband deserved to know that. "No, I don't think it will be nearly enough at all."

Unlike that time, a part of Sansa was relishing it.


	273. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I've just had the weekend from hell. Please don't forget to comment so I can find some motivation for this story!

It was difficult to find Megga, that following week. The Tyrells were in a flurry, sending Mace Tyrell off, and then doing...whatever it was they were doing, to mourn Willas here in King's Landing. Many of them hadn't left the Sept of Baelor in days, she knew.

But she did find her.

Megga was standing in the corridor, a pile of clothes in her hands that were too fine to be her own, Sansa thought idly, though it could certainly be said that most of the Tyrell ladies had better clothes than her own.

She blinked at the sight of Sansa, and then sent her a smile that was rather forced. "Sansa," she said. "I didn't expect to see you here." A pause. "In the Maidenvault."

Sansa shrugged, aware that she had made a risk, in coming here. But, she supposed, Megga had also made a risk, in deciding to involve Megga in any of this.

"Yes," she said slowly, "but I thought we needed to talk."

Megga blinked at her, and Sansa rolled her eyes, pulling Megga ito the narrow archway beside the Maidenvault, where they would not be overheard.

“You were right,” Sansa said, leaning into her.

Megga lifted a brow. “I’m sorry?” she asked, looking genuinely bemused.

Sansa took a deep breath, because she'd been thinking about this since Lord Mace had stood in front of Joffrey and demanded to be allowed to return home.

And Lord Mace wasn't risking what Sansa might be risking just now, but she had to do something. Because Sansa had lost most of her family to the Lannisters, and she didn't want Margaery to lose the rest of hers.

“We’re not friends, and I’m a little angry at you for making me believe that perhaps we could be, but you’re right. Margaery needs something to protect her, once she returns to King’s Landing, and if that something could bring down Cersei Lannister?” She took another deep breath. “That might just do it.”

Megga hesitated. “Are you sure?” she asked. “It is my mandate, and I realize that asking you could get you into trouble. Seven Hells,” she went on, “It could get me into trouble with Margaery, if she finds out. You have to be sure.”

Sansa met Megga’s eyes. “I’m sure,” she said, wondering where this hesitance had been the other day. “What do you need me to do?”

Megga took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. "Okay," she said, clearing her throat. "Okay." She paused.

"Megga?"

"I..." Megga pressed a hand to her forehead. "Margaery won't like it," she said finally, and Sansa blinked at her. "She'll think that I'm using you. Or, that I'm failing my promise to keep you safe."

Sansa stared at her. "I thought we already had this conversation. And besides, Margaery isn't here," she said finally, and Megga blinked at her, before her lips spread into a slow smile.

"Okay," she repeated. "Cersei and the King are having a dinner tonight, with the rest of the Lannister family." She gave Sansa a long look. "Can you be convincingly sick?"

Sansa gulped. "Joffrey will expect me to be there," she said, and then a thought occured to her. "Dinner, you said? What about breakfast?"

Megga stared at her for a long moment, and then she smirked. "I like the way you think," she said finally. "But I'm not sure that would be believable."

Sansa flushed, wondering how many of the Tyrell ladies knew about her private marriage to her husband. "Right," she said finally. "I suppose I could be sick. I'm not sure I would convince my husband and...and Shae, however."

Megga tossed her hair. "I have...potions," she said finally, giving Sansa a long look. "I'm not sure if you know, but I'm sort of...known for that thing, among the servants."

Sansa raised an eyebrow. "Potions?" she asked.

Megga nodded. "Your serving lady will have heard of it," she said. "I...When the Queen Mother tried to give Margaery those...potions, to...ah, she said help with the child, I was the one who convinced her not to take them."

Sansa blinked at her. "Is that why you're the one spying on Maester Quyburn?" she asked, and Megga pinched her.

"Not so loud," she snapped, glancing over her shoulder. "But, uh, yes. I'm the only one who might have a hope of knowing..." she shook her head. "But I doubt I will. I'm hardly a maester, after all."

Something about those words made Sansa think the girl was being modest, and that struck her as strange, in a girl like Megga.

"Send your lady for me, tell her you need something for stomach sickness," Megga said. "I know that's, uh, a concern with you."

Sansa flushed again. "Did...Margaery tell you that?" she demanded.

Megga smirked. "No," she said. "You may think Margaery just sits around gossiping with her servants whenever she's not with you, but she has me spying on someone for a reason."

Sansa blinked at her. "All right," she said finally. "As long as you think you can fool my serving woman."

"Well," Megga said, "she is very protective of you, but luckily for both of us, I'm a better actress than you. Just pretend to be sick. I find that anxiety helps."

Sansa nodded. She didn't think that was going to be a problem. "I'll see you then," she said, nervously, and Megga reached out, squeezing her hands.

"We don't have to do this, remember," she said, and her voice was far more gentle, today, than Sansa had ever encountered it before.

Sansa forced herself to smile. "Margaery's lost her brother, and she asked this of you. I'm going to do it, whether I'm nervous about it or not."

Megga's smile was wide. "I knew it," she said. "I knew there was something of steel about you."

Sansa stared at her, unsure how to respond to that. And then Megga was gone, glancing over her shoulder once before disappearing down the corridor.

Sansa took a deep breath, and leaned against the wall.

A part of her knew that Margaery wouldn't approve of this, as Megga had said. That she would be angry that Sansa had risked herself in this way.

She was going to do it anyway, though. She was resolved, because she needed to feel like she was doing something for Margaery.

Wished that someone had done something for her, after her brother had been killed.

She made it back to her chambers in the Tower just in time for Shae to give her a suspicious look, and summoned up some of the nervousness that Megga had advised her to have.

"Sansa," Shae said, forcing a smile. Things had been strained between them recently, after all. Sansa didn't quite know how to fix that. "I was looking for you."

Sansa pinched herself beneath her gown. "I'm sorry," she said. "The Lady Megga invited me to tea, but I'm beginning to feel a bit...peaked."

Shae raised an eyebrow at her, clearly aware that Margaery was leagues away, and therefore Sansa didn't have a reasonable excuse to be acting suspicious, like this. She stepped closer, pressing a hand to Sansa's forehead. "Are you getting ill?" she asked.

Sansa leaned into the touch, before flinching away. "I'm fine," she insisted, moving away from Shae. "I just need to lie down for a while, I think."

Shae gave her another long look. "All right," she said. "I'll find a warm cloth for you, and maybe something to snack on." She took a deep breath, clearly aware that her next words were going to effect Sansa. "The King has called a supper for his family, tonight."

Sansa flinched, and then hated herself a little more. "I see," she said, affecting surprise. She remembered what Lord Baelish had told her, how terrible a liar she was. She hoped that she had at least been able to convince Shae, just now. "Well then," she said, smiling again. "I'm just going to have to get better in time, then. We all know how he can be about that."

In fact, she wouldn’t put it past Joffrey to come to her chambers and drag her to supper even if she did insist that she was sick.

Which meant that she was going to have to be sick enough that he wouldn't want to come, and risk exposing himself to whatever she had.

Sansa closed her eyes, taking a deep breath as she walked into her chambers and laid down on the bed, slipping off her shoes as she did so.

She hadn't been sick...honestly, she hadn't even thought of it until now, but she hadn't been sick in a good long while. She knew that it was likely that Shae and Margaery had been keeping track of that, knew exactly how long it had been, but now her stomach was twisting itself in knots, that she hadn't been sick in so long.

It felt...wrong, in some ways.

She lay down on the bed, waited for Shae's probing gaze to stop burning through her back, waited for the other woman to leave the room to go and find that warm cloth and snacks, and then she was leaping out of bed, running towards the chamber pot in the corner of the room.

She didn't have much time, she knew.

Sansa took a deep breath, closing her eyes as she knelt in front of the chamber pot. Her stomach twisted again, and Sansa waited until she did feel nauseous, before breathing in deep and jamming two fingers down her throat.

She'd never done it this way before, Sansa thought idly. Had never had to induce it in this way.

She felt bile rising in her throat first, and she pushed her fingers deeper, thought of her brother, with a wolf's head sewn into his neck-

She sicked up, violently, half of it missing the chamber pot, and Sansa could feel tears stinging at her eyes as she did so, as she heard Shae stumbling back into the room.

Quickly, Sansa yanked her fingers out of her mouth, before the other woman saw.

And then Shae was at her side, pulling the hair out of her face, saying soft words that Sansa couldn't make out, and she sagged into the other woman, felt tears slipping down her cheeks.

She couldn’t stop picturing her brother's wolf's head.

And then she couldn't force anything else past her throat, and she sighed, fell back onto her knees.

Shae was silent for a moment, and then she was saying, "Do you think you're done?"

Sansa shook her head, and then shrugged, and then Shae was standing, helping Sansa up onto the bed once more, and pulling the chamber pot closer, grimacing at the sight of it.

"I'll go and find you another one," she told Sansa. "Stay here, yes?"

Sansa sent her an unimpressed look, and Shae grimaced again, reaching out and pressing her hand to Sansa's forehead again.

And then she was gone, and Sansa breathed in relief, now that she was alone.

She didn't think it would be difficult to convince Shae that she wouldn't be able to go to supper tonight, but she still wasn't certain how Megga was going to get rid of Shae, once the other woman came to her for those ingredients, and that worried her.

Worried her enough to feel a bit sick again.

By the time Shae was back, Sansa had managed to be sick again. It almost felt good, though she felt guilty that Shae was going ot have to clean all of this up.

Shae thrust the other chamber pot out to Sansa, and Sansa took it gratefully, emptied her stomach of everything left in it.

Shae sat on the edge of her bed, staring at Sansa.

"I'm sorry," Sansa said suddenly, and Shae blinked at her.

"Hmm?"

"About...the chamber pot," she managed, though she didn't mean that at all, not really.

Shae gave her another long look, and then smiled. It didn't look forced, this time. She reached out, patting Sansa's foot. "I wish I could do something for you," she said. "I will tell the King's messenger that you're sick abed, and can't come to supper."

Sansa sagged in relief. "All right," she agreed. Then, "Shae?"

Shae was still rubbing her foot. "Yes?"

"Megga...Lady Megga, you know how we've gotten close, lately?"

Shae raised her eyebrow. "Yes," she said, dryly.

Sansa smiled slightly, still feeling queasy. "Sorry. She...she's intimated to me before that she has...that she makes things for women, when they feel ill."

Shae blinked at her. "You think it's...?"

"No," Sansa said quickly. "Or...I think I am about to start my moon's blood, perhaps. I...haven't really been keeping track."

Shae nodded, standing, letting go of Sansa. Sansa almost mourned the loss. "I'll go and ask her, how is that?"

Sansa half sat up in the bed. "How?" she asked. "You're just a..."

"Servant?" Shae asked, quirking her lips. "And what are the Queen's ladies, but her glorified servants, eh?" she smiled at Sansa's shocked expression. "Don’t worry. We servants have been going to her for some of our ills, lately. Our...only other supplier is much less likable."

The Grandmaester. Sansa had heard stories about him, too.

"All right," she said. Then, "Thank her for me."

Megga would understand the message, then.

Shae nodded, and then she was leaving, and Megga was just going to have to trust in Megga's ability to get rid of her, she thought, because she climbed out of bed, cleaning herself up and finding another gown.

It was difficult, dressing by herself when she was so used to Shae doing so now, but then again, she'd managed well enough before Tyrion had gifted Shae to her as a servant. She climbed into a gown that wouldn’t be too noticeable by any guards, that was plain enough that she almost seemed like a servant, and then she waited.

It took longer than she had been expecting, and by the time Megga finally arrived, Sansa was starting to get worried that something had gone wrong.

But then Megga was standing in the doorway, grinning wickedly at Sansa. "You ready?" she asked.

Sansa blinked, standing from her bed. She hoped Megga wouldn't say anything about the smile. "How did you...?"

Megga grinned. "I'm assuming that Shae went and told the messenger beforehand, for she took forever. But then she came to me, and I intimated to her that I was...out of a crucial ingredient, for stomach ills, and that I couldn't afford to be gone for long because Lady Olenna is such a cruel mistress compared to Margaery. She helpfully agreed to go down into the city and gather those ingredients for me, when I gave her the coins for them."

Sansa blinked, feeling a bit guilty about the depth of her deceptions to Shae, who didn't deserve this at all. But they both knew that Shae was far too protective to allow Sansa to do something like this.

"Then lead the way," she said, ignoring the knots in her stomach, this time.


	274. SANSA

Sansa had only been this low in the Keep a short number of times, since coming here as Joffrey's "guest." When Stannis had attacked King's Landing, the womenfolk had hidden here, and then during her imprisonment, she had gone further, down to the Black Cells.

But other than that, this was not a part of the Keep that any respectable young women tended to visit. Either because of the clandestine meetings that were rumored to take place here, or because the guards here were hardly kind, or because of the rumors of Maester Quyburn's experiments.

But now, walking alongside Megga, it didn't seem as terrifying as Sansa had been expecting.

Megga had done a better job of dressing up as a servant than Sansa had done, wearing pale brown, drab clothes, and, Sansa suspected, pants, and a pair of sandals. Her hair was down, loose, while Sansa's was tied up on her head, because her red hair was rather noticeable, no matter who she was.

They walked along in silence at first, as they went lower, and Sansa couldn't help but think about Shae, think about where she might be in her journey to get that medicine, as they walked. Megga had intimated that she had sent her on a wild goose chair, to look for a blue door in a small house in the lower levels, where one of her suppliers really did live, though the door to their home was green.

By the time she returned, it would be at least somewhat into supper, and Shae would suspect that Sansa had gone to dinner, anyway. Tyrion might deny that, when he returned from supper, but Sansa supposed she could worry about that once it had happened.

Right now, she had other things to worry about.

"Where does he work?" she whispered to Megga, starting to get nervous now, the more she thought about Shae.

Megga shrugged. "This way," she said, leading the way down another corridor. Sansa followed, still feeling queasy.

They didn’t get far into the lower levels before they heard the screams.

Sansa flinched, glancing at Megga, who faltered for a moment before she kept walking; a determined look on her face, and, after a moment’s hesitation, Sansa followed her.

The screaming grew louder.

“He’s...” Megga started to say, but Sansa never got to hear the rest of it, for suddenly the screaming was too much, mingling with the broken sound of Oberyn’s screams in her ears, and she turned on her heels, running back the way she had come.

A moment later, she heard Megga running along beside her, and she felt the blood rushing to her head.

This had been a horrible idea, what were they even thinking, what...

“Sansa,” Megga was saying, her voice as loud as Sansa thought the other girl quite dared, and Sansa paused, forced herself to turn and face Megga.

She could barely hear the other girl over the sound of her own – breathing, high and whining in the darkness of the corridor.

“Sansa, listen to me,” Megga said, and then she was reaching out, grabbing Sansa by the arms, and Sansa flinched violently back from her. Megga held her hands up, face morphing into something sad. “Sansa. Can you hear me?”

Sansa hesitated, forced herself to nod.

“Sansa, I need to know,” Megga said. “I need you to answer me out loud.”

Sansa flinched, and then looked at her again, really looked at her. “I can hear you,” she said hoarsely, and the words felt grounding. She sucked in another desperate breath.

Megga gave her a gentle smile. “Good,” she said. “Good, I’m glad to hear it.”

Sansa stared at her, uncertain how she could be glad about anything, just now.

Megga sighed. “We have to go back," Megga said, and Sansa stared at her incredulously. Megga ducked her head. "I can't report to my queen that I found nothing, Sansa."

Sansa took a deep breath, closing her eyes.

"You don't have to come with me," Megga said, and Sansa shot her a look. "Well? You don't."

But Sansa was thinking a bit more clearly now, and she knew that she did, and Megga didn't understand that. She hadn't been kept helpless in King's Landing for so long that when she finally resolved to do something, even if that something was a foolish, foolish thing, Sansa couldn’t help but think, she had to keep on doing it, no matter how little she wanted to.

Because the Tyrells had spies in every corner of the Keep, it seemed, and if they did, that meant they were planning something. Something big.

Revolution.

Sansa very badly wanted to see them take control of King's Landing away from the Lannisters, if that was indeed what they were planning.

She sighed. "I'm ready," she said, but couldn't bring herself to move.

Megga reached out, taking Sansa's hand in hers, giving it a gentle squeeze. Sansa squeezed back, and then they were moving.

Back into the dark, into the sound of screams that grew louder with every passing footfall.

But they didn’t make it far, for Quyburn was no longer holed up in some room with a screaming woman – and it was a woman, Sansa could tell that as much from the sounds coming from that horrible room – any longer.

Instead, he was walking past them, and Megga reached out, grabbing Sansa and throwing her so hard against the far wall of the corridor that when her back slammed into it she heard a horrible crack, and cringed at the ripple of pain running through her.

She didn’t cry out, though, not as the man who wasn’t really a maester passed them, not noticing them at all. She felt like she was breathing too loudly, but still, he didn’t turn.

He was wearing a butcher’s apron, Sansa thought, nauseous, curiously the first thing she noticed about the scene in front of her.

The next, of course, was the whimpering woman he was dragging along behind him, her feet barely scraping against the floor as he walked along, showing surprisingly strength for someone of his stature in the way he dragged the girl.

The woman’s bare feet were covered in blood, Sansa realized dully, as she watched them disappear through the other side of the doorway the two of them were hiding behind.

“Oh gods,” she whispered hoarsely, glancing at Megga, remembering that the other girl had warned her about this, about disappearing servants.

Megga lifted a finger to her lips in warning, and Sansa fell silent, watched in horror as things continued.

She shouldn't have agreed to do this, she thought. She should have just...

Megga's hand reached out to hers, and Sansa grabbed it instinctively, allowed the other girl to pull her out into the hall-

"What are you doing?" Sansa hissed at her.

Megga leaned close, her words butterfly whispers against Sansa's ears. "We need to find out where he's taking her, no?"

Sansa shuddered. She really, really didn't want to do that.

But she knew she was going to, anyway.

With a deep breath, she followed Megga down the hall.

It wasn't as far as Sansa had thought, to go from Maester Quyburn's secluded chambers to the Black Cells. She could tell they were getting closer when the air around her seemed to get denser, when she found it more difficult to breathe.

She clung to Megga, and didn't feel much shame about doing so. For her part, the other girl looked as nervous as she, and for a moment Sansa found herself wondering how Megga would have been able to handle Sansa's earlier imprisonment, if the other girl would have been able to handle it at all.

She couldn't imagine Megga Tyrell locked down here, dressed only in filthy rags, scared and alone.

Sansa shivered as they reached the back entrance to the Black Cells, as one of the guards stepped in front of them.

"What are you doing here?" the man demanded, giving Megga an incredibly slow onceover that had Sansa grimacing, and she couldn't help but think of the time she had come down here, to speak to her husband about Casterly Rock.

Megga flashed a smile, stepping forward until she was a mere breath away from the man, and Sansa blinked, found herself idly wondering if all the Tyrell girls took lessons in seduction, or something.

"We were...sent down here," Megga said, ignoring how wide Sansa's eyes grew, at those words. "One of your..." her hand reached out, running along the collar of the guard's uniform, "friends felt you must get rather lonely, down here."

Her entire demeanor had changed, Sansa thought, reluctantly impressed. She was taller, somehow, and her voice huskier, her eyes darker, even in the dim light of the dungeons.

It reminded Sansa a bit of how Margaery had acted, when she was first trying to seduce Joffrey.

The guard cleared his throat, glancing over his shoulder. "I don't suppose I have to share you with...all of my friends down here, do I?" he asked, reaching out and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

Megga giggled. "Do you want to?" she asked, and then her hand was motioning for Sansa, and Sansa blinked, uncertain what that gesture meant.

The guard reached out, pulling Megga into his arms. "I don't suppose I do," he said, and then he was kissing her, and Sansa grimaced, wondered how the other girl could just-

Megga's hand gesture was a tad more impatient that time, and Sansa understood it, inching around the two of them and scurrying down the hall as quickly as she could.

She wasn't even certain which cell was the woman's, Sansa thought, panicked, a moment later, or if Quyburn had even left her here, or carried her out of the back entrance of the Keep because he was done with her for-

She came to a startled stop in front of the cell which had set next to her own, before. The cell where Oberyn Martell had been kept, full of holes.

The door to the cell had an open hatch, and Sansa could already see the woman inside of it, sitting with knees hugged in front of her at the other end of it.

She swallowed hard, stepping forward, grimacing as she did so and the rats in the hall scurried out of her way.

She couldn't believe she was doing this. Couldn't believe that she thought this could help Margaery-

The woman's eyes were dead.

Sansa had enough experience with the brink of hopelessness to know when someone else had surpassed it, and this woman had.

She didn't know what had happened to her, or why she was stuck down here, but Sansa hated looking at her.

Hated looking at her, and seeing herself, sitting in the cold of one of these very same cells, hugging herself as tears streamed down her face, as she tried to reconcile herself to the rest of her very short life being stuck in this place.

She shouldn't have come down here.

The thought hit Sansa hard, and she shivered, hugging herself as the woman in the cell was doing.

And then Megga was standing beside her, panting a little, and Sansa turned to stare at her incredulously.

"How did you...?"

"You'd be amazed," Megga said, which was hardly an answer at all, and then she was moving forward, stepping on tiptoes to glance through the peephole as well, and Sansa moved back instinctively.

Megga glanced over at her after a moment, and then moved in front of Sansa, half blocking her view.

Sansa was only partially grateful for it.

"Can you hear us?" Megga called into the cell, and the woman's head jerked up, her eyes going very wide at the sight of them.

She scrambled back, away from the opening in the wall, and Sansa flinched, remembering how Oberyn had spoken to her through that hole, realizing that this was the same exact cell he had been kept in, during his imprisonment.

She shivered.

Megga sent her another look, and then focused her attention back on the woman. "We're not here to hurt you," she assured the other woman, though she hardly looked reassured. "We just want to know about what's going on. With Quyburn. If you tell us, we can help you."

Sansa sent her an incredulous look, but Megga ignored her completely, now.

The woman didn't respond, didn't even give any indication that she had heard Megga, this time.

"We can get you out of here," Megga repeated, and this time, that did gather the woman's attention. She lifted her head, staring at them for a moment, before scoffing.

"No you can't," she said, and went back to staring at the far wall, hugging her knees. "No one can."

"My lady can," Megga said, without hesitation, and the woman in the cell faltered. "But not until you tell us what he's doing down there."

The woman shuddered. "I..."

And then Sansa realized that the woman's gown was not red, but in fact covered in blood. She gestured, and Megga looked back at her. Sansa could see from the look in the other girl's eyes that she had already come to that conclusion.

"Are you...Are you all right?" Sansa whispered hoarsely.

The woman stared blankly back at them, her lips moving, but Sansa could not make out what she was saying, for she was saying now, her lips barely moving around the words, too quiet for them to make out.

Megga leaned forward, half of her head disappearing into the cell.

The woman saved her the trouble, speaking a little louder, now.

"May the Mother grant me her mercy, and the Father his justice. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die."

Sansa shivered.

Megga's eyes went very wide. "Please," she said. "What has he been doing to you? Have you seen-"

"I want to die!" the woman screamed, suddenly reeling forward and slamming herself against the wall of the prison, slamming herself against the small hole in that wall, and Megga leapt back, pulling Sansa down to the floor with her. "Kill me!"

Down the hall, Sansa could hear a commotion, as if the guards had only just now heard anything.

Megga's hand closed around her wrist. "We need to go," she hissed, and Sansa stumbled to her feet, oddly reluctant to leave the woman despite the approaching guards. "Sansa!"

"Kill me! Kill me!" the woman screamed, and kept throwing herself forward, until Sansa could see blood dripping on the stones.

She allowed Megga to pull her away, then.

And they ran. They ran all of the way back to the Maidenvault, despite how suspicious that might look, and stopped in the corridor outside of Megga's chambers, as one of the ladies to the Queen.

They stood there, panting and pointedly not looking at each other, and Sansa couldn't catch her breath no matter how hard she tried.

"What..." Megga breathed, still looking shocked and horrified, a mirror of what Sansa imagined was her own expression, but then a sound interrupted them.

The sound of voices, coming from the room they were standing in front of. Elinor's rooms.

Sansa opened her mouth, perhaps to tell Megga that she'd had enough intrigue for the day and didn't want to spy on Elinor, as well, but then she fell silent.

Because she recognized Lady Olenna's voice, coming from within Elinor's chambers.

"Do you have it?" Olenna asked, and Megga put a finger to her lips, gesturing to Sansa. Sansa nodded, uncertain why Megga would be willing to spy on her own people at all.

Elinor's voice, a moment later. "I do."

A long sigh from Olenna. "I see," she said, then, "Well, fuck."

Sansa pulled in a breath, surprised, and Megga pinched her. Hard. Sansa bit her lip to keep from crying out.

"I expect you not to do anything until my granddaughter returns to King's Landing," Olenna said archly. "I won't have this endangering her."

"Of course not, my lady."

A pause. "Is it somewhere no one will find it?"

"Of course."

"Don't 'of course' me, girl."

"It's hidden, my lady. No one even knows of the hiding place, I swear. Not even Margaery."

Another long pause, and Megga and Sansa exchanged wide eyed glances. "Good. I love my grandchildren, but my fop of a grandson can't seem to keep his mouth shut even with state secrets. We won't be risking it." A pause, and the old woman began to cough, moving closer to the door.

Megga yanked Sansa out of the way, pulling her into the corridor and pushing her against the wall. Sansa felt her breath quicken, and tried not to push Megga away, standing so closely to her.

Megga gave her a knowing look.

"I expect that won't be a problem?"

"No, my lady," Elinor agreed, placidly enough, and Megga raised a skeptical eyebrow.

Olenna harrumphed. "I will hold you to that. My granddaughter's life is at stake." She cleared her throat. "I have already lost one. I will not lose another."

And then the door was opening, and Megga yanked Sansa through the open door of her chambers, shutting the door as quickly as she could behind her without slamming it.

They were both panting. Megga eyed Sansa.

They waited until Olenna's retreating footsteps fell silent.

"Megga," Sansa demanded, "What is going on?"

Megga met her eyes, and there wasn't a shred of deceit in them that Sansa could see. "I don't know," she whispered.


	275. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, confession time. I...forgot that I'd sent Brienne with Jaime to Dragonstone, when Cersei sent him away. I've gone back and revised Jaime's POV chapter to include a couple of mentions of her. You're not missing much though, and she's not in the Myrcella chapter. Just a head's up for the next time she appears, haha.

She didn't know why she was resolved to come back. Didn't know why it was so important to her to lie to Shae about needing to go to the library alone, so that Shae and Tyrion could have some time alone, didn't know why she sought out Megga.

Megga had been asking her, covertly, of course she had, but without much enthusiasm, and this was the first time they had agreed to go again.

She thought perhaps Megga had been as shaken up as Sansa, though she hadn't shown it as badly.

But Sansa wasn't doing this for Margaery anymore, when she showed up on Megga's doorstep. She wasn't even doing this for herself, for her own curiosity to know what in the seven hells was going on.

That woman's face, how dead inside she had been while still breathing...that had been horrifying. She couldn't get her screams out of her head.

And she knew, from what Megga had said, that that woman hadn't been the only one. That there were others, perhaps countless others, who were being used for these cruel experiments, but none of them had remained in the Black Cells by the time Sansa and Megga had arrived.

Which was why she found herself knocking on Megga's door, relieved when the girl answered it quickly enough. She gestured Sansa inside, and, with a quick look over her shoulder, Sansa followed.

"I'm...surprised you came back," Megga said, taking Sansa's hands in her own. Sansa forced herself not to pull them back. "I have to do this, but you don't, Sansa."

Sansa shook her head. "We still don't have proof that Cersei is behind that," she said. "That she even knows. Or that Quyburn...what is going on with the girl. Perhaps she really is a criminal."

"She isn't," Megga said, and the other girl turned to stare at her. Megga shrugged. "I asked around. She was a lady in Cersei's employ. Cersei decided that she was a spy for the Tyrells."

Sansa licked her lips. "Was she?"

Megga shook her head. "Not one that I've heard of."

And that was a disturbing thought, that the Tyrells had spies in every corner of the Keep, including Margaery's own ladies somehow managing to spy, as well, and no one even knew about it.

Disturbing, and perhaps a little comforting.

"What...what's her name?" Sansa asked.

Megga sent her a look. "Are you sure about this? I know I said you would be protecting me if you did this, but you don't have to do that. Not with girls being dragged away to the Black Cells and..."

Sansa shook her head. "What was her name?"

Megga sighed. "Senelle. Her name's Senelle."

Sansa shivered. "Megga..."

"I told you, Sansa, leave," Megga said dangerously.

Sansa shook her head. "Never mind," she said. "Let's...let's just go, all right?"

Megga hesitated, and then nodded, walking to the door and motioning Sansa out in front of her. It took Sansa a moment, but then she was walking down the short corridor, feeling Megga's worried breaths on her shoulder.

They made it back down to the lower levels before Sansa's body seemed to remember where they were, and she found it more difficult to breathe, her chest going tight as the air around them thickened.

Megga placed a hand on her shoulder. "You're all right, Sansa," she reminded the other girl, and Sansa breathed in deep, grateful that Megga said nothing more than that.

They walked on in silence, but Megga didn't take her hand off Sansa's shoulder. The gesture was more comforting than Sansa had expected it to be.

And then they reached the chambers where Maester Quyburn had experimented on the girl the other day, before he had dragged her down to the Black Cells. Sansa bit her lip, glancing back at Megga, not entirely certain what the other girl was planning to do, now that they were actually here.

Megga brought a finger to her lips, and then she was letting go of Sansa, moving around to the door of Quyburn's chambers and bending down, no doubt to see through the peephole.

A moment later, she frowned, standing upright and trying the door. It was latched, Sansa surmised, by the annoyed look on Megga's face when she glanced back up at Sansa.

But she shook her head, stubborn as she was, and walked around the side of the corridor, Sansa following along cautiously. She somehow doubted there were going to be any other holes in the walls, in this part of the lower levels.

That was, of course, until they saw the small staircase just behind Quyburn's chambers. Sansa blinked at it, rather astonished that it was there, especially because it looked like it had been shoved into the wall by someone who hadn't been an architect for the rest of the Keep.

And then she glanced at Megga, and saw that the other girl didn't look very surprised to see it.

She moved closer, whispered, "What is that?"

Megga glanced back at her, grinning. "The Tyrells aren't the only ones who employ spies in King's Landing, Sansa," she said, typically cryptic, and then she was grabbing up her skirts and hurrying up the stairs.

Sansa stared incredulously after her for a moment; the stairs wound up into darkness, and Sansa couldn't believe the other girl would willingly go up them when she wasn't certain where they went.

And if the Tyrells weren't the only ones who used spies in King's Landing, surely it wasn't a good idea to use the tools of the others, was it?

Sansa sighed, and followed after the other girl.

They didn't make it far, and by the time they finally saw daylight again, Sansa was clutching to Megga's hand, squeezing it so hard she could hear the other girl struggling to contain her whimpers.

But then Sansa was gasping at the streaming sunlight, and she blinked at Megga, for surely if they could see the sun then they had gone too far to glean anything of use from the chambers Quyburn had been in before...

Megga turned around, and Sansa was almost amused to find them standing in what looked like a little, unkempt garden. There was no way to exit the garden save the little staircase they had come by it from, Sansa noticed immediately, and all of the flowers were dead, the sun barely peeking down on the small stretch of land.

It looked almost as though the architects who had built this place had made some sort of mistake with the angles, and that was why it was even here at all.

But Megga didn't seem to care about any of that, moving forward and squatting down by a little window against the far wall of the garden, nearly to the ground.

She got on her hands and knees, and reached out to brush the grime away from the window pane. Sansa took a deep breath, and reminded herself that she was doing this for Margaery and that poor serving woman.

Cersei's serving woman, whom she had deliberately sent down here for some purpose, and they needed to figure out what it was, if they were ever going to get the upper hand on Cersei, Sansa reminded herself.

She glanced through the windowpane, and stiffened.

If she'd bothered to glance at Megga before she'd done so, she would have seen how pale the other girl was.

Down in the room below them, Quyburn stood over a body on a table, ominous tools in his hands and wearing spun wool and a leather blacksmith's apron.

Sansa tried not to think too hard about that, when she saw the body on the table. The body clamped down to the table with iron bindings, nearly naked and pale as death, but recognizable all the same.

Recognizable because he'd been inhabiting one too many of Sansa's nightmares, of late.

For a moment, Sansa thought that she was still in one of those dreams, that this couldn't possibly be real because the Mountain was dead, he was long dead, and it was against the laws of the Seven to experiment on the bodies of the dead, anyway.

And surely his body would be decaying beyond repair, by now.

"By the seven," Megga whispered hoarsely, staring, and it was the only thing convincing Sansa that the other girl was seeing the same thing that she had.

Sansa couldn't believe what she was seeing, either. Her eyes went wide as she watched the Mountain half sit up on the wooden table, watched the vile grin on the face of the man who was no longer called maester.

And then the Mountain began to scream. Long, horrible screams that filled Sansa's ears, despite the glass separating them. The maester moved forward then, placing something else down on the Mountain's...thigh, and the screams grew louder, more intense.

And then the thing, whatever it was, for Sansa couldn't quite see that from here, fell off the man, a black splotch hitting the floor, and black blood began to ooze from the thigh, where the thing had been a moment before.

The Mountain kept screaming, and abruptly went silent, slamming back down onto the table once more.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat, at the rather loud thud that accompanied the movement.

"But..." Sansa said, rather loudly, she realized too late, and Megga's eyes went wide as she grabbed her and jerked Sansa out into the garden, slamming them down onto their backs in the dirt.

She shoved a hand over Megga's mouth, and for a moment, the only sound Sansa heard was that of her own ragged breathing, and Megga's.

And then...Megga let go of her, grimacing. "Just because I brought you here in case we get caught doesn't mean I want to get caught," she snapped, glancing down the window again and seeming to determine them safe, and Sansa grimaced.

"Sorry. I just..."

"We should go," Megga interrupted her, glancing over her shoulder. Quyburn, down in the room, didn't seem to have noticed the interruption, and then Megga was pulling her along, down those stairs again, passed the closed doors of the maester's chambers, and Sansa barely managed not to trip over her own two feet, as they hurried past, trying not to make a sound.

But no one heard them.

Neither the maester or...whatever the other one had been, for Sansa's mind refused to believe that the man on the table could possibly be the Mountain.

The very dead Mountain.

She shook her head. No, that was impossible. Her eyes were merely tricking her, because she was spooked about being down here. Yes, that had to be it.

The Mountain had died of his wounds, his poisoned, spear wounds, after the Trial by Combat. She hadn't seen it, but...surely, he was dead.

Why would the King lie about that, in any case?

She swallowed hard, glancing at Megga, hoping not to see her own horror and shocked radiated in the other girl's face. She was disappointed.

But Megga wouldn't let them stop moving until they had made their way out of the lower levels, Sansa stumbling behind her and hoping that she wasn't providing fodder for the servants' gossip, even as her mind felt numb at the same time.

Because, somehow, dead men were coming back to life.

She was far too in over her head, if she had thought se was going to help Margaery with any of this. Far too lost when Cersei could resurrect the dead.

They paused inside an empty pair of chambers in the Maidenvault, and Sansa didn’t think they were Megga's, though she didn't look around much to make sure. Megga cleared her throat, moving back and latching the doors before returning to Sansa's side, her own eyes wide.

Neither girl said anything for several long moments, merely panting.

"That was..."

Sansa glanced at her, and could only manage, "Yeah."

Megga shook her head. "I didn't imagine...that can't be possible," she said. "It doesn't make sense."

Sansa shook her head again. "Megga..."

She turned to Sansa. "Well?" she asked. "Did you see what I just saw, or not?"

Sansa shook her head. She didn't want to say her next thoughts, because they were silly and didn't make any sense, but then again, neither did coming back to life from the dead.

She'd heard of such things, of course. In fairy tales that weren't true and didn't have any basis in reality, where the old gods took a life to return one, but nothing like this.

Nothing like this, and they weren't true, in any case.

"I...I saw it," she whispered hoarsely. "I don't...I don't know what I saw, but I saw it, Megga. I did."

Megga sucked in a huge breath. And then another.

A horrible thought occurred to Sansa, as they stood there in the silence, the thought of dead men and blood magic and the sorcery her mother had always feared.

Later, Sansa would try to convince herself that it was just the shock, prompting her to say those next words. The shock, and the memory of Oberyn Martell, bleeding out in the arena, his eyes crushed out of his head by that...creature.

She wasn't sure, of course. She wasn't sure of anything, and Sansa took a shuddering, deep breath, and wondered if she should save this theory for when she was actually thinking straight.

But Megga had been the one always telling her to take risks, hadn't she?

"Megga..."

Megga waited, crossing her arms over her chest. No, hugging herself.

"Willas died, and suddenly..." Sansa shook her head. "No. No, I'm being foolish. We must have been mistaken, in thinking that the Mountain died. Cersei must have been mistaken."

Megga stared at her. "You think...you think they somehow sacrificed Willas to bring back the Mountain?"

Such was the nature of their lives, Sansa thought hysterically, that Megga only sounded slightly skeptical.

"I...it's foolish," she repeated. "It doesn't make any sense."

"Doesn't it?" Megga asked, and her voice was hoarse. Sansa turned to squint at the other girl. "I...Sansa...this is..." she reached up, brushing the hair out of her eyes. "This is above my service to the Queen," she said finally.

Sansa blinked at her again. "Megga..." she hesitated, waited for the other girl to meet her eyes. "What are we going to do about this?"

Megga shook her head. "I don't know," she said, tiredly. "But, Sansa..." she shook her head again, and this time, the motion was almost frantic. "Whatever's going on, I don't think we should tell Margaery, just yet."

Sansa stared at her incredulously. "You said that this whole thing was because..."

"I know," Megga said, and her voice was so tired. "But...well, you heard Lady Olenna, and Elinor. Something is going on here, something I don't think we understand. And...seven hells, I don't understand any of this." She scrubbed her hair out of her eyes, grimacing.

Sansa rather sympathized with the sentiment.

"Am I going crazy, being stuck here so long?" Megga asked. "My mother..." she shook her head, grimacing. "My mother said this was the sort of place that drove people mad."

Sansa moved forward, reaching out and pulling the other girl into an embrace, friend or not. "I don't suppose I can answer that for you," she said softly. "I've been here long enough."

Megga snorted, pulling back and looking rather uncomfortable. "I'm sorry," she said.

Sansa gave her a soft look. "You don't have to apologize," she said hoarsely.

But Megga just shook her head. "I do," she said, "because..." and she cleared her throat. "I would never have taken you down there and subjected you to having to see that...man again, if I'd known..."

Sansa scoffed. "And how could you have possibly known?" she asked, just as dazed as Megga looked.

Megga considered that for a moment, before nodding, and clicking her teeth shut. "Right," she said. "Margaery may have enlisted me to spy here, but she doesn't know that Lady Olenna is keeping secrets from her. What if...what if Olenna knows?" Megga looked up at Sansa with wide, frightened eyes.

Sansa stared at her, thrown, for, whatever was going on between Elinor and Olenna the other day, Sansa hadn't gotten the impression that it had anything to do with the Mountain coming back to...

No, all of this was ridiculous. Whatever they had just seen, it couldn't have been the Mountain.

Except that Sansa didn’t think she could ever mistake anyone else for the Mountain, not after what she had seen. "I don't think that's what's going on," she said finally, slowly. "And if the Mountain really is...still alive, somehow, I think that we should tell someone."

Except that Margaery had just lost her brother, and was doubtless not in the right frame of mind to believe them, much less do anything about the situation.

"I don't think he's 'still' alive, Sansa," Megga said, not meeting her eyes, but Sansa didn't dare let herself consider that, for long.

As it turned out, neither did Megga.

Megga bit her lip, looking just as disturbed as Sansa at the prospect of telling Margaery. "Perhaps...we should tell Olenna," she said finally, slowly, and Sansa blinked at her.

Because she admired the older woman, and thought that Olenna Tyrell cared as deeply for Margaery as Margaery did for her, but she didn't know about that. Didn't get the impression that Margaery and Olenna shared everything with each other, even as they pretended to.

But, still. Megga was right, that perhaps it wasn't the right idea to tell Margaery. But if they didn't tell anyone, that...that was going to keep on living down here, with Quyburn continuing to use those poor women for his experiments, and nothing was going to be done about it.

Nothing was going to be done about the fact that Oberyn Martell's killer was somehow being given a second chance at life.

"We should," Sansa agreed, tiredly nodding. "Yes, perhaps we should."

Megga squinted at her. "I'm going to need you to come with me, then," she said, and Sansa balked at the prospect.

"What?"

Megga's smile was cool. "Lady Olenna doesn't much like me. She likes you."

Another stare. "Why doesn't she much like you?" Sansa asked, cautiously.

Megga's smile widened a little bit, at that. "Does that really matter?" she asked.

Sansa met her eyes, and the smile dimmed a little. "Lady Olenna is...very protective of her grandchildren," she told Sansa, which Sansa hardly needed the reminder of. She was well aware, after all.

She waited.

Megga shifted on her feet. "She doesn't think I'm a good fit, for a lady to her favorite granddaughter," she said finally. "Or, perhaps to the Queen. Because I'm..." she rubbed her arms a little, and Sansa thought about the guard, about the easy way Megga had managed to seduce him before telling Sansa that she would have been amazed by it, by how quickly Megga had gotten rid of the man.

She swallowed. "Somehow, I don't think Lady Olenna will just let us both come into her chambers, then," she said, and, at Megga's inquisitive gaze, "She hasn't spoken to me since the trial. I don't think she liked that Margaery..."

Endangered her family to save Sansa.

Megga licked her lips. "Still better than me," she said, grabbing Sansa by the arm. "Come on."

Sansa's feet dug into the floor. "What, now?" she asked.

Megga raised an eyebrow. "You just saw him," she said. "You're still in shock. Lady Olenna will actually listen to that, and she won't be able to put us off if we just interrupt her."

Sansa was beginning to realize why, perhaps, the woman disliked Megga Tyrell. Still...

"All right," she said, and Megga gave her another long look, before pulling her along behind her.

"Well then, it's decided," she said, sounding entirely too pleased with herself, and Sansa didn't quite meet her eyes as Megga dragged her back to the Maidenvault.

They made it to the chambers of the Queen of Thorns without being seen by the servants, and Sansa found herself pausing outside of them, wishing they belonged to someone else entirely.

Megga knocked, and a moment later, the door opened, to an older, haggard looking woman whom for a moment, Sansa pitied.

After all, she'd spent some time in the Queen of Thorns' company. Enough to know that all of her servants hated her.

Hated and feared her.

It was odd, to think of that, when the old woman was always offering Sansa tea and crumpets, so nicely, whenever they were in company together.

Or, she was, before she hadn't been speaking to Sansa at all.

The serving woman peered down at them. "What do you want?" she asked, looking at Megga and not Sansa at all.

Megga forced her brightest smile, dipping into a curtsey. "We need to speak with Lady Olenna," she said. "It's...rather urgent."

The serving woman squinted at them. "She's quite busy," she said, after a moment, but there was a spark of hesitation in her voice.

"Tell her Lady Sansa needs to speak with her," Megga said helpfully. "I'm quite certain she'll see us if you convey the...urgency of the matter."

The serving woman gave Megga another incredulous look, and then shut the door in their faces.

Megga sagged against the wall. "Well, there we have it, then."

Sansa stared at her. "She...really doesn't like you," she said, finally.

Megga smiled. "She doesn't like any of Margaery's ladies," she said. "Really. Except Alla. Honestly, I was surprised she was even speaking to Elinor. She's never shown much affinity for her in the past."

Sansa thought about the time she had walked in on Elinor and Margaery, and wondered if the older woman knew about them, somehow.

She licked her lips.

"Why?"

"Other than that she thinks we're all going to get our lady killed?" Megga asked sarcastically, and Sansa blinked at her.

"She thinks we're all-"

The door opened then, the older serving woman motioning them inside, glancing down the hallway suspiciously.

Megga practically floated into Lady Olenna's chambers, Sansa following hesitantly behind her.

Sansa had never given much thought to what the inside of the chambers of the Queen of Thorns must look like, because honestly, when she was fantasizing about the Maidenvault, it was not generally about Lady Olenna.

But she had imagined something a bit...different, than what she found. The Queen of Thorns was a blunt, sarcastic woman, and Sansa was expecting chambers which echoed that.

She wondered if these chambers echoed Cersei's wish for the woman's chambers, or if Olenna genuinely liked her chambers to be a bright, happy pink which clogged at one's eyes. The doors, all of them, were filled with golden trim.

The rooms were almost nicer than Margaery's, but they fit a young princess, not a queen.

Lady Olenna was sitting on a divan in the middle of the rooms, hands in her lap, looking for all the world as if she had been sitting there all day, just waiting for company.

"Lady Sansa," she said, ignoring Megga altogether, and the younger girl rolled her eyes, sinking down onto the divan across from Lady Olenna without being invited to do so. Olenna cast her a look, and gestured for Sansa to do the same.

"Tea?" she asked.

Sansa glanced down t her hands. They were shaking. She doubted she would be able to hold a cup.

Olenna's eyes followed hers. "Something the matter?" she asked, and, when Sansa said nothing, "Raka, dear, go and...busy yourself somewhere else, yes?" she said, and the servant woman took the hint, turning and going out of the chambers, shutting the door behind her.

"I trust we're not being overheard?" Olenna asked, eyes hard, and Sansa felt her cheeks flush.

Megga glanced down at her own hands.

"What is going on?" Olenna demanded, when neither of them answered. "I don't trust that I get many visits from either of you, on a regular basis."

Megga grimaced, glancing at Sansa, and it was at that moment that Sansa realized she was going to have to do all of the talking bits herself.

"I...we..." she grimaced, licking her lips and glancing at Megga.

Olenna glanced between them. "Cat got your tongue, girl?"

Sansa flushed. "We..." she glanced at Megga rather desperately, and suddenly understood why the other girl had brought her along.

She hadn't been worried about Margaery. Well, not in that way. Megga had already explained it to her; Margaery was going to be less than happy when she figured all of this out, and Megga was trying to avoid that as much as possible.

"I went down to the Black Cells," Sansa blurted out, and Olenna blinked at her. "Well, we did. I mean..." she was aware that she had lied much better about Oberyn to Joffrey than she was doing right now. "I found Megga down there."

Olenna's eyes shot to Megga. "And what, pray tell, were either of you doing down there?"

Sansa gulped. "I wanted..." she cleared her throat. "I wanted to see the cells again."

Time froze. Megga turned to look at her, eyes very wide, and Sansa felt her face growing hot for another reason.

Olenna turned and scrutinized her, face expressionless, though there was something about her eyes, something...sad.

"And you dragged the Lady Megga along with you?" she asked finally, and there was something...pinched, about her lips.

"Lady Sansa and I have been getting along, lately," Megga said, lifting her chin, defiant, though Sansa couldn't imagine why.

Olenna glanced between them once more. "I see," she said. Then, "Well, out with it, then. What is this horrible thing you saw in the Black Cells? Some sort of monster?"

The girls exchanged glances, and Olenna let out a long sigh.

"It...I don't know how to explain it," Sansa said, twirling her fingers together nervously in her lap. "But we saw Maester Quyburn, experimenting on the Mountain."

Olenna went very still. "You saw what?" she repeated.

Sansa didn't want to repeat it.

Megga cleared her throat. "He...it was definitely him. It's not like Sansa's going to forget what he-"

"Megga!" Olenna's short rebuke cut the other girl off completely. Then, she turned back to Sansa. "What was he doing with...the body?"

Her eyes were no longer filled with...Sansa thought it might have been the woman's version of sympathy, this time. Instead, they were cold and hard, and Sansa realized why she had never trusted the Tyrell woman.

Because this was who she was. A kind old woman who understood Sansa's pain in one moment, and a woman who would do anything to eliminate a threat to her family in the next.

For Sansa had no doubt that if Cersei was commissioning the former maester to practice dark arts on the dead, against the laws of the Faith...it was going to be a threat to all of them.

And this, Sansa realized, heart sinking, was what Margaery would one day become, whether Sansa wanted that or not.

"It was...moving," Sansa said hoarsely. "Of its own. I don't..." she held up a hand when the other woman went to speak, and was surprised when she fell silent. "I don't know how. But he...it...was moving on its own."

"That's ridiculous," Olenna snapped, straightening in her chair. "You're confused. Perhaps Quyburn-"

"I saw it too, my lady," Megga started softly, and Olenna sent her a vicious look.

"You don't know what you-"

"I know what I saw," Sansa said, lifting her chin, and Olenna turned to stare at her. Whatever she saw in Sansa's eyes had her swallowing. Hard.

"I see," she said, after the longest pause, in which Sansa felt oddly under scrutiny. Olenna folded her hands in her lap. "Very well. You may go."

They blinked at her.

"My lady?" Megga asked, timidly. Until this moment, Sansa would never have described her as timid.

"I've heard what you had to say," Olenna said calmly. "You may go."

"But..." Sansa cleared her throat. "What do we do with this?"

Olenna turned cold eyes on her. "You are not going to do anything about this," she told Sansa, harshly. "If my granddaughter..." she closed her eyes, pained. "Thank you for bringing this information to me, Lady Sansa," she said finally, opening her eyes once more. "I will...handle things, from here."

Sansa stared at her.

And then Megga was taking her arm, and leading her from the room, shutting the door behind them.

"She...she knew we were spying on her, the other day," Sansa said, a tad hoarsely. She was still rather bemused by the whole exchange, by Olenna's lack of shock, but she supposed she was just going to have to get used to that.

Olenna, she knew, at least intellectually, was trying to protect the both of them, even if she no longer cared for either of them, apparently. For Margaery's sake.

But Sansa couldn't imagine what she was going to do with the information that Cersei now had the power to raise the dead.

Megga turned to look at her. "I'm not surprised," she said. "Though I'm a little disappointed she found me out so quickly."

Sansa shook her head. "Why...why would she have wanted us to hear that exchange, though? She...the way she was speaking with Elinor...it didn't exactly sound like something she would have wanted overheard."

Megga hummed, leaning against the closed door, now. "Don't you get it?" she asked, and Sansa turned to look at her. "It doesn't matter that we overheard her, Sansa, because there's nothing we can do about it."

_Nothing we can do about it._

Sansa had thought she was joining Megga in this little quest so that she could do something, and now she felt as helpless as she had before.

She hated this feeling.

"Whatever it is she's planning," Megga continued, "There's nothing anyone can do about it, at this point."

Sansa felt a cold shiver run through her. "I..." she licked her lips, not liking the sound of Megga's ominous words. "I should go," she said finally, feeling a bit sick. "I'm sure Shae will be looking for me, at this point."

Megga nodded, tiredly. "I'll be happy to back up whatever story you tell her," she said, and Sansa didn't bother to say that she'd already told Shae one, however bad it had been.

Olenna was going to do something about the Mountain. About a discovery Sansa had made.

She shook her head, pulling away from Megga and making the long trek back to the Tower of the Hand, that feeling of queasiness still filling her.

It wasn't until she had closed the door to her husband's chambers, however, that she realized there was another reason for it.

Turning around, Sansa found herself facing down her husband, sitting on the divan in the middle of the parlor, and Shae, beside him, her arms crossed over her chest.

"Where have you been?" Shae demanded, and Sansa froze, heart pounding.


	276. MARGAERY

The arrival of her lord father was a somber occasion, and Margaery couldn't help but mourn that a little, as well.

He came straight to the Starry Sept, rather than stopping in Highgarden first, because he didn't have time to do so, Margaery knew, no matter how quickly his horses had tried to get here.

The ceremony was today, and had merely awaited the Lord of Highgarden's arrival.

She remembered when she was a little girl, how, every time her father would return from business in another realm, always he would bring gifts for his children, and a wide smile, spinning them around and telling them how much he had missed them.

Well, perhaps those memories were limited only to Margaery, she thought with a wry smile, as her father moved forward and clasped Garlan's arm, but she had treasured them, all the same.

Her father wasn't smiling, today.

They hadn't been able to hold off the funeral any longer, and Margaery could admit that it was a relief her father had managed to come so quickly. The Silent Sisters had insisted that they would not be able to keep Willas' body preserved for much longer, for they didn't have the...ingredients which had been used in King's Landing, to preserve Lord Tywin.

Margaery rather suspected that was some sort of slight against the Lannisters, though she was too drained to figure out what. She did remember the old man's body stinking, though. Perhaps the Silent Sisters merely wished to avoid that.

Gods. Her brother had only been dead a week, and already here she was, thinking about his corpse in this way, as if it were something that had never been her brother-

Her father turned to her, his eyes misty as he reached out and told her forehead with his forefinger, as he used to do when she was a child and had had a particularly brilliant idea, Margaery thought, the thought souring her mood further.

She wanted nothing more than to move forward, and lay her head on her father's chest the way she had as a little girl, and pretend that none of this had happened at all.

That she wasn't a Queen, but a girl. That Willas was still-

Her father cleared his throat. "Your mother?" he asked her.

Margaery's throat closed. "She's...she's already seated inside, Papa," she said, and Mace hesitated for a moment longer, before holding his arm out to her.

Margaery took it, allowed him to lead her into the Sept, her remaining brothers following along close behind them.

"Where is Grandmother?" Loras asked, and Margaery found herself a tad surprised that he sounded so concerned.

Mace's face darkened. "Your grandmother could not make the journey," he said, and, uncharacteristically, refused to tell them more. "Shall we go in? I understand that they had only agreed to delay the ceremony until my arrival."

Margaery gulped, at the realization that her grandmother was not going to be here. She supposed it was smart, in a way; at least one high ranking Tyrell needed to remain in King's Landing, to make sure that the Lannisters weren't attempting to seek power, in their absence.

But how could her grandmother be thinking about that, just now, when her grandchild was dead?

Margaery reached up, covering her hand with her mouth in a vain attempt to hide the betrayal on her features. Garlan reached over, squeezing her shoulder, and Margaery found herself glad of the touch, even as Loras sent a scorching glare her way.

Seven hells, no doubt he thought this was part of some other plot he had not been invited to participate in.

Margaery didn't meet his eyes, turning away from both of her brothers to follow her father into the Starry Sept in silence.

Behind them, the green cloaks who had traveled alongside Mace made to do away with the horses in silence, their faces equally grim.

But of course; everyone had loved Willas, of course.

Save for whoever had murdered him.

Margaery heaved a sigh at that thought and looked her father over as they walked, the crowd of smallfolk parting for them as they went; he seemed gaunt and exhausted, and she could imagine that he had only allowed the Tyrell caravan to stop a few times, on the Kingsroad, during the journey here.

He looked in need of a decent meal and a bath, and perhaps a few hours' rest, but of course the Silent Sisters would not conscience that, not when half of Oldtown and the Reach were already assembled here for the funeral.

The smallfolk would not be allowed into the Sept itself during the ceremony, Margaery knew, but they expressed their condolences in softly spoken words and sad faces as the Tyrells marched past them; they knew, Margaery thought, that Willas Tyrell had been the one most likely to change any of their situations for the better, no doubt.

And now he was gone.

Margaery sniffed, and then forced herself to raise her chin and show some damn decorum, as she walked into the Sept abreast with her father, to where Alerie and Leonette were already waiting for them, Alerie having declared earlier that once she caught sight of her son's body, she would not be able to leave the Sept until after the ceremony had concluded.

She was sitting at the front of the Sept beside Leonette, turning immediately to look for her husband when a commotion of whispers started, at his entrance. She didn't move to greet him, though; rather, waited until he had gone forward to look at their son and then take his seat.

Mace paused, when he looked at Willas, displayed as he was before the crowd, before his face contorted in what looked like agony and he fell to his knees before the podium his son had been placed on.

Margaery swallowed hard, and didn't meet Loras' gaze as she made her way into the seats beside her mother and goodsister. Garlan and Loras followed in silence; they had all already made their goodbyes, after all.

And then Mace stood to his feet, following his children to their seats and moving forward until he was beside Alerie, reaching out for her hand.

She held it out to him, and he took it, squeezing her hand rather hard as he brought it to his lips and kissed it. Alerie remained the picture of comportment, giving her husband nothing but a sad smile as he turned and gestured for the septons to begin the ceremony.

Margaery stood in front of her seat, and wished that the ceremony would be over soon. Willas would have hated all of this...ceremony. Would have thought it silly, in fact, and no doubt would have been annoyed that half the lords of the Reach and the merchants of Oldtown had been allowed into the Sept while the smallfolk for whom he genuinely cared had not.

That had been who her brother was, not this silent, stone figure before them, pale as wax and so very...unapproachable.

Margaery sucked in a shuddering breath, ignoring the concerned look Garlan sent her way as that damned septon, Morren, she thought his name had been, stepped forward to speak a few words.

The prayer for the dead, Margaery thought, closing her eyes and wishing she was able to act better, around the rest of her family.

It was so much easier, when it was Joffrey and half of King's Landing she needed to convince, and not her brothers and mother.

"Lord Willas was loved by all," the septon intoned, and Margaery heard her mother sniffing. She watched as her father wrapped an arm around the woman.

But this wasn't a prayer for the dead, Margaery realized abruptly; this wasn't part of the ceremony. That realization had her sitting up a little straighter in her chair.

"But especially by the children. He was...he was a kind soul, and had always with him a treat for the shoeless, tired children of Oldtown." The septon smiled. "Whether they were young or old."

This gained quiet smiles from several in the congregation. Margaery glanced around, realized suddenly how many people were here.

No, that wasn't right. She had noticed how many people were here before, just hadn't thought much of it, walking in. Seeing her brother's body displayed, before all of these strangers, but now she was.

Because she didn't know most of these people, but she could place them anyway. Every member of the Merchants' Guild from Oldtown, though Margaery knew they had very little love for her brother, half the little orphans whom Willas had cared for so dearly, nobles whose names she didn't remember.

It was the merchants, however, who had caught her attention. Because the merchants had, historically, loathed her brother. Had known that he was undermining Leyton Hightower years ago, was slowly fixing the city into something the Hightowers hadn't planned it to be, and none of them had ever thanked him for that, she knew.

But they were all here. Not a single merchant from the largest city in the world was missing.

Her eyes narrowed, and she glanced back at the septon.

"May the gods grant him peace, in the life beyond this one. May the Mother grant him her mercy, and the Stranger guide him gently into the seven heavens, where he might eternally feast in the Father's golden halls." His voice darkened, and it was then that Margaery glanced up, raising an eyebrow. "But most of all, may the Father grant him justice in this world, for a life so cruelly snuffed out before its time."

He dipped his head, signifying that his words were over, and Margaery blinked at him, blinked at the others, intoning the Seven under their breaths.

None of them had known Willas, not as she had, and yet here they were, speaking as if they had all known him as intimately as she.

Speaking as though...he were some sort of King.

She swallowed hard, because the way that septon had spoken...

She could almost believe he had been the one to marry to her a traitor, now. There was something about him, something that didn't seem very holy, after all.

She found herself focusing on the Septon for the rest of the ceremony, because gods, that was better than looking at her brother's embalmed body, wondering what herbs and potions the Silent Sisters had used to keep his body whole and ready until this moment, better than wondering why all of these people thought they had the right to mourn her beloved brother, when none of them had even known him.

She cleared her throat, suddenly realizing that the ceremony was over. That the family was being invited, behind Lord Mace, to say their final goodbyes to Willas once more, before he was lowered into the catacombs below the Starry Sept, where the old Kings of Westeros were buried, where the Reach lords were buried, these days.

Margaery stood to her feet, following without thinking too hard about it behind Loras, watching her brother lay a kiss on Willas' forehead before he moved on.

Margaery stepped up to her brother's body, and stared down at it, wanting to immortalize this image in her mind.

Joffrey had done this, she knew with certainty, as she stared down at her brother. Joffrey had turned her sweet, loving brother into this pale shadow of his former self, and she would be damned if he didn't pay for it.

She'd be damned.

She was vaguely aware of Leonette gently pushing her forward, of no longer looking down at her brother, but the feeling of helpless anger didn't leave her.

Didn't leave her, that was, until she realized that most of her family had already left the Sept itself, that those left behind were merely the merchants of Oldtown, who had never held much love for her brother and his meddling ways, and she found herself alone near Septon Morren.

Who was moving steadily closer to her. As if he had angling for this from the beginning, Margaery thought, and wondered if she would ever stop thinking like she was still in King's Landing.

Margaery cleared her throat again, and wondered idly how the rest of her family had deemed it wise to leave her alone here.

"Forgive me, Septon Morren," she said, and the man turned, bowing deeply to her.

"Your Grace," he said, moving away from the other septons. "What can I do for you?"

Margaery forced herself to smile. It felt wrong on her face. Too tight. "You spoke in there as if you knew my brother," she said, raising an expectant eyebrow.

The septon smiled. "I did, Your Grace," then, "As much as anyone knew Lord Willas. He came often to the Starry Sept for his prayers, and I was the one to absolve him of his sins, many of the times that he came."

Margaery chewed on the inside of her cheek. "My brother was not a very religious man, Septon," she said, tapping her side. "One would think that his requests for absolution, moreover, would not have sparked the vitriol with which you attacked his assailants, moreover."

The man smiled thinly, tucking his arms into his sleeves. "We all approach the Faith of the Seven differently, Your Grace," he said, finally, and his tone was gentle in a way that brought tears to Margaery's eyes.

She hated it, instantly, and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Some of us are devout enough to come daily to the Sept, and proclaim our sins." He took a step closer to her. "Beg for absolution, and accept the consequences of our confession. These, I find, are usually the most sinful of the bunch."

That startled a snort out of Margaery, and the septon glanced up at her through uncommonly long eyelashes for a man, particularly one of his age.

"Your brother was not like these. When he came to the Sept, it was because he felt he had something for the gods to hear. Not confessions, often, but...words." He eyed her. "I don't suppose that makes any sense, unless you have often seen your brother in prayer."

Margaery raised an eyebrow. "And did you?" she asked.

The septon blinked at her. "Your Grace?"

"Did you often see my brother in prayer?" He stared blankly at her, and Margaery shook her head, realizing how silly she was being. She turned to go. "Never mind."

A hand latched out around her own, and she glanced up at it, then at the septon. It occurred to her then that without her brother at her side, she did not have a Kingsguard guarding her as she had ever since marrying Joffrey.

The green cloaks were waiting outside, but...it occurred to her suddenly that Loras might still inside the Sept somewhere as well as he could have returned to Highgarden, and she mourned his loss almost as keenly as she did her brother's, as foolish as it felt to do so.

"If ever you wish to come here in prayer, Your Grace," Septon Morren said, eyes suddenly intense, "I would be glad to hear your confession. Your brother was a kind patron to this city, though he wished no acknowledgment for it, while he lived. Oldtown will always remember his family."

Margaery stared at him for a moment, and then extracted her arm. "Th-thank you," she said, stammering and not altogether certain why, before she turned on her heel and made her way out of the Starry Sept.

She would not enter it again for many years.


	277. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Communication, you say? What's that?  
> Sorry I've been dead so long, guys. I got really sick for a little while there and am only just starting to get better, but I didn't want to leave you in suspense too long, hehe.

"Sansa, what is going on?"

It took Sansa a moment to realize that she was not alone with Shae in the parlor; that Tyrion was sitting on the divan before them as well, clearly waiting for her alongside Shae.

Oh, gods.

Sansa froze, lifting her head and meeting Tyrion's eyes. "I...what do you mean, my lord?" she asked hoarsely.

She had just walked into the parlor of the Tower, to find her husband sitting on the divan, his short legs crossed, hands folded in his lap.

Tyrion gave her a look she couldn't decipher, and then he sighed.

The side door to the parlor opened, and Shae walked through, a guilty expression on her face. Guilty and...worried.

Sansa felt her stomach drop.

Tyrion glanced at Shae, and then back at Sansa. "Sansa...sit down," he invited, gesturing to one of the chairs in front of the divan.

She walked forward to one of the chairs, sitting down. "What...what's going on?" she asked.

"Perhaps you could tell us," Tyrion said, and then glanced at Shae again. "Shae said that..."

"It's all right, Tyrion," Shae interrupted, turning to Sansa. "I saw you with the Lady Megga," she said. "Going down to the lower levels."

Tyrion chewed on his lower lip, looking at Sansa. "What were you doing, Sansa?"

She felt her face grow hot, and she reared on Shae. "What, now you're spying on me?"

Shae raised a brow. "I never found a house with a blue door, Sansa," she said, stiffly. "Your lady led me on a merry chase, though. Then, I figured something was wrong."

"You had no right..."

"Sansa," Tyrion interrupted, his voice gentle but firm. "We're worried about you. About...all of this. Are you and Lady Megga...?" he grimaced, blushing.

She didn't think she had ever seen her husband blush.

"N-no," she stammered out. "Of course not. I wouldn't do that to..." she cut herself off. "We're really not."

"Then what is happening?" Tyrion asked. "Because if you're not...with her, then something else is going on, and I need to know what it is in case one of the gold cloaks finds you skulking around the Black Cells when you have a very good reason not to go down there again."

Sansa felt annoyance flaring up in her. "I don't have to tell you that," she said, but her husband merely raised a brow.

"Sansa..." he took a deep breath. "You made your feelings very clear, about the Queen," he said. "But Lady Megga is not the Queen, and I can forbid you from spending time with her, if I feel that she is endangering you."

Sansa stared at him. "I..." He had sounded annoyed, that he had only the right to forbid Sansa's ability to spend time with Margaery. It just made her feel more annoyed. "She's...she’s giving me information about Margaery," she lied. "Because it's not like she can just send me letters."

Shae shook her head. "They're spying on that maester. Quyburn."

Sansa turned and glared at her. Shae met her gaze unapologetically.

"Is that true, Sansa?" Tyrion asked, and Sansa sighed, turning round to face her husband once more.

"Of course-"

"Sansa."

She cleared her throat, feeling suddenly like a recalcitrant child, which wasn't fair at all, considering it had been marriage into this man's horrible family which had caused her to grow up so quickly.

"We've just spending time together," she gritted out. "Are you going to forbid that as well, seeing as I finally have one friend in the city?"

Tyrion winced, eyes slanting away from hers. "Sansa..."

"No, I want to know," Sansa said, standing to her feet abruptly, the adrenaline pounding through her since she'd seen that poor woman locked away coming forth. "Is it now part of Shae's duties to spy on me, too? Because if that's the case, I'm not sure I care for her services at all."

"Sansa!" Tyrion snapped, and then he was standing to his feet, as well, and Sansa forced back the flinch her body wanted to make, at the motion.

Her husband had never hurt her, she reminded herself, and she was beginning to finally believe that he never would.

Not physically, anyway.

"Please," she said finally. "I know that it was cruel, the way that I spoke to you, about Margaery. But I don't need..." she forced her eyes shut, breathing in deep. "I don't need a keeper with me all of the time. And I don't need you ferreting out who it might be safe for me to befriend. We live in King's Landing, Tyrion," she said hoarsely, meeting his eyes. "No one here is safe to befriend, but I don't think I ought to live in misery because of it."

Tyrion winced. "Sansa..." he tried again, clearing his throat. "If Lady Megga is inducing you to spy with her, then she is not your friend. At least with Queen Margaery, I can trust that your activities are not...so treacherous."

"Treacherous?" Sansa scoffed. "You want to talk about treachery? You think the King would give two figs if he found out the Lady Megga and I were spying on Cersei's maester? I think he would if he found out I was fucking his-"

"Lady Sansa!" Tyrion roared, and she flinched, falling silent and glancing towards the shut door.

Shae closed her eyes, looking pained.

Sansa took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm. "What is my punishment to be then, my lord?" she asked, into the silence that followed.

Tyrion squinted at her. "Pardon?"

"My punishment," Sansa repeated. "For...endangering myself, or allying with your enemies, or whatever. What is it to be?"

Tyrion eyed her for several long moments, as if genuinely shocked by her words. As if it had never occurred to him to punish her for it, beyond threatening to take away her friend, once more.

She wished she could believe that were the case.

But, whatever else he was, Sansa did not think she would ever be able to forgive him for being a Lannister, even if there were times when...she wished that she could.

Tyrion sighed, reaching up and brushing at his hair. A nervous gesture and one she had never quite seen him indulge in, before.

She had often wondered what it took to make her husband truly nervous.

"Sansa, I have been trying to help you from the moment i laid eyes on you, alone here in King's Landing," Tyrion finally said, and he sounded so...drained, that Sansa felt herself pale. "I have done what I could for you, even if I understood your resentment for it at every turn. And I do not ask for your thanks."

Well, that was good, Sansa almost said aloud, because she'd be dead before he ever received it.

"But I do ask for your understanding, and I know that is...difficult for you, when you live amongst a den of lions," Tyrion continued, meeting her eyes, waiting for her to respond. She made a humming noise that might have been acknowledgement; she wasn't sure. "I am not trying to hurt you more, Sansa. I am trying to keep you safe in a world where my nephew the King would gladly see you harmed."

Sansa swallowed hard. "I know that," she whispered. "And...I..."

She couldn't say it.

Sansa looked down at her hands and cleared her throat. "I won't spend any more time with Megga, if that is truly what you wish, my lord," she said finally, stiffly, and blinked, her head jerking up in surprise at the groan that came from her husband.

"That isn't what I wish," he ground out, and she struggled nto to take a step back from him. "Sansa..." he mopped at his face again, glancing at Shae, but she was stayig silent through this conversation, Sansa had noticed. "Tell me what it is that you want from me," he said.

Sansa blinked at him. "My...my lord?" she echoed, shock rippling through her.

"What do you want from me?" he repeated. "I have tried..." his brows furrowed. "I have tried to be a friend to you, Sansa, where you have made it understandably clear that you do not want a husband. I have tried to protect you from the rest of my family where you have made it clear that you resent our name. I have tried to be kind to you where I think you expect my cruelty. But I don't think you have ever wanted those things from me. So." He cleared his throat. "What is it that you do want from me?"

Shae cleared her throat. "Tyrion..."

He held up a hand, and she fell silent, looking expectantly at Sansa, now.

"Is it that you want me to be cruel?" Tyrion asked, into the silence that followed. "Is that why you can never meet my eyes? Is that why you hate me so much more than you do Cersei, or Jaime?"

And Sansa...felt her throat go dry, at her husband's demand.

Because...well, that was just the problem, wasn't it? She was grateful to her husband, for everything he had done for her since placing his cloak around her shoulders. Grateful to him for some of the same things she resented him for.

She was glad that he had not raped her, on their wedding night, when everyone had made it clear that he would. She was glad that he did not expect anything more...wifely of her since, when he would have been within his rights to make such demands.

She was glad that he did not beat her nightly, that he went out of his way to be kind to her.

And...at the same time, she resented it. Resented that her husband was kind enough not to beat her, when she watched the bruises form on Margaery's arms because she was keeping Joffrey's attention away from Sansa. Resented that he didn't have his way with her each night, as was his due, while Joffrey tried nightly to fill his wife with child. Resented that he had given her Shae, who was like a m...good friend to her, when Cersei had taken away Sansa's Jeyne.

Resented that he was so, unfailingly kind to her, when he bore the name of Lannister.

And Sansa didn't know how to combine those feelings for her husband. Was beginning to fear that she never would.

"I don't want any of those things from you, my lord," she said, looking down. "I just want..." she swallowed hard. "You have been more than kind to me, my lord. I have no right to-"

"What. Do. You. Want. From. Me?" he demanded, each word low and icy. Shae was looking a bit nervous, now.

Sansa contained the urge to jump out of her skin at that tone.

Sansa cleared her throat, meeting her husband's eyes. "I don't want anything from you, my lord," she said, shortly. "I just want you to leave me alone."

Tyrion closed his eyes, letting out his breath slowly. "If we were to annul the marriage, it would only put you in danger, my lady," he told her, and Sansa jerked her head up, surprised the man had thought of it.

"I...I don't want that," she said, and swallowed. "I know...I know this is unfair to you," she said. "Having a wife who can never..." she looked away, pursing her lips. "But you have Shae. And I just want to be able to live, my lord. Just a little."

She knew it was too much to ask.

"And I am...grateful for your protection," Sansa continued. Her husband snorted, but she carried on. "No, I am. Very grateful. But I wsa protecting myself from your sister and your nephew long before you arrived in King's Landing or took me under your cloak, and there will come a day when you won't be able to protect me any longer, my lord. I would prefer we not pretend things, now."

Sansa felt her husband's searching gaze on her, and forced herself not to twitch.

"Sansa, I know you want independence," Shae spoke up then, startling her. "But if you get in trouble with the King, like it or not, Tyrion is responsible for you because-"

"Shae," Tyrion interrupted, holding up a hand to silence the other woman. His gaze had not left Sansa. "Sansa, if that is truly what you want, if my...backing off is the only thing that will reconcile you to this marriage, I will give it to you."

Both women turned to stare at him, startled.

"But I hope that in time, you do not come to resent me for that, as well," Tyrion said, and then turned and walked out of the room.


	278. TYRION

Pycelle had fallen asleep again.

Tyrion supposed it was not too uncommon of an occurrence, these days, during meetings of the Small Council. The man was what, one hundred summers old? And it was not as if anything of worth was ever said in these meetings, now that Margaery Tyrell had returned to Highgarden.

He sighed, reaching up and rubbing at his temples.

It was irritating, of late, how many of his thoughts seemed to revolve around that girl.

“And what do you think of the matter, Maester Pycelle?” Joffrey asked, into the agonizing silence that seemed to surround the Small Council table. Cersei didn’t seem aware of the awkwardness at all.

Varys cleared his throat, and silence met Joffrey’s words.

Tyrion tried to focus on what Joffrey had even been asking, but he would be lying if he said he was paying attention. Something about an investigation into the death of Willas Tyrell, as if Joffrey himself could have any reason to want such an investigation.

Tyrion slanted a glance toward Pycelle; saw that his head was lowered practically into his lap, his eyes fluttering. For a moment, Tyrion thought he might have done them all a favor and rid King’s Landing of his own irritating presence.

Joffrey seemed to have the same thought. “Is he dead?” he asked.

Cersei cleared her throat, loudly that time.

"The Grandmaester has served on the Small Council for many years, Your Grace," Cersei said, reaching out and touching her son's arm. "He cannot be expected to be at full service at all times."

"Well, he can damn well be expected to be awake," Joffrey muttered, glaring resentfully at the old man.

Across the table, Varys jerked in his seat. Tyrion's suspicion that he was kicking the old man under the table came to light a moment later, when Pycelle nearly leapt out of his chair, grunting in surprise and glancing around, as if wondering if anyone had noticed that he had been sleeping.

Cersei looked disgustingly pleased at the sight, considering how miserable she looked lately, and Tyrion narrowed his eyes at her.

He was getting tired of this. Tired of not knowing what was going on in his own Keep, when he was the Hand of the King. Not even knowing why the Tyrells were suddenly recruiting his wife to spy on Cersei's pets in the dungeons.

"My love," Cersei said, in that patient, condescending tone of hers that Tyrion doubted had ever worked on her son, "perhaps if we were to turn our minds to other matters. The Tyrells have asked-"

"I bet it was the Martells," Joffrey said suddenly, interrupting her, and Cersei ground her teeth together, forcing a smile.

"My love?"

"Who killed Willas Tyrell," Joffrey said, glancing around the table, seeming to wait until he had everyone's attention, even the old codger's, before he spoke again. "They sent an assassin after him because they knew they couldn't get at the Crown, and they're belligerent traitors who think somehow that we're to blame for the death fo their traitor prince. I saw that whore's eyes, before she left. She blamed me, as if her King wasn't above the level of a whore in every way."

Tyrion bit back a smirk, at those words.

"I'm sure we don't yet know who it was, Your Grace," Cersei said, tossing her head a little, and Tyrion narrowed his eyes. "But the death of my husband, regrettable though it may be, has caused repercussions. I fear that the other Houses will begin to wonder why we have not hung flags-"

"We ought to be destroying Dorne right now, not allowing the traitors to remain free of any consequences for anything they've done recently," Joffrey continued, turning cold eyes on Tyrion. "The biggest mistake of my kingship so far was removing our ships from Dorne."

Tyrion snorted, unable to hold it back, that time.

Cersei sent him an incredulous look.

Joffrey didn't appear to him at all.

"Perhaps we ought to have Lady Sansa beaten again," Joffrey mused, running his fingers lovingly across the mahogany table. "See what it is she really knew about Oberyn Martell. Bitch thought she could just get away with sending him to his death without facing the consequences of her own whorish actions in-"

"And perhaps I ought to have you beaten, for running the fucking kingdoms into the ground," Tyrion ground out.

Everyone at the table went still. Tyrion thought Varys might have stopped breathing, for a moment, which only confirmed yet another suspicion he had about the other.

"What did you just say to me?" Joffrey demanded, but Tyrion wasn't looking at him at all, this time. He was looking at Cersei.

At her downcast gaze and the way her hands trembled, tucked away in the sleeves of her red gown. At the circles under her eyes.

He'd wager she hadn't had a drink in some days.

Tyrion leaned forward, still staring at Cersei as he spoke. "I said, Your Grace, that I ought to have you beaten if you keep running this fucking country into the ground," he repeated. "But if you're going deaf, perhaps that explains some things."

Joffrey leapt to his feet, face turning purple in a record number of seconds. "How dare you!" he screamed. "How dare you say that to me!"

"I am sure I did not mean to threaten the King," Tyrion said lightly, thinking back to his wedding day, a knife stabbed into the table before him. Joffrey had looked much the same, then. He couldn't help but smirk, at the reminder.

Joffrey's mouth opened and shut twice; stupid as the boy was, he got the subtle hint. He glanced at his mother; she wasn't meeting his gaze.

And Tyrion knew that she wouldn't. Remembered what she had said to him, about how at least their father was able to keep a handle on Joffrey.

Tyrion was fucking tired of feeling out of control. He couldn't control his inheritance, because his sister had stolen it out of the naive hands of his young wife. He couldn't control his wife, because she thought that one treason amounted to another. He couldn't control his own fucking nephew, because the boy was a maniac. And he was the fucking Hand of the King.

"How..."

"The Hand of the King should apologize to the King," Pycelle blurted out then, seeming to come alive for the first time during this meeting. "He should..."

"Go back to your fucking nap, old man," Tyrion snapped, and the man's eyes went wide, he fell silent, staring.

Varys was staring, too, though his expression was lent more to shock than Pycelle's.

Joffrey's face was rapidly turning red, now. "I can have you stripped of that title anytime I want, Uncle, don't forget."

"Yes," Tyrion said placidly, "So you could. But I notice that Mace Tyrell isn't here to accept the position in my stead. And we wouldn't want that, would we, sister?"

She was grinding her teeth. He scoffed. Trust her to ask him for something and then get angry when he actually did it.

Tyrion laid his hands flat on the table. "So when I say to stop disrespecting my fucking wife, I expect you to do just that, Nephew," he told Joffrey, finally meeting the boy's eyes, now.

Joffrey flinched. "You...you..."

"She's no longer your plaything," Tyrion continued, "And I'll thank you to remember that, the next time you decide you want to beat something because you're bored."

Joffrey turned incredulously to his mother, who still wasn't looking at him. "He...he can't say those things to me!"

"Do you remember," Tyrion drawled, "in your penchant for gathering stories about the old Targaryens, what happened when the Mad King disrespected your grandfather?"

Joffrey stared at him.

"He resigned from Hand of the King, packed up his wife, and went back to the Rock," Tyrion said, amicably enough.

Joffrey gave a slow smile then, stupid boy that he was. "But you don't have a Rock to go back to," he said. "Casterly Rock belongs to my mother, now."

Tyrion smiled then, too. "Yes, it does," he said. "Which means that I can't go back, you're right." Joffrey looked a bit uncertain now. Tyrion leaned forward in his chair. "And, since I must remain here, I will just have to do what my father did not, when he left."

Joffrey sat back down in his chair, seeming to finally understand the threat.

Tyrion let his smile fade. "So why don't you hang the fucking Tyrell flag above the city, hand out some food to the smallfolk, and call for the Sept of Baelor to mourn the death of the Queen Mother's husband, like you've been told to do."

Joffrey glared at him mulishly. "Margaery doesn't care much about her cripple brother, she told me as-"

"I don't give a fuck what Margaery Tyrell cares about and doesn't care about," Tyrion interrupted. "You're going to hang that fucking flag because House Tyrell, you'll notice, has left behind one prominent member in the city, and it's the smart thing to do. And then you're going to sit your arse down on the Iron Throne, and listen to the grievances of your people while I save what is left of your kingdom from falling into another war, because I am your Hand of the King, and that is my job. Is that clear, or would you like your mother to repeat it for you in smaller sentences?"

Joffrey's hands clenched into fists, and then unclenched. Beside him, Cersei reached out, placing her hands over Joffrey's.

"The King is tired..." she tried, and Joffrey shook free of her.

"I'll see the flags are hung, Uncle," he said, and there was the bratty voice of the child Tyrion had seen grow up. "But I'll expect the war done soon, since I cannot devote my attention to it when I am caught up in other matters."

Varys looked like he might have been about to smile.

"Of course," Tyrion said, deliberately pausing. "Your Grace."

Joffrey made what sounded like a silent scream, and leapt out of his chair, storming from the room.

Cersei sent Tyrion an exasperated look, and then followed after her son.

"The Hand of the King should really-"

"I suppose you'd like to be fucking those serving girls with a wooden cock as well, Grandmaester," Tyrion interrupted coldly, and the old man fell abruptly silent.


	279. SANSA

They sat in agonized silence, the way they seemed to do these days, as Sansa worked on her embroidery and steadily didn’t meet Shae’s eyes.

The truth was, Sansa didn't know how to fix things between them. It felt as if every time she tried, she only made herself more angry, thinking about the ways that now not just the Lannisters, but even Shae were able to push her down, here.

That she wasn't even allowed to have a conversation with another girl without it being dangerous to Tyrion Fucking Lannister, and the rest of his family.

And every time Shae intervened, Sansa knew it was because the other woman was trying to protect her, she did. But all she could think about was that Shae was her serving woman because she belonged to Tyrion, after all.

And that given the choice, she would choose Tyrion, over Sansa.

So they sat in silence, Shae casually observing her while pretending not to, and Sansa gritting her teeth and biting back everything she wanted to say to the rother woman.

Or rather, didn't want to say.

Until she couldn’t stand it, that was.

“Shae?” she asked, lifting her head, and the woman turned to meet her eyes.

“Something wrong?”

Sansa cleared her throat. “I thought perhaps...I’d like some tea,” she said quietly, lowering her gaze again.

Gods, she felt guilty even asking for that. As if she were ordering Shae around, rather than asking.

Shae was silent for several moments, and then she nodded, turning away from Sansa and walking out of the room.

Sansa let out an audible sigh of relief, the moment the other woman was gone.

She knew that they were trying, at least. They had been trying from the moment that fight ended, for lack of a better word, and Sansa rather thought they had been trying before that, as well.

She just wished that she could appreciate it, with Margaery leagues away and Sansa feeling more alone the more her husband and his mistress reached out to her.

No, that wasn't fair.

Shae was so much more than her husband's mistress, and to think of her as anything else was an insult, surely.

Shae had done so much for her, and she just...She just wished that she knew Shae didn't belong to Tyrion, first and foremost.

That would make things between them so much easier, she couldn't help but believe.

She sighed, reaching up and scrubbing at her face.

She just wished...she wished Margaery would come home, already. She understood, of course she did, that Margaery had just lost her brother, that she would want to be with her family and no doubt as far away from the Lannisters as she could get, but Sansa...

Sansa needed her to.

Things just...made so much more sense, when Margaery was there, at her side. When she knew that no matter what happened with Shae and Tyrion, she could always go running back into Margaery's arms at the end of the day.

Gods, she missed her, and it hadn't even been that long since the other girl had left.

How pathetic was she?

Sansa sniffed, and didn't realize until that moment that she had been crying. She sniffed again, groaning this time, and wished, suddenly, impulsively, that she could go down to the library and find a book of fairy tales to calm her mind with.

She had a feeling Shae would have gone and fetched her one, if she'd had the presence of mind to ask the other woman, before.

But Sansa couldn't even bring herself to go now, for she knew it was a silly impulse. There was nothing in fairy tales for her any longer but a mockery of everything she had once thought of the world, and reading them would only be another reminder of that.

She sniffed again, and suddenly Shae was standing in the doorway, a platter with a steaming cup of tea and little lemon cakes in her hands, and that just made Sansa want to cry harder.

Gods, she felt like she had the first time she'd had her moon's blood, where everything and nothing had made her want to burst into tears.

Shae saw the expression on her face, and her own seemed to close off, for a moment. She moved forward as if mechanically, setting the tray on the table in front of Sansa's bed and waiting for her to approach it.

Sansa did so, not meeting Shae's eyes.

"Thank you," she whispered down at the tray, and heard Shae heave a long sigh. Sansa glanced up at her.

"You don't have to do that, Sansa," she said, and Sansa blinked at her stupidly for a moment, before blushing as she realized what the other woman meant.

"I do," she said simply, and reaching out, taking a sip of the steaming tea and marvelling at how easily it seemed to calm her down.

I really do.

Shae gave her another long look, and then sat down across from her, helping herself to a piece of lemon cake.

Sansa stared, and then marveled. She remembered a time, not so long ago, when she would have berated the other woman, a servant, for doing such a thing.

Now, she wasn't quite hungry enough to care.

And, she realized, she wouldn't have said anything, even if she was.

"I want to apologize," Sansa said, not looking at Shae, staring instead down into her tea cup. "I...I've been cruel to you, lately, because of Tyri..." she looked away. "Anyway, that doesn't matter. I'm sorry."

Shae stared at her for a moment, before nodding tiredly. "Sansa..." she pursed her lips, and then tried again. "I know you think I am being cruel, or perhaps choosing Tyrion over you, but I think I should apologize as well, for that."

Sansa blinked at her, privately thinking that wasn't much of an apology. And then the corners of Shae's lips twitched, and Sansa found herself smiling, as well.

"Do you..." she cleared her throat. "Do you think you could forgive me?" she asked. "I know I said...I said things I wasn't proud of, the other day."

Shae shot her a look. "Doesn't mean you didn't mean them."

Sansa straightened in her chair. She wasn't going to apologize for that. Not to Shae, and not to Tyrion, either.

She started as a nasty little voice in the back of her head asked if that did mean she trusted them a little, after all.

She never would have contemplated not apologizing to Joffrey for such a thing, at the very least.

"I..." she chewed on her lower lip, and then reached for a lemon cake, chewing on the bitter corners before she reached the sweet insides. "You've been very kind to me, since you became my maidservant, and I haven't always returned the favor."

Shae's eyes softened, then. "Those things you said..." she hesitated. "Did you mean them?"

Sansa lifted her chin. "I did," she whispered, and hated the way Shae looked at her, then.

"I see," she said, voice going a little colder then, and Sansa thought perhaps she had better explain.

"I...I meant what I said," she repeated. "I...Tyrion would make a fine husband, I think, a gentle, loving husband...for someone who's last name isn't Stark."

Shae went still, blinking up at her.

"And I...I sometimes wish that mine wasn't, the way he looks at me," Sansa said. "But it is, and I can't change that. I can't, Shae."

Shae gave her a long look, and then sighed. "And what about me?" she asked. "Can you live with the woman who fucks your Lannister husband?"

They had never said it so bluntly, never allowed that secret so out in the open before this moment.

Sansa flinched. "I...I'm sorry," she whispered, looking down at her hands, surprised to see them trembling. No, that was her whole body, trembling with the force of the sobs she was trying to keep in.

And then Shae was moving, around the narrow table in between them, until she was standing in front of Sansa, looking down at her as if she were waiting for Sansa to break.

"I'm sorry," Sansa gasped out again, lower lips trembling. "Shae, I'm sorry."

"There, there," Shae murmured, reaching out and pulling Sansa into her arms. "Come here, it's all right, Sansa. It's all right."

Sansa fell into the other woman's embrace and closed her eyes, felt her body wracking with silent sobs, and just tried to hang on.

"I told Tyrion that you didn't know what you wanted," Shae said into the silence, and Sansa lifted her head, blinking at the other woman as she felt a familiar irritation bleeding up inside of her. "How could you? I remember the things that I wanted when I was your age."

Sansa licked her lips. "I don't..."

_Want your pity._

Shae tutted. "But he is determined to meet your wishes, to leave you in this marriage in name only. I know that is what you think you desire as well."

"Shae..."

"But I want you to listen to me, if only for a moment," Shae said. "I know that you think that you shouldn't be forced to live under Tyrion's protection because in the end, he can't protect you from Joffrey, if it comes down to it, but I think you underestimate him."

Sansa hummed low in her throat. "All right," she said softly.

Shae took a deep breath. "When I was a little girl," she said finally, "Nine summers old, living in Lorath, my mother sold me to the first man who came along and offered her a few gold dragons."

Sansa sucked in a breath. "Shae..."

"She didn't really want to," Shae said. "But I had three younger brothers, and boys are far more important than girls, even so far away as Lorath. We were poor, Sansa, very poor."

Sansa cleared her throat. "You don't have to..."

"Be quiet and let me finish the story," Shae reprimanded her, and Sansa fell silent. "The man, he...he promised my mother that he would take good care of me," she said. "But I could tell even then, just looking in my mother's eyes, that she didn't believe him. That she knew I was as good as dead, to our family, but at least she would be able to buy my brothers enough bread to last them the season."

Sansa felt bile rising in her throat. She couldn't imagine her own lady mother selling her like that, no matter if their family had gone destitute. Couldn't imagine what would drive a mother to do that to her own child.

"My father, you see, had tried to make me his whore before," Shae said, and Sansa flinched. "He wanted me, because my mother's tits had grown saggy, and I was just starting to be beautiful. My mother wanted to get rid of me before that happened. In a way, I suppose I have to thank her for that."

"Shae..." Sansa whispered, horror filling her.

Shae continued on, heedless. "The man she sold me to didn't want much from me, at first. He himself didn't like little girls. But they do, in Volantis. I traveled with him there, and he sold me to a brothel. The brothel later sold me to a Dornish lord. He was kind, and fun. But I didn't have his protection."

Sansa felt her heart leaping up in her throat, because she suddenly knew where this story was going.

"The lord sold me too, after a while, to a brothel in the North. It was hideous. I hated living there, every second of it, and when Tyrion came along, you're right, I jumped at the chance to be away. To go South again. You see, I didn't know what I wanted, when I was a little girl. I resented my mother for sending me away from my father, from my brothers, when I should have been thanking her. I resented the man who bought me and was paid for other men to fuck me when I was barely ten summers old, but I should have been thanking him, too. He was teaching me a lesson, one that I finally learned when I found my way into the Imp's bed."

Sansa swallowed, waiting for Shae to impart the moral of that story. But all she was hearing, truly, was that Shae was as helpless as she, here in King's Landing, totally dependent on the goodwill of Sansa's husband.

And Sansa didn't want that for herself anymore, even if it was something Shae could abide.

"Is that true?" she asked, and Shae blinked down at her. "That story?"

Shae cleared her throat. "Some of it," she admitted, and Sansa smiled, a tad wistfully. "I know none of it is what you want to hear, of course. But the point still stands. We are women, Sansa. It is very difficult for us to live in this world on our own. Tyrion is a man; he doesn't understand that, so he is indulging your wish. But you will come to resent him for it, as he said."

Sansa shivered, for the words almost sounded like a prophecy, to her ears.

"He cares for you very much, don't you see?" Shae asked. "Else he wouldn't have offered that."

Sansa licked her lips, wondered how the other woman had eventually put aside her jealousy for Sansa. "I know that he cares about me, Shae," she said. "That's just the problem, don't you see?"

Shae pulled back then, meeting her eyes. "Why?" she asked. "Why is that the problem? I need to hear you say it, Sansa. And...I think, so do you."

Sansa closed her eyes. She really, really didn't want to say it. "Because," she licked her lips, forced her eyes back open, because she owed Shae that as much. "Because I know that he wants to rpotect me because he worries about me," she said. "He sees me as a scared little girl without protection in a horrible world that has been destroyed because of his wicked family. But he doesn't understand, Shae."

Shae smoothed down Sansa's hair. "What doesn't he understand?"

Sansa thought about what Megga had said, about how Sansa wasn't quite living because seh wasn't allowing herself to take any risks, about how Margaery had been wrong to protect her, all of this time.

A paradigm shift, in her mind.

"He's a Lannister," Sansa said, meeting Shae's gaze. "And in the end, they are his family. That is all he will ever be."

"Sansa..."

Sansa knew a little about the strain between Shae and Tyrion, even if they attempted to hide it. Knew that it bothered Shae, that she had no family name to offer Tyrion, that she must sit by and let him be married to another woman, even while she shared his bed.

She would have thought that Shae would be happier about this, all things considered.

"So I would rather he not befriend me now, rather he not feel that he has to protect me out of some sense of obligation, later," Sansa said shortly. "Because he's a Lannister, and I can never, ever forget that. I can never forget what his family has done to mine. Has don to me. And neither can he."

"Sansa..." Shae cleared her throat. "Do you think that is all he is to you? To me?"

"Yes," Sansa breathed, and gods, it felt so good to say those words. "Yes, and it has to be that way, because, don't you understand?"

Shae shook her head. "No," she said. "No, I don't."

But her eyes were wet.

"I've thrown my lot in with Margaery Tyrell," Sansa said, and Shae was already shaking her head. "Just as you've thrown it in with a Lannister."

"Sansa, that isn't what happened between Tyrion and I, not really."

Sansa shook her head, because Shae might have genuinely convinced herself of that, she might have, but Sansa couldn't. "They're more than just their family names, but they're not, at the same time. And it isn't the reason I fell for her, Shae, but I do know, as I think Tyrion does, that one day, the Tyrells are going to be the ones openly ruling Westeros. That one day, they're not going to bother with remaining friends with the Lannisters."

Shae didn't bother to deny it. They had all seen how furious Loras Tyrell looked, when he saw those bruises on his sister's arms. They all knew that a Kingsguard was capable of killing the King.

"And I've...I've already thrown my lot in with them. Because I cannot keep living in a world where I've befriended my Lannister husband, and where I cannot at least hope that one day, all of the Lannisters are going to be lying in pools of their own blood." She cleared her throat. "And I can't sit here and hope for that if one of them is someone I care about, Shae. I just can't. So. I'm sorry."

Shae's jaw twitched. "Sansa..."

"Please, Shae," Sansa interrupted, and Shae fell silent. "I can't...I want you by my side, I do. But I can't...not him. Please."

Shae gave her another long look and then, slowly, nodded.


	280. CERSEI

Cersei was furious.

Her fucking brother was an idiot, and he'd twisted her words out of context, doing the one thing guaranteed to set Joffrey into a mood that would reflect on all of them, when he turned his anger outward.

And her brother had the gall to smile about it, while he taunted the boy.

She wouldn't be surprised if he ended up with an arrow through his head by morning, Cersei thought, a little nastily, and not feeling at all guilty for the thought.

Then, she could appoint someone else to the position of Hand of the King, before that fat flower came back, and so she supposed even she would get something out of this.

Her hands shook a little, as she walked, and Cersei paused, looking down at them.

Gods, she needed a stiff drink.

They had so many other things to worry about; Stannis, most especially now, after what he had just been reported to have done, the raven coming first to her because she paid well to be better informed than her brother, if the need ever arose to hold such a thing over his head. But also the Iron Islands, the fucking Tyrells, and here her brother was, playing at games with her son, as if he thought that was what Cersei had meant, when she sacrificed her pride to warn her brother to get their house in order before things ended up much worse than they were. 

She felt a small bit of smugness, at that. Tyrion had just lost whatever leverage he thought he had over Joffrey, and here he was, making threats to her boy. He was going to find out soon enough, she knew, and she couldn't wait to see him grovel, even if it would leave her son without a hand to steady him.

Better no hand, she thought bitterly, than the Imp's.

If only their father were still alive. He would know how to handle Joffrey, in the ways that Tyrion clearly did not. He would know what to do with the boy.

But her father was dead, killed by that mongrel Martell, leaving Cersei to have to clean up their family's messes every day now, it seemed.

She sighed, reaching up and rubbing at her forehead. She didn't dare find a stiff drink, and that irritated her to no end, that between her son and her brother, nothing in King's Landing could be accomplished.

She shook her head. And all for what sat between a woman's legs. Gods, Tyrion was almost as bad as Jaime, in that respect.

She shook that thought from her mind, because no, she didn't want to think about Jaime, not just now. Not when he was leagues away, and had yet to report anything of value about his rescue of Myrcella beyond that he had her.

Cersei took a deep, shuddering breath, and paused in the corridor.

He was all right, she told herself. He and Myrcella, the both of them, they would be back in King's Landing soon. She had warned them to take the Kingsroad, rather than a ship, knowing all too well lately the dangers of ships, and they would be fine.

Jaime had taken a large group of soldiers with him, she remembered, when he had gone to rescue her daughter. Granted, they hadn't gone into Dorne with him, but it seemed that the Dornish were happy enough to give her daughter up, provided that her new...husband travel back to King's Landing with her.

And if Cersei weren't so infuriated by the impertinence of such a demand, she might have focused more of her thoughts on what she was going to do with the boy, once she had her hands on him.

This boy, who had stolen her baby girl from her arms in the same way that Margaery Fucking Tyrell had stolen Joffrey, the both of them wholly unrepentant, practically rubbing their triumphs in Cersei's face.

Well, they were both going to pay, and soon enough, if she had her way.

A blur behind Cersei caught her attention, out of the corner of her eye, and she shook it off, kept walking.

The pieces were already in place, of course, to deal with Margaery, and would need only a bit of maneuvering to deal with the boy, as well.

He and his fucking family of sand rats were going to rue the day they thought they could marry away her daughter like some sort of joke, and in the end, Cersei would be the only one laughing, her daughter at her side again, Joffrey free of that bitch's influence.

She almost felt sorry for the Tyrells, in this case. Or at least, she felt more sympathy for them than she did for the Martells.

Losing two children, in such quick succession...even Cersei hadn't planned for that.

But she had to admit, that revenge was certainly sweet, even if it hadn't been her own.

Because she had put things together, remarkably quickly, looking at the expression on her son's face as Tyrion told him to hang the Tyrell flags and mourn the crippled, dead husband as if he had truly been a part of their family.

She hadn't realized it before, not truly. Hadn't, in all honesty, even suspected. In her mind, the only ones who could have been guilty were the Tyrells, and considering that Mace had already sworn revenge and war upon the Dornish, it was practically a proven fact.

But then her son had pouted about raising the flags, and asked Cersei if she'd had anything to drink today after stalking away from the Small Council meeting, and Cersei found herself remembering a conversation she'd been doing her level best to forget, of late.

_"Do you miss him?"_

_"Does your husband mistreat you, Mother?"_

_"Do you want another child?"_

He hadn't been asking that day out of concern for her, for any future children she might want, not tainted by the throne, as Cersei had scarcely believed at the time.

He'd been asking his mother if he had her permission to kill Willas Tyrell.

The thought rankled, at first, and then she couldn't help but smile, at how devious her son was.

Because clearly, this showed that the bond between mother and son was greater than that between husband and wife. He was willing to kill Willas Tyrell for her, so that she need not remain married to him any longer, so that she could remain in King's Landing with her child, even knowing that he was his wife's favorite brother.

And, somehow, he'd done it.

She hadn't quite worked all of that out, just yet. She remembered what her son was capable of though; what he had done to Bran Stark, what he had done to her husband's bastards, and she believed that he could do it, if he'd wanted.

Cersei spun about, turning back to the little girl standing in the middle of the corridor, playacting as if she thought she wouldn't be noticed, who'd been following her for half of a hallway.

Who did she think Cersei was?

"What are you doing here, skulking about?" Cersei asked, her eyes narrowing on the girl.

She looked familiar, Cersei thought, though she couldn't immediately place her. A lady of some distinction, clearly, by the manner of her dress and the way her hair was plaited so stylishly, the way the young ladies in King's Landing liked to wear it, these days.

The way Margaery Fucking Tyrell wore it, these days.

Cersei felt a spike of anger at that thought, and recognized the girl.

Mera, or Megga, or something, but a Tyrell lady under Margaery's house, nonetheless. She had seen the girl often enough, at Margaery's side, forced into interactions with the young woman as she often was.

In fact, this specific young woman never seemed to leave Margaery's side, which no doubt meant she was one of Margaery's personal ladies.

Which meant that there was no reason, by the Stranger, this little bitch ought to be anywhere near Cersei's private chambers.

"Answer me, girl," she gritted out, reaching out and grabbing the girl by the wrist, jerking her forward.

If that bitch thought she could send spies on Cersei even while she wasn't in King's Landing to oversee them, she was going to learn a nasty lesson, Cersei thought vindictively.

Too long now, had Cersei been cowering in the corner, not allowing herself to make the decisions she knew her father would have made. Long enough that Margaery Tyrell thought she could get away with something like this.

But Cersei was the Head of their family now; Jaime didn't want the position, and Tyrion hadn't been able to claim it. Casterly Rock belonged to her, and she was the Head of House Lannister now, and this girl was never going to forget it, by the time she was done with her.

She felt hot rage bubbling up inside of her, and a part of Cersei which hadn't been at the forefront in some time latched onto the feeling.

Megga Tyrell flushed even as she stumbled forward, looking like a clueless little bumpkin. Cersei supposed she understood the appeal, in hiring such a woman as one's spy. She looked innocent enough, in those few moments before she opened her mouth again.

"J-Just running errands for Queen Margaery," she stammered out, and Cersei raised a brow.

"I'm sure you are," she snapped, and Megga went rather pale.

"Your Grace-"

"Though it stands to wonder, what sort of errands your lady has you running here, not three paces from my quarters."

Megga Tyrell licked dry lips, then lifted her chin defiantly, the little chit. "My queen, you mean."

Cersei blinked at her, feeling that hot rage only growing. How dare she. "Indeed," she hissed out. Then, "Why are you here, girl?"

"I told you, Your Grace, just running errands," Megga repeated, and oh, if the little bitch thought she was going to get away with that defense, she had another thing coming.

Cersei found herself hoping this stupid girl was Margaery Tyrell's favorite handmaiden.

Cersei crossed her arms. "Your queen is in Highgarden, or did you forget?" she elaned forward. "What does the Queen of Thorns want?"

Megga licked her lips. "I...wouldn't know, Your Grace," she said. "I am hardly one of her confidants."

Which meant there was nothing important she could spill under torture, yes, Cersei understood these little flowers' language.

That didn't mean she wasn't going to try, anyway.

"Indeed," she said dryly. "Yet you're here, spying on me."

Megga lifted her chin. "I'm not-"

"Don't lie to me," Cersei gritted out, and was actually surprised when the girl fell abruptly silent. "Do you think your mistress is the only one in King's Landing with spies of her own?"

Megga went pale again. "I-"

But Cersei was done playing with her. She was too annoyed to take this girl seriously, not when Margaery Tyrell was leagues away and still managing to bungle everything Cersei did, like some sort of witch.

"Your little queen wants to know so desperately what I'm hiding does she?" Cersei asked, with a cold smirk as her grip around Megga Tyrell's arm tightened to the point of pain, the girl whimpering. "Then you'd best find out. And," Cersei smiled nastily, "You can thank your queen, when you do."

The girl, stubbornly, lifted her chin. "I am a handmaiden of the Queen," she warned Cersei, as if that meant anything, but her voice was trembling. Cersei wondered what about herself inspired such terror, and then she knew.

She knew, and her eyes narrowed in hate, that this girl should have figured out what she and Quyburn had been making such an effort to conceal. The only question, of course, was how she had found out at all.

"If you harm me, the Queen will know of it," Megga warned, and Cersei scoffed, remembering what she had done to Lady Rhaella, that traitorous bitch. Remembering that Margaery Tyrell had done nothing then. Her friends should be more worried for their own necks, she thought, if they truly believed that their queen would protect them at any risk to herself.

"Please," Megga started, and fear bled into her voice even as she was fighting against her, but Cersei felt another bit of cold fury rush through her, at the girl's attempts, and she only pulled her along all the harder. "Please, Your Grace-"

It was the first time, Cersei realized abruptly, that the girl had called her that, since she'd found her skulking about. She felt a small thrill, at the realization.

"Quiet," Cersei snapped at her, "Or it will be all the worse for you."

She would make sure of that. And perhaps, this time, she might teach the little Tyrell whore what it was to go against Cersei Lannister.

Cersei couldn't turn against her brother, just yet. But this girl? She would pay.


	281. SANSA

"I don't understand," she confessed to Shae, as they made their way out into the gardens. They had been doing that a lot lately; Sansa found that the gardens were the only way to clear her head, these days. "I know Lord Tyrion said that the King was wrapped up in matters of state, but I don't think he's so much as terrorized a kitten, recently."

Or me, she didn't say, but that was a concern, as well. Because Sansa knew well that the moment when Joffrey stopped tormenting her was when one had to stand at attention.

More than that, Joffrey was even attending meetings of the Small Council without Margaery's prompting. His wife wasn't even in King's Landing, and he seemed to have set up a second home there.

Shae gave her a mysterious smile. "Lord Tyrion can be very terrifying, when he wishes to be, to certain nephews. My understanding is that he told him off for not doing an effective job as king," she teased, and Sansa allowed herself a small smile, bumping her hip against the other woman's as they kept walking down the beaten path.

There wasn't anyone about, today. Privately, Sansa found herself thinking this was the perfect day to be in the gardens, bright and sunny without being too warm, and it was certainly a day when Margaery would have found herself in the gardens, were she here.

Sansa flinched, and hugged herself, though it wasn't cold.

And then she realized what Shae had just said.

"He...told him off?" she echoed, pausing to turn and stare at Shae incredulously.

Shae smiled. "I believe so," she said. "The servants have been gossiping about it for days. I'm surprised you heard nothing, what with the Tyrell girls."

Sansa flushed. "I haven't...I haven't spoken to them, lately,' she said, and felt a private flush of relief, that it appeared that Shae really wasn't spying on her, anymore, just as she'd begged for.

It was far easier to get along with Shae and Tyrion, now. While Shae hardly left her side, when she did, Sansa didn't get the feeling that the other woman was still following her, and she didn't push Sansa harder than she could take, anymore.

And Tyrion...hadn't spoken more than a few words to Sansa a day, since their argument. It was refreshing in every way that it shouldn't have been.

"Yes," she said slowly, "but even when Lord Tywin warned him away from me, he certainly didn't make an effort not to hide his feelings about the matter." She had a horrible feeling that if Tyrion had told the King off for something, they were all about to suffer for it.

Shae gave her another strange smile, and started walking again. "Well, perhaps he is distracted with something else."

Sansa paled. "He isn't..." she swallowed. "Tyrion isn't sending him...ladies from Lord Baelish's brothels, if he?"

The thought horrified her more than she had expected it to. A small part of her also felt relief, that someone else could suffer instead of her, for she was certain that something like that must be happening, for Joffrey to curb his interest in her for so long.

Shae's smile dropped as she realized the implication of her words. "No, no, not at all. Rather..." she glanced over her shoulder, clearly ill at ease with what she was about to tell Sansa, and then grimaced. "Sansa...Lord Stannis has taken Winterfell."

She said the words so matter of fact, it took Sansa a moment to understand them.

_Lord Stannis has taken Winterfell._

Sansa stared. "Taken..." she repeated dumbly, unable to wrap her mind around the words.

Shae nodded, biting her lip. "They learned it just after Lord Willas’ death. He...Stannis destroyed the Bolton forces there and the Lannister reinforcements like he was cutting through butter, according to Tyrion." She took a shuddering breath. "Needless to say, the Lannisters are less than pleased by the loss. They are trying to keep it quiet for now, but it will be out soon enough."

Sansa took a deep breath, found it suddenly difficult to breathe as the last thing she had eaten lodged in her throat. "I..."

"Sansa?" Shae asked, voice sharp as she noticed the change immediately. "Sansa, what is it?"

She wondered if any of these people understood, if any of them could understand, that Winterfell was a home, not a piece of land to be thrown between one lord and another.

Stannis had taken Winterfell, and Sansa had not even known about it.

"Where is he?" she demanded, all of her earlier resolve to ignore her husband until the end of time vanishing in the fury bubbling up inside of her.

Shae blinked at her. "Sansa?"

"My husband," Sansa gritted out, saying words she hadn't thought to say again, after that enlightening conversation she'd had with her husband, before. "Where is he?"

Shae gave her a long look. "I don't think I should say," she said finally, which was answer enough.

She would have told Sansa, after all, if he was in a Small Council meeting and therefore totally unavailable.

She sucked in one breath, and then another.

"Where is he, Shae?" she demanded, and Shae blinked at her, and she could see in the other woman's eyes that she was thinking about the conversation they'd had the other day.

Sansa swallowed, and was just turning on her heel when Shae said quietly behind her, "The Tower, Sansa. He's still in the Tower."

And Sansa turned on her heel and marched back down the garden path and back into the Keep, only vaguely aware of Shae following along behind her.

Stannis had taken Winterfell, and no one had bothered to tell her.

She supposed she should not be terribly surprised by that. She had asked her husband to leave her alone, after all, and he was only following her wishes. And she was just Sansa Stark, a prisoner here in the Keep, so what did it matter if she was made aware of important battles, unless Joffrey wished to rub them in her face somehow?

Still, it rankled.

"When were you going to tell me that my home had been taken by Stannis Baratheon?" Sansa asked calmly as she marched into her husband's office in the Tower, and Tyrion's head jerked up from the map he was hunched over, his wide eyes turning from her to Shae almost immediately.

Shae stared back at her lover unrepentantly, and Sansa found herself glad for the other woman's show of support, even if she hadn't meant to tell her. "She deserved to know."

Tyrion sighed, scrubbing a hand over his face once more. "That was the Small Council's decision to make, not your own."

Shae didn't look particularly abashed by the reprimand as Tyrion turned back to Sansa.

"Was it?" Sansa demanded, and hated only a little the ice in her tone.

"Sansa..." he said carefully, and then sighed. "It's true. Stannis and his army won the battle for Winterfell against House Bolton. They've retreated into the woods, and the Lannister forces that were sent there were soundly defeated when they showed up, as well."

Sansa found herself wondering why Tyrion was looking at her that way, as if this news was something he expected to break her. She wanted to smile. Perhaps she would have, if this were Margaery telling her the news.

It occurred to her abruptly that she should be less silent, at this point.

Sansa stared at him. "I...Wasn't that most of the Lannister forces?" she asked incredulously. "How...I thought Lord Stannis barely had an army, at this point."

That thought brought an abrupt halt to her joy, because surely something was off about all of this, surely...

"I..." she shook her head. "I don't understand." Then she swallowed. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Tyrion nodded, looking very tired when he spoke next. "Sansa...Stannis has declared that, because Robb Stark disinherited you out of the fear that House Lannister would use you to control the North years ago, Winterfell rightfully belongs to him, by right of conquest."

Sansa felt as if one of Joffrey's Kingsguard had hit her in the stomach. She gasped, reached for the glass of wine which had been sitting on the table and Tyrion slid her way, took a long gulp that did nothing to make her feel better.

If anything, it seemed to make her feel worse.

She was going to be sick. The sensation hit her, the image of her mother's neck cut by a Bolton or a Frey, of her brother's direwolf sewn onto his neck, of her own throat, bleeding under Ellaria Sand's fingers, and suddenly she was upending her last meal into a chamber pot that Shae had conveniently brought forward for her.

She remembered that her father had thought Stannis Baratheon was the rightful heir to the Iron Throne. Joffrey had taunted her about as much after the Battle of Blackwater, before he had been taken in by Margaery's charms and forgot about her for a while.

Remembered that her brother had attempted to ally himself with Stannis, though the man had refused to take his offer and her brother had been forced to ask Renly Baratheon, instead. Remembered that Stannis called himself the true king.

And now Stannis had taken her home, just like any other of the Houses fighting this war they thought was a game, had taken the last living part of House Stark from Sansa, if Arya no longer lived, as she was beginning to fear.

It was gone, as surely as if it had never been hers to begin with, and Sansa was dry-heaving into a chamber pot because she was a weak little girl who couldn't even hold onto her home.

It wasn't that she wanted the Lannisters to have it, because of course she didn't.

But to hear it so obviously stated, that Winterfell didn't belong to her but to a King who had never allied with her brother just because Robb had disinherited her...it stung, and she thought for a moment that she would never stop being sick.

Shae began brushing through Sansa's hair, and Sansa leaned into the comforting motion, even as she was aware of the mess she had made of herself.

"Sansa?" Tyrion's voice called from in front of her, and she jumped where she lay quivering in Shae's arms.

She glanced up at him, saw his wide, sad eyes, and realized abruptly that her plan of having them live separate lives within this marriage was never going to work.

It was a wonder that she had never realized it before.

Sansa found herself shaking again, as she tore her gaze away from that of a man who somehow, despite his namesake, had the audacity to look at her like _that_.

"How long has he had it?" she forced out.

Tyrion grimaced. "Since two days after Willas Tyrell was killed," he told her bluntly, and Sansa felt as if all of the air had been sucked out of the room. "I'm sorry."

Sansa shook her head, because she didn't see what he had to be sorry about.

Winterfell was no longer hers. It hadn’t really been hers at all while the Lannisters claimed it, but it was gone, now, all the same. Winterfell would never be hers again, whether Stannis Baratheon held onto it and his claim that it was his by right of conquest now, or whether the Lannisters ever stole it back in her name.

Winterfell was no longer a home she could dream of returning to, whatever that fucking fortune teller had promised her.

Perhaps she had taken the fortune teller's prophecy wrong, Sansa thought. The fortune teller had warned Loras not to go to the sea, but he had done it anyway, and he had encountered a great loss, assuming he was close with his brother, which Margaery had always intimated that he was.

She shook her head. She was putting far too much stock in the words of a soothsayer, and she needed to stop it. It would send her mad, continuing to think like this.

It occurred to her that she might be in shock, just now, thinking about that fucking fortune teller rather than the loss of her home, just as surely as if someone had burned it to the ground in front of her.

"Sansa," Tyrion promised her, voice gentle as it so often was with her, "We are going to get your home back. The Crown did not recognize Robb Stark's attempts to push a rightful heir to Winterfell out of the succession when he did it, and it does not recognize it now."

Sansa shuddered again, closed her eyes as she choked down more bile, not wishing to make herself sick once more in front of her husband, and wondered why Tyrion thought it would make her feel any better to know that the Lannisters had plans to steal her home back for themselves.

To know that her own brother had thrown her out of the line of succession because he knew that something like this was going to happen. Knew that Sansa would be too weak to protect their home.

To know that the Crown, under Joffrey, would never recognize anything her brother had ever done, so why should they recognize this?

She shuddered again, the last vestiges of bile releasing, and then lifted her chin, wiping at her mouth and not meeting Tyrion's or Shae's eyes. "I..."

She took a shaky breath, and then another, ignoring the way that Shae and Tyrion were both looking at her. "I need..." she took another deep breath, and then fled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case anyone cares, Stannis was able to take Winterfell in this universe because he didn’t traumatize his men by burning Shireen. (Because the Red Woman promised him that all of his enemy kings would die, and Joffrey’s still kicking. He doesn’t trust her quite as much now. At least, not enough to kill his own daughter.)


	282. GARLAN

"Garlan?" he heard his wife call out sleepily from their bed, no doubt woken by the gentle breeze coming in from the door he'd opened, before the balcony. "Darling? Come back to bed."

He closed his eyes, taking in a deep, shuddering breath, and did not turn away from his position on the balcony of their chambers, staring out at the stars.

Too bright, tonight. They weren't quite the force they had once been for him.

He remembered, when they were younger, the panics he used to fall into. It was strange; as a child, he had not been particularly adept at fighting; in fact much of the prospects frightened him.

He had seen what fighting in just one mock battle had done to his brother, and Garlan had not wanted to suffer the same fate, selfish though he had known it to be.

The panics hit him at the oddest of times; when he was training on the field, or trying to get up onto a horse taller than he, or, sometimes, when he was hard at work, the maesters deploring his abominable lack of education.

Willas used to take him up to the East Tower when the panics were at their worst and the maesters were recommending milk of the poppy, and would point out to the stars. Would, slowly, name each and every one of them, tell the myths behind their creation, until Garlan could recite the constellations back to him, perfectly, by the time they were disappearing into velvet morning.

That had always helped.

Because, somehow, looking at the stars reminded Garlan how very not alone he was in the world, large and bright as they were, shining down on him.

And Willas had known that, and had never judged him for the fears which plagued Garlan and not his younger siblings throughout his childhood.

Looking at the stars still helped, these days. When he was off in the Iron Islands, desperately trying to win a fight he knew he could not, looking at the stars had helped.

He wondered if Margaery ever tried it, then shook the thought away. He could not imagine her doing so. She was always so stoic in her misery.

"I'll be just a moment, my love," he promised over his shoulder, still blinking up at the Cup, where it hung in the sky above his balcony.

The Cup that the gods had filled with wine on the night that the Father took the Maiden into his arms, and poured out over the heavens in their jubilance.

Well, that was one of the stories Willas told about it. The septons did not put such stock in the tales of old, and so sometimes the gods were not the same.

Willas had never repeated the story in front of their parents or their septons, however. Garlan was not even sure where he'd learned it, since he couldn't imagine it was the sort of thing one might learn in the Tyrell library, nor in the Citadel, where the maesters often let Willas sneak in despite his not having any intention to become a maester himself.

Garlan remembered, abruptly, that Oberyn Martell, another dead man, used to encourage Willas in his letters to become a maester, that it hadn't been fulfilling for him but it might be for Willas.

Garlan gritted his teeth, and turned his attention back to the stars.

"Not too long, I hope," Leonette said, and Garlan closed his eyes again, heaving a sigh.

He hated this.

Hated that he had come home too late, hated that when he did come home, it was bearing this terrible knowledge of what had happened to his brother, and knowing that he could tell no one of it.

He had seen the wild look in his sister's eyes, when she spoke of her husband and what she thought he had done to Willas. Had seen the bone deep fear there, the resentment.

He had never seen such hatred in his sister's eyes before, and a part of him had been terrified by it.

And he knew that if she found out the whole truth of the matter, he would lose her forever, just as he had lost Willas.

The truth was, Garlan had not abandoned the fighting in the Iron Islands, like he'd allowed his family to believe.

He was a soldier, first and foremost, had always been, and if the King hard ordered him to remain in the fighting despite his brother's death, it would have angered him, but he would have agreed to do so.

No matter which King it was their family currently followed, for that in itself seemed to change by the day.

But that was the reason Garlan had believed Margaery, when she said it wasn't the Martells, when she hinted that it was Joffrey who had killed their beloved brother, where Loras had been more skeptical.

He had believed the words the moment they left his sister's mouth, though he had pretended not to, for her own sake, for he knew that his sister would repeat that conversation over and over in her mind for years to come, and would remember every detail.

And while she wouldn't remember it now, she would, someday, remember that her brother hadn't at all seemed surprised by her theory, Garlan knew, before she had even opened her mouth to convince him.

He knew his sister well enough to know that as much about her, even now.

Because the Martells may have been furious enough to exact their revenge in this way, and there was a part of Garlan which would have understood, angry as he was, if they did so.

But that was not something the King would have known about in advance.

And the raven that had been sent from King's Landing, conveying the express orders of the King that Garlan return to the Reach to secure the Dornish Pass in case of war breaking out between Dorne and the Reach once more, arrived conveniently in the Iron Islands the day after his brother's death.

Garlan knew it took more than a day for a raven to travel most places in Westeros, and especially halfway across the Seven Kingdoms. Which meant that Joffrey had known that something was about to happen which would be prelude to a war between their two houses.

And, unless it was something yet to pass, and Garlan shuddered at that thought, that meant he had known, whether he had planned it himself or not, that Willas was going to die. Had known that the heir to Highgarden was going to die, and that the Tyrells would be looking for someone to blame.

Just so long as that someone wasn't him. Loras was right. Little shit, indeed.

And they had played right into his hands, the moment their father arrived in Highgarden and saw the knife Margaery had taken from the body of the assassin, the Martell sun shining on it.

Garlan had known that was the conclusion their father would draw the moment Margaery told him about that damn knife, had known he would not listen to reason even if it came from his sons.

So he didn't bother to dissuade their father, the moment the funeral was over and the man was declaring war on Dorne, independent of the Crown, the way the Starks and the Lannisters had once fought.

Because he knew how this would play out. Mace would seek permission from the Crown if he had to, but he would declare war all the same. And Joffrey, if he really had done this, would let Mace have his war.

Because that was what he had wanted all along. The chance to continue the fighting between the two houses.

Garlan was beginning to think the little shit was in fact the mastermind no one took him for.

He sighed when he felt lithe arms wrap around him from behind, and then Leonette was there, trailing kisses down his neck.

"Come to bed, darling," she repeated, the words a soft order, and Garlan turned, leaning into her touch.

He'd missed his wife, in the months he'd been away. The rest of this, the plotting, the scandals, he hadn't missed a bit, but Leonette?

She was his anchor.

"Can't sleep," he mumbled, because he knew she was going to get to the end of the matter whether he wanted her to or not, and it was just as well that he tried to dissuade her, now.

She hummed, reaching a hand up and running it through his hair. "And why is that, hm?"

Gods, he'd missed her.

Garlan turned fully then, burying his face in the crook of her neck and breathing in deep. "Leo..."

"I'm right here," she promised, and for a moment, there was blood on his hands and the world was screaming around him. Then he blinked, and he was inhaling Leonette's sweet scent again.

"My father has asked me to lead the charge against the Dornish Pass," he said quietly, and he felt Leonette stiffen against him. He pulled back then, meeting her eyes, because he owed her that as much.

She swallowed hard, eyes frantic and patient and soft. "Garlan..." she whispered, then, "What about the Iron Islands?"

"He's gotten special permission from the King to send someone else in my stead," Garlan said. "I've heard it might be Randyll Tarly."

Leonette shivered; she'd never liked the man, though he was the picture of loyalty to all of the Tyrell ladies.

"So soon?" she asked, for she knew that if Garlan was here and Randyll was not, it was for one reason alone.

Garlan nodded miserably, and Leonette sighed.

"I barely managed to convince him that as Loras was a member of the Kingsguard, he would not be able to fight on House Tyrell's behalf, as well," he said darkly, remembering that conversation with a bit more malice.

He wasn't going to sacrifice another brother in this game the Lannisters were playing. He wasn't going to allow it.

"Surely you're able to talk sense into him," Leonette said, running a hand through her husband's long, dark hair.

Garlan pulled his head away from her. "My father has never seen sense, my dear," he said, taking her hand in his and kissing it. "And he won't now. My brother is dead, and even if a part of him really believes it was not the Martells, he needs someone to fight over it."

Leonette groaned. "Does your sister know?" she asked, and Garlan winced.

Yes, Margaery knew. Honestly, he was surprised that Leonette had not heard the ruckus she had drawn over it, storming into their father's study and demanding to know what he was thinking, after Garlan had been the one to tell him about that knife.

But his sister had been a queen for far too long, and Garlan pitied her for that, because she seemed to have forgotten her place in Highgarden, as a Tyrell daughter.

Their father loved her and had spoiled her above all of his boys, but in the end, she was still a girl, and his youngest child. Mace dismissed her theory (no longer Garlan's, but _Margaery's_ , now that his men were preparing for the fighting) about her husband with a wave of his hand, citing that he knew she and her husband had been having...difficulties.

_"But this is beyond your petty squabbles with the man you love, Margaery," Mace had told her. "This is your brother's life. I need you to see beyond that."_

Margaery had scoffed and stormed out of the study with the same fervor with which she had entered it, and Garlan cringed as the doors slammed behind her.

"My father will have his war," Garlan said softly, and Leonette bit back a sigh.

"And when I've just gotten you home, too," she murmured, laying a kiss on his bare chest, and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

He didn't have the heart to tell her the truth; that he'd known before he'd even come home that he wouldn't be here for long. That he had come home for the express purpose of fighting the Martells.

And that there was a part of him which wanted to do just that, regardless of whether they had been the ones ultimately responsible for his poor brother's death. A part of him that wanted to see his blood rise with the deaths of his enemies, just as their father did, because Willas was dead, and Garlan had still been leagues away, helpless to do a godsbedamned thing about it.

Helpless to protect any of his siblings.

"I will come home as soon as I am able; you know that," he told Leonette gently, squeezing her shoulder, and she leaned into the touch.

"I do," she agreed. "I just wish you didn't have to go, is all."

Garlan nodded, clearing his throat. "You're going to have enough problems of your own to call a war back here, in any case," he told her, and Leonette glanced up at him sharply, eyes narrowing. "Margaery won't be cowed into silence because our father has chosen a target to unleash his grief on. And mother...you're going to have to take care of both of them."

Leonette swallowed hard, and he was glad that she knew how daunting that task was going to be. She would need that inner strength he knew she had, if she was going to achieve it. "I will, you know that," she said, voice choked, and he squeezed her to him again.

He wished he didn't have to force this burden on his young wife. Wished that he didn't have to leave her again, when he knew how she and the rest of their family would need him.

Wished that, and also wished to kill something, anything, for what had happened to his poor brother, who never should have had to shoulder the burden of a marriage to Cersei Lannister in the first place.

"Margaery will act as if she's fine," he reminded Leonette. "She isn't. In fact, that's when you know she's at her worst. Mother will at least be a bit easier, because she doesn't have that Tyrell fury running through her veins."

Leonette's smile was gentle. "I'll make sure your sister doesn't kill any servants, in your absence," she promised, but Garlan could hardly find the reassurance amusing, not after learning what Loras had done to their servants in his absence.

He'd hardly thought his brother capable of such nonsense, but then, Loras was a Tyrell, too, no matter that he might have been raised half a Baratheon.

When he'd returned to his chambers, that first day he'd been home, he hadn't been able to find a single squire to help him out of his armor. The only ones Loras had left alive were those explicitly related to House Tyrell or one of the houses loyal to them; the rest were lying in a pit outside of Oldtown, a message to anyone who wished to betray House Tyrell in the future.

The Lannisters were not the only ones who paid their debts, and there was a reason the Tyrell house had managed to grow so strong.

Sometimes, Garlan wondered if he would ever recognize what was left of his family again.

"I'm going to declare you head of the household, when I go," Garlan said softly, and Leonette sucked in a breath, at those words.

"Garlan, your mother..."

"Is overcome with grief, and Margaery can't handle those tasks, either, though she will resent you for taking the opportunity to have something to distract herself with away from her," Garlan said shortly, looking down at his wife. "You're the only one I trust with the responsibility, at the moment."

Leonette blushed, looking down. "And your father?"

"Will understand," Garlan said. "Such things as the running of the household are beneath him, in any case. I'll tell the Steward, the day I leave, and he can help you."

Leonette took a deep breath. "I'm honored," she said, and he smiled at her again.

"I know you'll do me proud," he said.

She fell silent for several moments. "There's another reason I so selfishly want you to remain in Highgarden for a while longer," she said, and he stared at her.

"What is it?" he asked, fear filling him. He had already lost his brother, he had no intention of losing anyone else any time soon.

"I know that now is not the best time for a celebration, but..." Leonette said softly, taking Garlan's hand, placing it on her stomach.

Garlan's eyes widened, and he stared at her. "You're...?"

Leonette smiled widely. "Yes," she whispered, and Garlan moved forward, kissing her hard.

"My gods," he whispered, when he pulled back. "Are you sure?"

Her smile grew. "I am." And then it faded, and he knew from the seriousness of her expression what she was about to ask. "And if it's a boy, I want to name him Willas."

He scrubbed a hand over his face, for a moment hiding his feelings from her. They two had never been good at hiding how they felt from one another.

But the request...it made him worry. He knew that Lady Alys Beesbury, Alla's mother, had recently died because of a complication in her pregnancy.

Naming the child Willas, and so soon after what had happened, felt like a terrible omen, to him, but he didn't want to reveal such fears to his wife. Because he didn't want to look down at their child, ten years from now, and blame himself for the fact that his brother's name had been long forgotten.

"I'll have to ask my father, and we'll give it a few weeks. I’m not due to leave for a little while longer; father is still gathering the Houses to his side," he said, watching her face fall. "But if it's a boy, then I think..." his throat closed up, and he swallowed hard. "I think that would be a wonderful idea."


	283. MARGAERY

Margaery sighed, setting aside the letter embossed with her husband's bold, childish script, and turned back to her packing, not meeting Meredyth's eyes as the girl packed alongside her, brushing away tears every few moments, just as sad to be leaving Highgarden as Margaery was.

But the King's word was law, and Margaery could not be seen to disobey a command from her husband, not when the period of mourning was technically over.

Her husband certainly didn't waste any time, however.

Joffrey had summoned his lady wife back to King's Landing immediately, as if she should not even have the reprieve of a few days from him with the knowledge of her brother's death, and Margaery was packing her belongings alongside Meredyth because she was a coward who did not truly want her family to know until they had to.

Of course, Garlan already knew. That was why he was standing in the corner of her chambers, features embossed in stone. He hadn't once offered to help, not yet, but she wasn't going to push him.

Not when Margaery herself certainly felt no desire to be quick about her return to King's Landing.

He walked forward then, as she set aside the note, picking it up himself and reading it again, lip curling into a faint sneer as he reached the end.

She was beginning to think that the rest of her family would come away from this time of mourning hating her husband more than she did. Margaery wasn't certain how she felt about that.

Because now...now, she just felt drained.

Her husband had won, and he was rubbing that victory in her face, demanding that she return to King's Landing before her brother was cold in the ground. And Margaery didn't have a single idea for how to repay him for everything he had taken from her.

She sighed as she reached out and picked up the beautiful, black covered book Willas had given her, and resisted the childish urge to throw it across the room.

She'd been doing enough of that, lately, she thought with a sigh, turning and packing it in the chest of her belongings.

"Did you tell Mother and Father?" Garlan asked, his voice quiet.

She knew that he was going to lead the army to the Dornish Pass, soon enough. They couldn't allow the Martells to think that they'd gotten away with this, of course. Needed the element of speed if they were going to defeat them.

She cleared her throat, and tried not to laugh at the hysteria.

"No," she said, because how was she supposed to tell her mother, still shrouded in black, still faint at the thought that she had even lost Willas, that she was about to lose two more children, and then Garlan, mere days after that?

Margaery had thought she would at least have a month which she could give her mother. At least a month away from those poisonous Lannisters.

Garlan didn't seem surprised. "I'll break the news to her," he said, anticipating that which Margaery feared, and she shot him a grateful smile.

Meredyth sniffed again, loudly, as she folded another of Margaery's gowns, and Margaery bit back a sigh.

There was a knock to her open door, and Margaery stiffened, glancing at Garlan in alarm. He moved then, hand already going to the pommel of his sword; she supposed they were all on edge.

And then the door was opening, and Loras came sweeping into her chambers, then drew up short, at the sight of her things strewn around the room.

"What are you doing?" Loras demanded, a hard edge in his voice.

Margaery ignored him as best she could, pulled out one of her gowns and considered it. It was rather cool, for King's Landing. Cersei had been right, long ago; the climate in King's Landing was very different than that of Highgarden, though she had taken it as some proof that Margaery was a slut.

"What does it look like, Loras?" she asked. "Packing," she murmured, glancing at Garlan, where he'd gone back to leaning against the wall. She'd been prepared for something like this to happen, and now she could see that Garlan had been worried about the very same.

She knew that Loras wasn't going to take this well, after all.

"She's not going back there," Loras said, incredulous, as he leaned in the doorway and watched Meredyth pack her things away into bags.

"The King has summoned her back, Loras," Garlan said, a weariness in his tone that should have warned Loras away.

"The King killed our brother!" he snapped, stepping further into the room, and Margaery flinched, watched as Meredyth's head jerked up, with those words.

Margaery clapped her hands together, and they set aside their things, making themselves scarce. Leonette glanced at Margaery, and closed the door behind herself.

"Meredyth, get out," Garlan said, voice low and dangerous, and the girl all but fled, carefully shutting the door behind her. Garlan did not waste a moment, once she was gone.

Garlan spun on Loras, grabbing him by the collar and yanking him close. "What in the hells do you think you're doing, announcing your suspicions like that?" he demanded. "Do you want to get us all killed on the words of some suspicious servant?"

"My suspicions?" Loras repeated incredulously, voice raising. "Margaery all but admitted she gave Joffrey the idea!"

Margaery flinched as though she'd been slapped, the gown she was holding dropping from her hands, and Loras' face paled as he realized what he'd said a moment later.

"Margaery..."

She turned away from him again, paused as she came upon the book Joffrey had given her, shortly before their wedding, when he realized her to be some sort of kindred spirit.

Kindred spirit. She snorted inwardly at the thought. She'd thought she was so good at manipulating him, and here she was now, minus one brother because of her own damn arrogance.

"I didn't mean it like that," Loras said, stepping up behind her, but Margaery didn't turn around, merely reached for the book and tossed it into her bags once more. "Margaery, I'm sorry. This wasn't your fault."

She did turn around, then. "Wasn't it?" she asked, eyes blazing. "I'm tired of everyone tip toeing around me now that I am the Queen. I'm not my husband. I'm not going to...to kill you because you posed some little problem..."

She sank down onto the bed, burying her face in her hands. A moment later, she felt an arm wrapping around her shoulder, and Margaery leaned into the touch, keeping her eyes closed and breathing in deep.

When she opened her eyes, it was Garlan's soft gaze staring down at her. She glanced Loras' way, found that he was pacing the length of the room, tangling his fingers in his hair.

"No," Garlan said quietly. "No. You had no idea he would do something like this."

"I..." she took a shuddering breath. "I should have known," she said. "I've been married to him all of this time."

Garlan tutted, softly. "And the fact that you didn't shows that my sweet sister is still in there, somewhere," he said. "I'm grateful for that."

Margaery sniffed, reaching up and rubbing at her face. "I'm still your sister," she argued, and Garlan bobbed her on the nose. She smiled, despite herself, remembering how he used to do that all of the time, when they were younger.

In front of them, Loras sighed. "I didn't mean..." he repeated, and then sighed. "I'm just...so angry," he went on. "Willas is dead, Margaery."

Margaery flinched, and Garlan glared at Loras over her head, but Loras wasn't finished, just yet.

"I don't want you to go back there because I'm afraid he'll hurt you next, Margaery," Loras said softly. "He's already killed a brother he's never even met because he posed a minor inconvenience to his mother, by the sound of things."

"He has no reason to want me dead," Margaery said, voice flat. "I'm his adoring wife."

She couldn't have managed to make those words sound more dry.

Loras kissed her forehead. "I know you hate anyone mentioning it," he said, and she could see the irony the moment she realized what he was about to say, "But you aren't pregnant yet. If...I don't want him to kill you, but I won't stand by and watch him hurt you, either."

Margaery chewed on her lower lip, glanced up at Garlan, and saw the same hard resolve reflected in her older brother's eyes.

"That won't happen," Garlan swore, and exchanged a look with Margaery.

Loras glanced between them suspiciously. "Why not?" he demanded, and his features twisted in disgust when neither of them answered. "I'm tired of being left out of the loop. Tell me!"

Garlan snorted. "Perhaps if you were more trustworthy and didn't go around spilling our plans to whores..."

"You need have patience only until I am pregnant with his son, Loras," Margaery interrupted softly, with a hand on Garlan's arm to quiet him. She couldn't bear the thought of this family fighting one another. They'd already lost one brother.

And she couldn't bear the thought of Loras continuing to look at her as he had been, recently. As if she were the one responsible for that loss, even if he said that wasn't the case, now.

Her brother blinked at her. "W-What?"

She snorted. "What, you didn't think Grandmother would agree to this marriage if she thought I would be stuck with a monster for the rest of my life, did you?" she murmured, reaching out and brushing his cheek with the back of her knuckles.

Loras stared. "Father-"

"Father may be many things, most of them ambitious," Margaery interrupted him quietly, "But he has always desired to see a Tyrell son sitting upon the throne." She rubbed a hand over her barren stomach. "Else something would have been done about Joffrey before we'd even been wed."

Loras' mouth worked like he couldn't quite control it, and, after a moment, Margaery took pity on him.

"When the time comes," she promised, "Joffrey will pay for everything the Lannisters have done to us. For what he did to Willas. For every time he raised a hand to me. For forcing us to abandon Renly's troops after that fiend Stannis murdered him, just to survive."

Loras' breath caught in his throat as he clung to her. "Margaery...Why didn't anyone tell me?" he demanded, and she smiled gently.

"A secret is only so for as few people know it," she told him. "That is what Grandmother told me, when I asked her if you knew. If Father knew. If Mother knew. If anyone knew."

He sighed. "She didn't trust me."

Margaery lifted a brow, remembered the blonde boy she had seen slinking out of Loras' chambers almost daily lately, despite their Grandmother's orders that Loras was to see the boy no more after the marriage alliance with Sansa fell through. "With good reason."

He turned on their brother. "But she did trust you."

Garlan shrugged one shoulder. "There was a...contingency, in place," he said. "She'd spoken to Sansa Stark, and realized that Joffrey was even more of an ass than we'd taken him for. She needed someone to help place the poison in his wine, if necessary."

Margaery started, turning to stare at their brother. "She needed what?" she asked shrilly, and Garlan reached out, tucking her hair behind her ear.

"Forget I mentioned it," he said, paling, but Margaery was hardly going to forget that.

"W...when?" she demanded, her voice shaking.

"It doesn't matter," Garlan repeated, more intent, this time. _Drop it, Margaery_. "She changed her mind and decided the son was the better option, in the end."

Loras shrugged, even as he managed to look contrite at the same time. "Willas would have made a horrible husband," he told his sister. "Especially to Sansa Stark. She would have hated him as much as she hates the Imp. He wasn't...cut out to deal with a young and excitable bride. Or with Cersei."

Margaery lifted one shoulder in an elegant shrug. "Or with women, perhaps," she acknowledged. "But she might have enjoyed her time in Highgarden, away from this shithole. I know I did, for the scant amount of time I was back home again."

Loras' throat clicked, and for a long moment, they stood together in silence. And then, "Is father summoned back to King's Landing, as well?" he asked.

Margaery shook her head.

Loras' eyes darkened. "I want to be the one who kills the little shit, Margaery."

She glanced up at him, saw the light from the candles reflected in his eyes.

Beside them, their brother straightened. "Loras..."

She needed to tell him that Joffrey's death could not implicate them, that whatever did happen to him, and Olenna had forced her to acknowledge that she would have no part in whatever it eventually was, it would be a kinder fate than he deserved.

But she couldn't bring herself to say those words, looking up at her brother's face.

"I have to be the one to kill him, Margaery. I can't...I can't let it be someone else," he whispered, and, even as she knew it would damn them all, Margaery nodded.

"All right," she murmured, "As long as you are patient with me, then I will find a way for you to kill him, Loras. I swear."

Garlan stared at her. "Margaery..."

Margaery shook her head. "Allow us this, Garlan," she whispered, laying her head on her brother's shoulder once more. "Just...allow us this. Please."

Garlan hesitated, and then squeezed her shoulder again.


	284. SANSA

She knocked on the heavy door to Alla's chambers, remembering with a blush the last time she had been in these chambers.

The door opened before she could think on it too long, and then she was staring down at the young girl, who was blinking up at her in surprise.

"Sansa," she said. "I...hadn't expected to see you here." She glanced down the hall, first one way, and then the other. "What...are you doing here?"

Sansa abruptly felt foolish. "I..." she took a deep breath. "I actually came down to the Maidenvault to see Megga, but I haven't been able to find her. I was wondering if you could tell me where she is?" she swallowed. "I...we agreed to have...tea soon."

Alla cleared her throat, pulling the door a little further open, beckoning with a hand for Sansa to come inside. Sansa couldn't help glancing over her shoulder one more time before she followed the other girl inside. The door shut ominously behind her.

"Alla?"

"I..." Then, "Haven't you heard?"

Sansa blinked at her. "Heard what?" she asked, because it wasn't hard to imagine, she couldn’t help but think rather bitterly, that Sansa was one of the last people in King's Landing to hear anything of use, these days.

Alla cleared her throat again, this time flushing as she did so. "Lady Megga has been sent home to Highgarden, Sansa," she said, and Sansa stared at her in shock, leaning a little hard against the entryway.

"What?" she repeated. "When was this?"

She couldn’t help but think of Olenna, of how Megga had said the other woman didn't much like her, how the other woman had reacted to their news about the Mountain by practically throwing them out of her chambers.

But surely she wouldn't...

Alla looked away. "As I understand it, there was an issue of...indiscretion, between herself and Ser Mark Mullendore. Ser Mark is to be sent to fight at Dragonstone, tomorrow. The poor man is distraught. They made him give up his monkey, too."

Sansa gaped at her, trying not to think too hard about the way Megga had gotten rid of that guard in the Black Cells, trying not to think about how Megga had asked her whether she knew what love was, and whether that mattered, in any relationship.

The other girl was whip smart, Sansa could see that. And, like Margaery, she wouldn't have gotten herself pregnant on a whim, surely.

"When was this?' she asked, because Megga certainly hadn't looked pregnant, the last time Sansa had seen her. Or acted like she in any way was worried about such a risk.

Alla shrugged. "Couple of days ago," she mumbled. "We didn't even know. Lady Olenna simply told us after she had already sent Megga away on a caravan, and that was it." She hugged herself. "We didn't...we didn't even get the chance to say goodbye."

Sansa grimaced, paling. So she was right; this all did have something to do with Lady Olenna, and Sansa hated that she didn't know what.

And she had no doubt that Alla was thinking about how she hadn't gotten the chance to say goodbye to her mother, either.

"But..."

Alla wasn't meeting her eyes any longer. "I really should be going," she told Sansa, stepping around her as if Sansa carried some disease. "I have my duties to perform."

And then she was stepping nimbly past Sansa, into the hall.

"What duties?" Sansa called after her, and the other girl froze, turning around to face her. "Margaery isn't even in King's Landing."

Alla's eyes grew very wide, and she marched forward, throwing a hand over Sansa's mouth. "The Queen," she gritted out, sounding much too old for her age, "Has duties she requires of all her ladies regardless of whether or not she is present, Lady Sansa. And now that Lady Megga has failed her in such a way, it is up to us to cover her duties, as well."

Sansa stared at her. "But..." she mumbled against Alla's hand, and the other girl finally pulled away. Sansa cleared her throat, feeling faintly sick. "Doesn't it bother you, that you weren't even able to say goodbye to her?"

Alla flinched, before shrugging. "We live in service of our queen, Sansa," she said. "We're all ready to say goodbye to one another at any moment."

And then she was gone, scurrying down the hall of the Maidenvault, and Sansa could only gape after her, a feeling of dread filling her.

Because she had a terrible feeling that Megga hadn't been pregnant at all, and that she hadn't asked Sansa on another one of those secret missions because she'd gone alone.

And if she'd done that...

Sansa swallowed hard, closing her eyes as Senelle, that poor maid, filled her mind's eye once more, begging for them to kill her, for them to...

"What of her mission? Have you taken it, then?" Sansa blurted, and Alla stared at her for a moment, before pulling her close.

"Sansa..."

"What's going on in the lower levels..." Sansa shivered. She honestly didn't know what Olenna planned to do about that, didn't know what could be done about...that, but she could admit that it had made her feel markedly safer, to know that Megga was at least keeping an eye on things.

That someone was, under Margaery's direction.

Alla squinted at her. "The lower levels?" she asked, and it occurred to Sansa suddenly that perhaps Elinor keeping secrets from her other ladies was not as shocking as it had seemed. Perhaps none of them knew what the others' missions were.

"Yes," she said, slowly, before clearing her throat. Because surely Sansa Stark, useful against the Lannisters or not, would not know something that one of Margaery's own ladies did not. "She was spying on Maester Quyburn. Tell me someone else is not-" she swallowed hard.

But Alla was staring at her, an expression of shock on her pretty young features. "Sansa," she said, voice low as she glanced over her shoulder, "That was not Megga's duty."

Sansa stared at her. "But she said..."

"Our Queen would never have endangered Megga in such a way," Alla said, shivering. "She knows what a...depraved creature any maester so faithfully serving Cersei Lannister is."

Sansa was shaking her head now, for surely Alla just hadn't known. Had just...been confused. "I should go," she said, for she realized that, if that were the case, they should not even be having this conversation.

Alla reached out, snaking a hand around Sansa's wrist. "Sansa," she said softly, "Megga's mission was to find Lady Rosamund."

Sansa froze, did a double take. "Pardon me?" she said, when still she could not seem to understand those words. "Lady Rosamund?"

Alla nodded, miserably. "She...went missing, after Margaery returned her to King's Landing to demand to know who compelled her to speak against you," she said, sounding ages older than she was. "Megga was meant to find her."

Sansa shook her head, reaching up to rub at her furrowed brow. "No, she...she was very clear..." she swallowed hard, staring up at Alla.

Because Megga had been quite clear, hadn't she? She needed Sansa's help to spy on Maester Quyburn because...there were girls, going missing in the lower levels. Girls that he was experimenting on.

Girls, servants who had been missing for weeks, whom no one else cared about, but Megga was still terrified that she might become one of them.

And would Sansa have helped her at all, if Megga had revealed the truth? That one of those girls was the one responsible for Oberyn Martell's death? For Sansa's own imprisonment in the Black Cells?

That this was likely why Megga even knew about the experiments in the first place?

Sansa went pale. "Oh," she said, softly, and Alla cocked her head. Sansa shrugged. "I...I suppose I was confused. She mentioned him as an option, but of course that would be far too dangerous..."

She didn't want to give sweet, young Alla any ideas.

Because she had a horrible feeling she knew where Lady Rosamund was, if she was even still alive.

Had a horrible feeling that Megga had not returned to Highgarden at all.

And if that was the case, she certainly didn't want Alla getting caught up in these things, even if she was a handmaiden to the Queen and expected to.

She was far too young. Far, far too young, as Sansa herself suddenly felt.

Alla nodded. "It is just a pity," she said shortly, "That she could not be relied upon to put aside her dalliances in order to find Rosamund," she said. "I'm quite certain the trail will have gone long cold, by now."

Sansa sighed. "I wish you luck," she said, and Alla shot her a look that seemed to say, _that's sweet_.

Sansa flushed, hugging herself again. "Well," she said, "I suppose you're right, and I ought to leave you to your duties."

Alla gave her another long look, and then nodded. "I don't suppose you would want us to find her," she said slowly, as if trying to puzzle something out.

Sansa felt her face grow hot, and she took another step towards the door. "I don't suppose I would, no," she said hoarsely, and then she was practically throwing herself out of it, hurrying down the hall before Alla could surmise anything more.

She didn't make it far.

"Oh, no you don't," a voice said, and then Shae's arm was wrapping around her waist, pulling her into an empty room and slamming the door.

Sansa bit back a startled gasp, pulling back to glare at the other woman. "Let go of me," she said incredulously, and Shae gave her a long look, before doing so.

"What are you..." Sansa shook her head, anger filling her. "I thought I told Tyrion to make you stop following me."

"He told me to stop following you," Shae said, unrepentant. "I'm doing it on my own. You're welcome, by the way."

Sansa's eyebrows rose. "For disobeying my husband and now me?" she asked.

Shae's eyes skitted away from hers. "You were right, about some things," she said, tiredly. "Wrong, about others."

Sansa blinked at her warily. "What are you talking about?" she finally demanded.

Shae's smile was sad. "I do not trust easily, Sansa. It is...a matter of survival, in my line of work."

Sansa flushed. "I..."

"But you...you are not like me," Shae continued, meeting her eyes. "I think that is where I have been seeing things wrong, all of this time."

Sansa swallowed, suddenly feeling distinctly uncomfortable. "I don't know what you're implying..."

"You wear your heart on your sleeve," Shae continued, unabated. "And when you trust, you give it freely, even to those who have done nothing deserving of that trust. That is why you cannot trust Tyrion; because you are finally learning that you cannot trust anyone, and it hurts too much to find yourself broken hearted again."

Sansa stared at her incredulously, feeling heat pushing at her cheeks. "You...you don't know what you're talking about," she murmured. "I told you why I can't trust him, and..."

"I do think of him as a Lannister, often, and being your servant has forced such thoughts. He is not just a Lannister; he is my lover, and you are my lady. I am not going to allow you to walk straight into danger just because my lover thinks that you should have a bit of space. Would you?" Shae interrupted.

Sansa flushed, thinking of Margaery. "I...I have to do this," she said. "My friend, she's..."

"I thought she wasn't your friend," Shae said, quirking a brow.

Sansa gaped at her. "How long have you been following me?" she demanded.

Shae crossed her arms over her chest. "Clearly it was warranted," she said tightly. "So. Where were you planning on going, in such a hurry?"

Sansa felt her face growing hot. "I...Back to the Tower."

"The Tower is in the opposite direction," Shae said dryly. "Try again."

Sansa glared at her. "Shae..."

"You weren't," Shae said, moving forward, "planning on going down to the dungeons again, by any chance?"

Sansa crossed her arms over her chest, mirroring Shae. "My friend has gone missing, as I'm sure you heard," she told Shae. "And I intend to find out what happened to her."

Shae snorted. "I just heard the girl, Sansa. She's caught up with child. There's nothing can be done about that. Well..."

Sansa's jaw ticked, she was grinding her teeth so hard. "That's a lie, obviously," she said. "You're the one who's been spying lately. Surely you can tell?"

She moved towards the door, but Shae beat her to it, throwing her body against it and reaching out to grab Sansa by the arms.

"Let go of me," Sansa snapped.

"I can't let you go down there, Sansa," Shae said. "You may have cowed Tyrion into spoiling you, but I'm not going to let you play into Cersei's hands, whatever those hands may be."

Sansa felt panic filling her. "I'll scream," she whispered. "And then where will you be, keeping a girl locked in these chambers against her will, a servant?"

Shae's eyes filled with something that might have been sadness, before they hardened. "Do you remember the story I told you about my childhood?" she demanded, and Sansa blinked at her.

"It was hardly one I was going to forget," she ground out, not understanding why the oter woman was bringing it up now, other than to distract her, of course.

Shae sighed. "Sansa, I lied. You called me out on it almost immediately, of course."

Sansa stared at her. "What...what are you talking about?" she asked, and hated the bile filling her, where surely it shouldn't have been.

"My mother died when I was nine," Shae said bluntly, and Sansa stared at her. "She had always been so kind, so gentle. I can't imagine how, with a husband like my father." A shrug.

"Shae-"

"When she died, my father tried to rape me," Shae said. "He wanted me to be his new whore, and wanted to work me to death the way he did my mother."

Sansa flinched violently, at those words.

Shae shrugged. "But I didn't much care for that. I was a...precocious child, even then. I stabbed him in the leg with a hunting knife he'd stolen and ran away, decided I was going to be my own woman."

Sansa swallowed. "Then why did you tell me that story?' she demanded. "About...about your mother selling you like that?"

Shae was silent, pursing her lips for a moment. The grip of her hands on Sansa's arms still hurt. "I ran away to the nearest city, and decided right away I wanted to be someone. Like one of the great ladies. Of course, I needed a husband for that. Women, as I said, don't get much opportunity on their own, in this world."

Sansa blinked at her. "You...you married?" she asked, lifting a brow.

Shae shook her head. "No," she said. "And I didn't have any intention of it, back then. I met a Dornish man who taught me that perhaps I could be something, without ever marrying, and I could enjoy it, too."

Sansa instantly thought of Oberyn, of the warnings Shae had given her, over and over, and felt her face grow hot. "How old were you?"

Shae's smile was sad. "Does that matter?" she asked, and there was so much bitterness in her tone that Sansa cringed. "He showed me the world, and it was wonderful. I even started making money on my own, you know. I was good at cards, gambling. I've always had a good on my head shoulders, for that sort of thing."

Sansa licked her lips. "Shae..."

"And then he abandoned me, because I was too old for him," Shae said coolly. "It turns out he was thrown out of Dorne for raping the daughter of a prominent lord, and that's why he was in Lorath to begin with. That's why we'd had to sneak in, when he took me to Dorne."

Sansa swallowed. "I don't understand what this has to do with-"

"I found myself in a brothel in Dorne," Shae said. "Learned a lot there, and ended up riding with a Northerner to the Vale. Learned a lot there, too, but less about whoring. I met a young woman, a Northern bastard foisted off to a brothel there, given to their...tender mercies."

Sansa's throat was suddenly dry.

"She'd decided she wanted to be a lady proper, and not a whore, and she got herself killed for it." Shae shook her head. "A waste. She was good at what she did."

Sansa shivered at how cold Shae sounded, just then, but Shae wasn't quite done.

"I saw her, and I thought of myself," Shae said. "How I was, before. So full of life, so convinced that I was doing the right thing, in letting myself be independent. But that Dornish man did worse things to me than my father ever would have done."

Sansa swallowed. "So, what?" she demanded, ashamed when her voice broke almost immediately. "I should just let myself be used? I shouldn’t even try to fight back?"

Shae didn't even flinch. "By all means, Sansa, fight back, for fuck's sake," she said, and Sansa stared at her. "But know that if you keep going down this path you're on, mad at everyone around you who could you help you, you're not going to get very far."

Sansa looked down at her hands. "I..."

"When I met up with Tyrion, I thought I'd make myself sick, fucking a dwarf. The other ladies who were companions to the soldiers told me they didn't want to touch him. That a dwarf's touch meant you'd never have a child, or if you did, you would die with it still inside of you. They are very superstitious, that far North."

Sansa gaped at her.

"But I didn't care about that," Shae continued. "I just wanted to get the seven hells out of the North. Nothing to do there, you see. And then of course I came to King's Landing, and there's very little to do here, either."

Sansa lifted her chin, because she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the end of this story. "Shae..."

"But I told you, I do not trust easily. When I do, it is without condition. I like my dwarf very much, these days," Shae said, her words almost idle. "So much that sometimes I wonder..." she shook her head. "But I know that if ever I lost his protection, I would die here, and not because my last name is Stark, or even because I am a whore. But because Cersei Lannister once saw me and figured out who I belonged to. She knows what your name means you belong to, Sansa, no matter who you wish to throw your lot in with, in this war." She shook her head. "And there are other ways to lose your life without being killed. Fighting on your own is one of them."

Sansa pursed her lips. "But Tyrion..."

"Sansa," Shae repeated, in much the same voice. Then, "I told you that story before because I wanted you to realize that life isn't as simple as you want it to be, but I don't think you got the lesson. I'm telling you this one now because I've been where you are, Sansa." She reached up, placing her hands on Sansa's cheeks. "I've wanted, so hard, to live my life without a man controlling my actions. I've wanted to be free, the way you want to be free."

Sansa felt tears stinging at her eyes, clouding her vision of Shae.

"But it's not possible. Not in this world that we live in," Shae continued, and the tears filled over Sansa's cheeks. "That helplessness you feel, the one pushing down on your heart? It doesn't go away, Sansa, not unless you let it."

Sansa swallowed thickly. "I..."

"Come here," Shae said, and then she was pulling Sansa in for a hug. Her hands gently ran through Sansa's hair, and Sansa leaned into the touch, feeling her shoulders shaking even as her tears were silent. "You can't do everything on your own, Sansa; you'll just end up jaded and heartbroken, and that's hardly better. Your queen is gone, but she will come back. In the meantime, you could afford to keep a few friends. A girl is dead; this is how you avoid joining her."

Sansa shook her head. "I..." she shook her head. "Gods, Shae, I miss her so much." She rested her forehead against Shae's. "I...I know she's only been gone a couple of weeks, I know that, in my head, but..." she shook her head. "I miss her so much that it hurts, here." She pressed down on her chest. "And it's all I can think about. All I can do not to think about how, even with her brother dead in its halls, Highgarden must be such a relief compared to this hellish place. I doubt she ever wants to come back. Why would she? To me. I just...what if she doesn't want to come back to me at all, Shae?"

"Go on," Shae said, steel in her voice now, though she didn't pull away, didn't stop running her fingers through Sansa's hair.

"I..."

"It's all right, Sansa. I know you've asked this many times in the past, but we will listen, do you hear me?"

Sansa did pull back then, eyes wide with tears as she stared up at Shae. "Will you help me?" she whispered hoarsely. "Will you help me fight back?"

Sansa found herself crushed against Shae, a moment later. "Of course I will, you stupid girl," she said. "Of course we will. You only need to trust me."


	285. MARGAERY

Leonette almost looked pregnant now, Margaery thought, glancing at her goodsister where she stood huddled alongside the other Tyrells on the docks.

The ones who would be remaining in Highgarden, while Margaery and Loras were forced to return to a place that she definitely did not think of as her home.

She flushed, realizing how ungrateful her thoughts were. They had all come down to the harbor in Oldtown to see her off, and here she was, envying them that they got to stay.

She noticed Leonette's eyes on her as she moved forward to say goodbye to her mother, as her mother's thin, weak arms threw themselves around her shoulders and pulled her close, the motion almost desperate.

Her mother hadn't embraced her like this since Willas' death, Margaery thought, numbly, leaning into the warmth through the long, white fur cloak she was wearing, though it really wasn't cold enough for such attire.

She'd needed the armor, today.

"I wish you didn't have to go," Alerie said softly, and Margaery found herself squeezing the other woman just as tightly.

"I wish I didn't either, Mama," she whispered into the woman's graying dark hair. "I'll miss you."

When she pulled back, Alerie's eyes were filled with tears. She wiped at them quickly, and then reached out, squeezing Margaery's cheek.

"You be good," she said, voice hoarse, and Margaery found she couldn't meet the woman's eyes, at that command.

"I..."

But then Alerie was moving back, as if she knew what Margaery would say and didn't want to hear it.

Margaery supposed they were all entitled to such fantasies, no matter how dangerous they were. She sighed, watching as her mother turned to Loras, next, and then Margaery was standing in front of her father.

"You will carry the news of our war with the Martells to the King, of course," Mace said, voice full of formality, and Margaery cleared her throat. "And convey my apologies for not being able to retake my post on the Small Council until the matter is finished."

"Of course, Papa," she agreed, pulling back from the stiff hug her father gave her. Her throat clogged. "I'll tell him."

Her father reached out, squeezing her shoulder with a small smile. "Margaery..." then he cleared his throat, frowned again. "I am sorry that you are being called away so soon. I had wished..."

Margaery blinked rapidly, twice. "You have a war to fight, in any event, Papa, and I have retired from my days of camping on the frontlines."

Her father snorted. "Indeed," he said, eyes looking misty. Then, more gruffly, "Well, tell that grandmother of yours, too. I'm sure she'll have words to say about it."

Margaery rolled her eyes, fondly. "I'll do my best to sway her around, Papa, you have my word," she said, and thought of the fury that had burned in her grandmother's eyes, when she had resolved to send Cersei to Willas, in order to spare her granddaughter.

Somehow, she did not think it would be hard to sway the older woman into war, even if they both would know that it wasn't a war with the Martells that she wanted.

"I'll be thinking of you every day," Leonette promised when it was her turn to say goodbye, crushing Margaery against her.

"Leonette, be careful..."

"Oh, for gods' sake," Leonette pulled back, smiling. "You sound like Garlan. Hugging me is not going to crush the baby."

Margaery forced herself to smile. "I'm sorry," she said, smiling back. "But you're carrying..."

Oh gods. Leonette was carrying the second in line to Highgarden in her womb, now. Because Garlan was now the Heir.

The smile died on Leonette's face, and then she was pulling Margaery in for another crushing hug.

"I'll take care of him," she promised, and when she moved back, Margaery gave her a small nod.

That was quite all she could manage, and by the time she was in Garlan's arms once more, she felt near tears herself.

He reached out, squeezing her shoulders instead of hugging her, and Margaery found herself grateful for that, at least.

"You can do this, Margaery," he told her, and Margaery found herself flushing.

"I know," she said, because if she knew nothing else, she knew that. And then she was taking a deep breath and turning to Loras and Meredyth, where they stood beside her.

"Are you...?" she started, but then Loras was darting forward again, pulling Garlan in for another, fierce embrace.

Margaery looked away, quite unable to bear the sight.

There would be no hugs and sweet kisses for her brother in King's Landing, unless they came in the bed of that boy he was so fond of.

She couldn't envy him this, now.

And then he was moving back from Garlan, nodding to their father once more and, with a toss of his white Kingsguard's cloak, leading the way to the ship.

Margaery rolled her eyes at his dramatics, and followed, Meredyth bringing up the rear with a small sigh as she picked up the last of Margaery's belongings.

When they reached the deck, the Captain gave her a bow, ignoring Loras altogether. "Your Grace," he said, not quite meeting her eyes, "Are you ready, then?"

Margaery cleared her throat. "Of course, Captain," she said. "Thank you," she added. "Your services have been indispensible, for us, in this time of tragedy."

The captain cleared his throat too, and now he definitely wasn't meeting her eyes. Hm. She wondered if he was one of those men who had never seen a lady cry.

Was she crying? She couldn't tell.

And then he was gone, shouting orders to the men in an affected voice, and Margaery felt a hand squeezing her shoulder. She glanced back, surprised when it was Meredyth, rather than Loras, who still stood in the middle of the deck, looking lost.

The way he had when they had first sent him to Storm's End, Margaery thought, heart rising in her throat.

Meredyth swallowed, glancing out at the harbor once more. "It seems a lifetime since we were last here," she said wistfully, "and now we're leaving it, again."

Margaery thought she could not have summed up her own thoughts more concisely. She swallowed hard, resisting the urge to glare at the other girl.

"We'll be back, one day," Loras said decisively, and there was something about his words that almost stank of prophecy. He wrapped an arm around Margaery's shoulders, and she stiffened for a moment, before leaning into the touch, having almost forgotten what it was like, to feel her brother so close at her side, these days.

She'd missed him, more than she dared to admit, since Willas'...since Willas.

She cleared her throat, pulling away from Loras abruptly. "I'm going to take a rest, before we're well and truly off," she said softly, not meeting his eyes.

Loras blinked at her. "You don't want to watch Oldtown fade away?" he asked her, and there was something desperate about his words, some request for things to go back the way they had been that Margaery had thought herself dying to make, before this moment.

They used to love that, when they were younger. Making a game of who could see the last specks of Oldtown, as it faded away behind them.

Margaery glanced back at that town Willas Tyrell had poured his life into, and saw nothing but a great, ugly city, today.

A great, ugly city, and a brother at her side who blamed her for Willas’ death.

"I'm tired, Loras," she said, and disappeared below deck before her brother could follow her. "Come, Meredyth."


	286. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woah, 3000 comments, you guys are awesome.
> 
> Also: warning for sorta? gruesome content.

She was a wolf, running through the snows outside of a great, large hall, one that looked familiar, but then, her wolf's eyes thought all places built by men looked the same, no matter how much time they put into them.

And she was running, her paws smacking freely against the cold, wet earth beneath her, and she threw her head back, letting out a howl that pierced through the night air.

She couldn’t remember the last time she had felt so free, the last time she had been uninhibited by man's walls.

She wanted to enjoy every moment of it.

Sansa ran, and she laughed.

She couldn't remember a time when she had been just a simple young wolf in Winterfell, happy and content. Couldn't remember a time when she hadn't been dreaming of the South, and of the pleasures to be found there. The knights in shining armor, the chivalrous tourneys, a handsome prince come to sweep her off her feet and into a happy marriage.

A wolf cared for none of these things.

Sansa shook her head, for they all seemed wrong, now that she knew what to think of them. They seemed...foolish. The wishes of a silly young girl who had never been to the South herself, had never seen the evils there.

Wolves were happy enough to roam the wilds around Winterfell, to sniff at the snow laden air and wonder where their next meal would come from. Anything else was a needless bother, and Sansa smiled as her snout picked up a scent.

She followed it, because it was a familiar scent, somehow, and she wanted to know where it would lead her.

She had the leisure to do so, these days.

The scent led her into a forest, but it was not one she knew. The snow eventually disappeared from the ground, and the smell of fish filled her nostrils.

And then she came across a river, a river which Sansa had never seen but which looked familiar all the same, and Sansa paused at the edge of it, her forehead crinkling as she glanced around.

The river was streaming in a fast current that it made her dizzy just to look at, but a part of her thought that she needed to find a way to cross it, that it was important, there was something to that familiar scent on the other side of the river and she needed to find her way there.

So she did.

It wasn't so hard to cross the river, once she jumped straight into the flowing waters. The current wasn't so strong that her strong paws couldn't fight against it.

And Sansa fought. Fought until she was panting and her eyes were beginning to droop, until she collapsed on the other side of the stream.

The scent was right there, and Sansa lifted her head.

Lifted her head, and felt her eyes going wide, at the sight of the body lying beside her.

The body looked familiar, and she moved forward, and then started, at the sight that greeted her.

At the cold, pale body of Catelyn Stark, staring up at her daughter with glassy, sightless eyes.

Sansa screamed, and the sound was strange, coming from a wolf.

It didn't sound much like a scream at all, but she could hear the pain in it, all the same.

Her mother's skin had grown pale, with death, so waxy and white that she looked as if she had never been living, and Sansa looked away, drawing in a deep breath through her snout. She wanted to scream again, but she didn't think there was enough air in her body to do so.

She felt sick, and the meal she had just eaten, a dead rabbit she had found in the forest, she could feel it coming back up her throat.

She shook her head, because wolves didn't lose their meals when something upset them, and she was a wolf, she reminded herself.

She had always been a wolf, and then she had not been a wolf, and now she was a wolf again.

She shook her head, bending down and nosing at the body lying half out of the stream beside her, as if she could will it back to life.

It didn't move.

It, as if that was all her mother had been, and Sansa felt her eyes begin to prick. It was suddenly very important to her, whether she had paws or fingers, that she get the body out of the stream. That she rescue it from where it lay, because she'd be damned if she allowed her mother to waste away in water.

She grimaced, because she knew only one way to do so, in the body she was in now, and Sansa leaned forward, pressing her teeth as gently into the skin of her mother as she could, as she pulled the body all of the way out of the stream.

She pulled it until the body lay in the grass in a tiny knoll above the river, and then Sansa stopped, panting as she stared down at it, her paws beginning to ache for the first time since she had started running.

Her mother had never looked so beautiful while she was living as she did now, Sansa thought, staring down at her, enwreathed as she was in snow.

And then Catelyn's eyes opened, and they stared up intently at Sansa. " _Run_ ," she said, the words coming out without sound, and Sansa started.

And then she was awake, sitting up in her bed in the Tower of the Hand with a gasp.

"Sansa?" she heard, and Sansa lifted her head, was surprised to find Shae standing in her doorway, wearing a sheer, thin nightgown that left little to the imagination and staring at her in some concern. "Are you all right?"

Sansa shivered. "I..."

No, no, she really wasn't.

Sansa took several deep breaths, before forcing her eyes to meet Shae's.

"I..." she remembered that she was going to try trusting Shae, these days, and eventually, she nodded. "I...I need..."

Shae reached out, squeezing her hand. "What do you need, love?" she asked, and Sansa felt tears pricking at her eyes, for she could remember her mother calling her that, when she got sick back in Winterfell.

Back home.

Gods, that dream had seemed so real. So very real and Sansa couldn't breathe, couldn't...

"Sansa," Shae said, the word forcing its way through the haze lowering over her brain, and Sansa glanced up at the other woman. "Breathe."

Sansa sucked in a breath, and then another, and then nodded to show Shae that she was still here, that she was breathing like she'd been told to do.

She didn't know what had brought this dream on. Sansa hadn't dreamt of her mother in such a long time, and she didn't understand why she was suddenly dreaming of her again.

But, dream or not, a horrible ominous feeling had been settling over her in the last few days, as if her body knew something horrible was about to happen, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

As if she knew she was about to lose someone again, the way she had lost her mother.

But this dream had been different. In this dream, her mother had looked at her, had told her to run, and perhaps that ominous feeling wasn't because she was about to lose someone, Sansa realized, but because she really did need to run.

Her mother was coming to her in dreams and telling her to run, and Sansa knew that she might need to heed that advice.

She shook her head. This was ridiculous. She wasn't a seer, or a fortune teller. There was no reason to trust what her dreams were telling her. They were just nightmares.

"I dreamt of my mother," she whispered hoarsely, when she felt the bed dip beneath Shae's weight and suddenly the woman was wrapping her arms around Sansa's shoulders. "I...My mother..."

Shae reached out, running a hand through Sansa's hair. "Shh," she murmured. "It's all right, Sansa."

Sansa shook her head, feeling a gasping sob wrenching its way up her chest. No, it wasn't all right. Her mother was still dead. Her mother would never again open her eyes and tell Sansa to run, because she had been killed on Lannister orders...

"She...she was dead," Sansa said, because Shae hadn't asked but she felt as if she needed to tell someone. "She was dead, but she opened her eyes and she spoke to me."

Shae kept making soothing noises, but they were doing nothing to soothe Sansa, now.

"She was dead," Sansa repeated again, hoarsely.

Shae sighed, pulling back and meeting Sansa's eyes. "It's all right, Sansa," she promised the other girl. "I'm right here."

Sansa swallowed hard, and then she was clinging to Shae without thinking.

Shae, who had tried to help her cover up her moon's blood, the first time she got it. Shae, who loved Tyrion but loved Sansa, also. Shae, who encouraged her relationship with Margaery so long as she was careful. Who understood perhaps just how lonely Sansa was, here.

She thought of Shae running her fingers through Sansa's hair as she unbraided it each night before she fell asleep, her mangled attempts at mending Sansa's clothing before Sansa laughed and stole them back from her to do them herself.

Shae was nothing like Catelyn Stark.

But she thought Catelyn Stark might have liked her, all the same.

Sansa sniffed, reaching up to rub at her nose.

"I'm all right, now," she whispered, and Shae pulled back, giving her another look.

Still, she was all right, but Sansa could not stop thinking of the way her mother had been looking at her, when she told her to run.

"I want to go out to the Kingswood, to the heart tree there," Sansa told Shae, the conviction not fully formed until she spoke the words. "Will you...will you come with me?"

Shae gave the girl a long look, glancing out the window, where the world beyond was still dark. It was early morning, Sansa was sure of it, but not late enough for people to be out and about. Shae still looked disheveled, as if Sansa had awoken her from sleep, and she knew the other woman liked to wake up early so that breakfast would be ready when both Tyrion and Sansa awoke.

"I...I'm not sure if that's a good idea, so early," Shae settled on, not remarking on the fact that it was a rather strange thing for Sansa to request, in any case.

But Sansa's skin was still crawling over her bones, and she felt vaguely unsettled, the image of her mother lying in the snow, her eyes open and unseeing, not leaving her mind.

She needed to go to the heart tree. She had never needed anything so badly before, and if she didn't go, she wasn't sure that she would ever be all right, again.

Sansa lifted her chin, sitting up a little taller in her bed. "Well, I'm going," she said. "You can go with me or not."

Shae smiled at the girl, something sad in her expression. "Then I'd love to," she said, the words sounding strangely genuine. "Will we need a guard?"

Sansa shrugged. "It's the Kingswood," she said. "I suppose, at this time of night, it would be wise."

Shae gave her another small smile. "Then I shall go and tell Tyrion we are leaving," she said, and Sansa opened her mouth, wanted to protest...and found that she couldn't.

Shae had asked Sansa to trust her.

No doubt, this dream was the product of that trust. A reminder from Sansa's subconscious that the last thing she should be doing was trusting a Lannister and his lover.

She shivered as Shae left her chambers, the door wide open.

Still, she didn't try to stop the other woman.

She heard the quiet murmur of voices in the other room, no doubt as Shae woke Tyrion to tell him where they were going, and then she was back, holding one of Sansa's shawls that she vaguely remembered dropping in the outer room.

Sansa got up from bed, reaching for her slippers, and hesitantly allowed the other woman to help dress her.

Now that she was doing this, she thought it rather a bad idea.

If anyone saw them, they might think that Sansa was attempting to run away. Might send Joffrey's hunting dogs after her, to rip the skin from her back the way he'd wanted Margaery to do, so long ago.

She shook her head, taking a deep breath. "Are there guards you trust?" she asked Shae, and the other woman gave her a long look, before shrugging.

"Tyrion went to find Pod," she informed Sansa, and Sansa blinked at her. "He's Tyrion's squire."

"I..." Sansa took a deep breath. "I know who he is," she said, because she couldn't think of anything else to say. "You could have just left him a note."

Shae gave her a pinched smile. "I can't write, Sansa," she said, and Sansa lowered her head.

"Oh," she said. She felt, very suddenly, as if she didn't know Shae at all, for all the time they had spent in one another's company.

"Well," Shae said brightly, a little too brightly for so early in the morning, in Sansa's opinion, "Are you ready?"

Sansa cleared her throat. "Right," she said, and then blushed. "Yes, I think so."

Shae nodded, glancing toward the door. "Tyrion said Pod should be along shortly. He didn't, ah, that is, he slept in his own bed last night."

Sansa found herself blushing again, realizing what the other woman was saying. "I see," she said, and wondered if Pod had inherited Tyrion's philandering ways.

And then she blushed at the thought, feeling a spike of guilt that she thought she had gotten over, at the word she had used to think of Pod.

Of course he wasn't Tyrion's son, even if Tyrion seemed rather fond of the boy.

Tyrion would never have children of his own; she thought, at least, not legitimate ones. She had made that very clear to him some time ago, and he had never questioned her on the matter since.

But he was a lord, and surely one day, even if he never thought he would inherit Casterly Rock, he had hoped to have children.

She swallowed hard, pushing the thought down with the certainty that she was only thinking it at all because she had just dreamt of her mother.

Her mother, who had always been so proud of her own children, who had-

Sansa shook her head violently, and Shae glanced at her in concern.

She let Shae lead her out into the parlor then, because the woman seemed to find some comfort in doing so, and they waited for Tyrion and Pod to return, Sansa thrumming her fingers against the arms of the sofa she sat in.

"Do you think..." she cleared her throat, feeling Shae's eyes on her. "Do you think Margaery's returning soon? I know the King expressed an interest in her coming back to King's Landing..."

Shae hummed. "If she's taking a ship, it might be some time, Sansa. And I doubt she would leave a ship the King had made for her in the Reach."

Sansa snorted. "I suppose," she said.

"And," Shae continued, "I've...heard some disquieting things, about the Reach, these days. They're threatening open war on the Dornish."

Sansa felt her heart rate spike up. "They are?" she whispered, for she'd not heard a word of that. She had wondered why Joffrey hadn't mentioned having Mace return alongside his daughter, but a war...

She couldn't help think of the last time there had been a war between two great houses, and shuddered.

She didn't want to think of Margaery's family killed anymore than they had been, in recent months.

Shae hesitated, as if uncertain whether she should worry Sansa with any more news after her nightmare. Then, "Sansa, why are we going to the heart tree?"

Sansa bit her lip, no longer meeting Shae's gaze. In fact, her fingers suddenly seemed very interesting indeed. "I...They were where we prayed, in the North. To the old gods." She glanced over her shoulder, as if she expected someone to come out of nowhere and attack her for daring to speak of the old gods.

It had been so long since she had, after all.

She could feel Shae's gaze on her, even if she didn't look up at the older woman, but Shae didn't ask another question.

Instead, they sat in silence until Tyrion and Pod returned, Pod panting and still slipping on his leather armor.

Shae rolled her eyes in amusement, getting up and walking over to Tyrion to whisper something in his ear, before placing a kiss on his cheek.

Tyrion's eyes flitted over to Sansa, and then away.

Pod cleared his throat, and gave Sansa a little bow. "Lead the way, my lady," he told her, and Sansa blushed, standing to her feet.

She'd not had much interaction with Pod, since becoming Tyrion's wife. She knew that he served her husband faithfully, that he was a squire that Tyrion had picked up from...somewhere, though she didn't know where, and that he had stood by Tyrion even after Bronn had gone off to fight with Ser Jaime Lannister, which had rather bothered her husband, now that she remembered it.

He had a sweet face, but Shae's slip earlier had not been the first time Sansa had heard of his indiscretions. Joffrey had been happy enough to tease her about them, when she first became betrothed to Tyrion.

He must have been desperate to find ways to torment her, if he was willing to dig up dirt about Tyrion's squire.

_"I've heard his squire has just as much interest in the bedchamber as my uncle," Joffrey had told her, his fingers bruising into her elbow. "I bet, when he gets bored of you, he'll share."_

She forced herself to smile at Pod, avoiding her husband's gaze.

"We shouldn't be gone too long," she informed him, more for Tyrion's sake than Pod's. The boy was still rubbing sleep from his eyes. "I just...wished for a chance to...to think," she amended at the last moment, uncertain what this boy would think of a Northerner praying before the old gods.

She knew what was said of Northerners, down here in the South. It didn't come up much; her septa had taught her in the ways of the Faith of the Seven, and Sansa had been happy enough to embrace that Faith when she thought the Lannisters embraced it, as well.

Tyrion nodded, and then moved off in the direction of his bedchamber again. Sansa followed him with her eyes, and then cleared her throat.

Shae reached her hand out to Sansa, and then nodded to Pod to lead the way himself.

The boy let out a sound that might have been a sigh, and then turned around and led them from the Tower.

The walk out of the Keep and to the Kingswood was silent; Sansa was still haunted by the image of her mother's dead eyes, Shae seemed to sense that, and Sansa was rather certain that Pod was too tired to defend them from anything, should they actually need it.

Still, by the time she reached the old oak in the Kingswood, Sansa wasn't at all certain why she'd been so convinced that she had to come here.

She just knew that she had to do this.

In fact, she wasn't certain why she was there at all until she reached the heart tree, until its wrinkled old eyes were staring down at her, and then, quite suddenly, she knew.

She glanced back at Pod and Shae, and Shae seemed to get the message, pulling Pod to the side.

Sansa licked her lips, kneeling down before the tree and staring up at it with wide eyes as she waited for inspiration to strike.

"Ma-Mother," she whispered hoarsely, feeling a bit silly for only a few moments before inspiration did strike, "I...I dreamt about you, tonight. It...Joffrey told me how you died. No one else would, you see, but he was all too happy to."

Silence behind her; she wondered how far away Shae and Pod had moved.

"I wish...I don't wish I was there," Sansa corrected, because what Joffrey had described for her had sounded horrible. "But I wish..." she cleared her throat. "I wish there was something I could have done. Wish I could have helped you, somehow." She sniffed, and reached up, rubbing at her nose.

The heart tree merely stared ominously back at her. It wasn't weirwood, like the one in Winterfell, and suddenly she felt rather silly, speaking to it. As if the gods themselves truly had existed in the one back in Winterfell, and this tree before her was only a cheap copy of that one.

Funny; she'd never really believed in the old gods, then. Had thought it just as silly as her septa did, that Jon felt happy enough, praying to a tree.

It wasn't quite as absurd when her father did it, of course.

"And I'm sorry," she went on, into the horrible, dark silence of the forest. "I'm sorry that I couldn't, mama," she said, and her voice broke on the word. "I'm sorry I couldn't do anything to help you then, but I swear, on the old gods, that I'm never going to be helpless like that again. That I'll find a way. I swear it."

She sniffed again, and lowered her head.

A breeze seemed to pick up around her, tearing at her clothes and hair, and Sansa gasped at the sensation, in the summer weather of King's Landing, before it disappeared once more.

She closed her eyes, breathing in deep.

And then Shae was at her side.

"Sansa?" she called, and Sansa blinked at her. "Are you all right?"

Sansa hesitated, and then nodded. "Yeah," she said. "Yes, I feel...I feel better than I have in a while," she said, and it wasn't even a lie.

Shae gave her a long look. "You've been here for almost an hour," she told the younger girl, and Sansa blinked in surprise, glancing up toward the sky. It was indeed lighter out than it had been, but...It felt as if she'd only been here for a couple of minutes.

"Oh," she said eloquently, and Shae gave her a sad smile.

"Are you all right?" she repeated.

"Have you found out anything yet?" Sansa asked hoarsely. Shae squinted at her. "About Megga."

Shae took a deep breath, and then sank down onto the grass beside Sansa.

"I haven't," she said, carefully. "The servants know nothing except that Lady Megga Tyrell never left King's Landing. At least..." she grimaced. "Not alive."

Sansa choked. "Do you know something?" she asked, dread filling her.

"I don't," Shae said, staring up at the canopy in lieu of Sansa. "But Sansa, Ser Mark Mullendore came to the Keep the other day, looking for his lady. He hasn't been sent to Dragonstone, as Alla Tyrell told you. And he was...quite distressed, when they sent him away."

Which meant that either Megga wasn't pregnant at all, or she had certainly kept it a secret from Ser Mark.

Sansa swallowed. "Do you think...do you think she's dead?" she asked hoarsely.

Shae didn't meet Sansa's gaze, which was answer enough, she supposed. "I don't know," she admitted. "But I think...I think if what you said is the truth, that you girls were investigating a dead man brought back to life on the whim of Cersei Lannister, then...well, I think anything is likely."

Sansa shuddered. "I..." she cleared her throat. "She wasn't exactly a friend to me," she said. "But I can't imagine...Shae, what was happening to those girls...It was horrible."

Shae moved forward, pulling Sansa into an embrace. "I won't let that happen to you," Shae promised her fiercely. "I won't, do you hear me?"

Sansa pulled back, numb. "They would never do it to me," she said. "That was what Megga told me. Never, because I'm Sansa Stark."

Shae gave her a wry look, but her face was hard. "I don't want to test that, Sansa. Ever, do you hear me?"

Sansa found herself nodding without even thinking about it, the image of her mother lying in the snow, begging her to run, rushing once more through her mind.

"Shae," she said, and marveled at how tired she sounded. "Do you think...do you think it's possible to receive messages through your dreams?" she asked, and Shae, startled, glanced at her.

"Messages," she repeated slowly, as if she thought Sansa had gone a bit barmy.

Perhaps Sansa had.

Sansa nodded. "I mean...I dreamt something, and it felt...so real."

She didn't want to say more. Didn't want to tell Shae that she had dreamt herself as a wolf outside of Winterfell, had seen her mother's body, and that her mother's corpse had told her to run.

She knew that sounded barmy.

And yet.

Shae hesitated for a moment, and then shook her head. "I think that is the ploy of fortune tellers," she said slowly, "to leech money from those with too much worry in their minds."

Sansa took a deep breath, and wondered if somehow, the other woman knew about the fortune teller she, Margaery, and Alla had visited.

She wouldn’t put it past Shae, not now.

"You can't know that for sure," she said, not meeting the other woman's eyes as she turned back to the heart tree, but she could feel Shae's gaze on her, still.

"No, I can't," Shae said finally. "But none of us can know anything for sure, can we?"

Sansa felt herself blush. She blinked, and her mother's pale form was behind her eyelids. "I think I'm ready to return to the Keep," she said, opening her eyes once more.

Shae's gaze hadn't left her face. "As am I," she said, standing to her feet and holding out a hand for Sansa.

After a moment's hesitation, Sansa took it, and tried to ignore the spark she felt, at the touch of another human being.

Because she didn't know what it meant.


	287. MARGAERY

Gods, they had only been at sea for three days, and already Margaery wanted to kill someone.

"Loras?" Margaery asked, peering into the darkness of her cabin, the one Meredyth and everyone else had been too terrified to bother with, for two of those three days. Not that anyone else on this ship had any business coming into her private chambers, of course.

Her brother sent her a rather smarmy grin that she wanted nothing more than to slap off of his face as he stepped into the cabin, shutting the door behind him.

She wanted to slug him.

"At least you're far more susceptible to sea sicknesses than I ever was, at any rate," he said, and Margaery glared at her brother as she rubbed her hands over her barren stomach, willing it to settle with the tasteless crackers Meredyth had brought her.

Feverish, nauseous, and head throbbing, Margaery had spent the last two days holed up in her cabin, emptying whatever remained of her stomach into the chamber pots Meredyth was good enough to replace as often as possible. She had a feeling that she stank as well, but her brother and Meredyth never said a word about it, when they came in to check on her.

She didn't quite understand why the seasickness was affecting her so this time, where it hadn't been, the last time they'd taken this ship.

"You always used to say you were horrible at sea when you were younger," Margaery said gloomily, glancing back up at her brother. "How did you get rid of it?"

He came forward, taking a seat in the chair across from her bed. "Oh, no worries, Sister, you'll get your sea legs about you soon enough," he said, and she shot him a glare. His face softened. "Ginger."

She stared at him. "And I don't suppose you have any?"

Wordlessly, he held out a small cube to her, and Margaery scrambled upright for it, snatching it from his fingers and biting at the corner. She grimaced; she'd never much cared for the taste.

"Stole it from the kitchen," he said. "Or," with a grimace, "Whatever it is they're calling that room passing for a kitchen."

Margaery rolled her eyes, wrapping her hand protectively around the ginger, as if that would help it to work faster. "I don't understand," she said. "Suddenly I'm the one who can't handle a few days rocking about in a boat, and you're fine? It's not fair."

Loras shot her an amused look. "Maybe you're..." he gestured at her stomach, and this time, the glare she shot him was less than playful.

"That would be impossible, brother," she told him coldly, and the smile faded from her brother's face.

He cleared his throat. "Right," he said, and glanced at the shut door. "Are you sure?"

Margaery closed her eyes as another wave of nausea swept over her. Once again, she was totally bewildered by Sansa's odd...desire for such an affliction. Oh, she understood where the feeling came from, of course. Had made it her business to understand, that she might better convince Sansa to actually eat.

But to actually wish oneself sick...

She grimaced, flopping back down onto the bed. "How much longer does the Captain say we have?"

Her brother was silent for a moment, and Margaery cracked one eye open, glancing up at him. "What is it?"

"Margaery...we haven't even passed Dorne, yet," Loras told her, and Margaery felt her face grow white as a sheet. Her brother at least looked sympathetic, now. "The last two days, it's been storming. Probably why you're sick, this time around."

Margaery grimaced. "I knew we should have taken the damn horses," she muttered, reaching up and rubbing at her throbbing forehead.

"Personally, I think this Captain is a bit of a lily belly," he said, and Margaery quirked a brow. "He doesn't want to keep going and risk losing the Queen of Westeros in a storm," he elaborated, at her silence.

Margaery groaned. "If I threaten to cut his head off, do you think he'll force his way through it?" she asked idly, wishing that Meredyth would bring her another cool, wet cloth.

She'd brought one earlier, but now it was as hot as Margaery's insides felt.

"I think you better not chance it," Loras said, and Margaery turned on her side, taking a few taxing breaths as her body disagreed with the motion. She cracked her eyes open again, gazing at her brother.

Now that she thought of it, he didn't look much better than her. Pale, wan, and with dark circles under his eyes, he sat stiffly in her chair, eying her in much the same way she was eying him.

For a brief moment, Margaery found herself wondering if he was lying altogether about the storm, and it was in fact some punishment she was devising for herself, this sickness, because of her part in Willas' death.

But then she pushed the thought aside. She had never been one for self-flagellation. Margaery much preferred action.

"Why?" she asked.

Loras grimaced, shifting uncomfortably in his chair. "I don't suppose you noticed how very many Lannisters there on this ship?" he asked her.

Margaery lifted an eyebrow. "You do realize this ship was built by Lannisters, do you not, brother?" she drawled. "In fact, it was originally built for the Queen Mother. I'm sure the crew was picked to suit."

Loras grimaced. "A pity your husband can't be more understanding."

Margaery grimaced as well, though she was no longer thinking about the ship at all, and a moment later, she was certain that Loras had followed the direction of her thoughts.

"Oh gods..." he took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, and Margaery took another bite of her ginger, slowly, this time.

She concentrated on the feeling of it slipping down her throat, further, closed her eyes for a moment, breathing in deep.

No, she still felt like she needed to vomit.

Wordlessly, she reached out a hand, and a moment later, Loras was pressing the chamber pot into her fingers.

Margaery made quick use of it, wincing as the foul taste remained in her mouth once she was done, and handed it back to her brother.

"Do you want me to go and fetch Meredyth?" he asked her, and Margaery shook her head, leaning back onto the bed and closing her eyes.

"I don't see that it'll do any help," she said tiredly, feeling as if the world was swimming around her. She could hear Loras moving about the room around her, no doubt setting the chamber pot in the corner until he decided to leave.

It was a rather long, rickety walk up onto the deck, after all.

The ship rocked again, and Margaery almost tossed out of her bed, taking a shuddering breath and glancing helplessly at her brother.

She had always hated being sick, even as a child. Had hated the helplessness it inspired in her, that feeling of being totally unable to care for herself, of being dependent on everyone around her to do as she needed. Had hated the feeling that everything was out of hre control long before her grandmother instilled in her the feeling that she needed to be in control.

When she was sick, she wasn't afraid to admit that she was a bit of a nightmare to everyone around her, with the way she acted.

Loras had never been that way. Even before he met Renly, she knew that he had always enjoyed being sick to some extent, because it meant that their mother would dote on him and ensure that the kitchens made anything he wanted to eat, so long as he could keep it down.

She knew that the first time he had truly bonded with Renly had been during a horrible summer fever, where Renly had nearly worked himself sick trying to make sure that Loras would be well.

She hadn't realized that the other young man cared for her brother at all, until she came to visit her brother in Storm's End, too sick to be moved as he was, and found Renly Baratheon doting over him like a septa.

Margaery smiled wistfully at the memory, opening her eyes once the world no longer looked like it was swimming before her vision.

"I don't suppose that's the ginger?" her brother asked.

Margaery blinked a couple times up at the ceiling. It was so...shiny. "Fever," she gasped out. Then, "Loras?"

She felt him by her side suddenly, and she blinked, at how quickly he much have moved to reach her. Turned her head just slightly to look at him, and felt the nausea hitting her again.

Her brother reached out, taking both of her hands into his own and kissing them. "I'm right here, Margaery."

His voice sounded unaccountably somber, and for a moment, Margaery thought to ask him if he was lying to her, if she was dying, just now.

And then another thought struck her, the thought she'd wanted to ask in the first place.

"Do you think...When do you think Garlan was meant to poison my husband?" she asked tiredly. "He wouldn't say. Do you think...Do you think Grandmother meant to kill him before we were to be married?"

Her brother was silent for so long that Margaery reached out and poked him. He roused, blinking sadly down at her.

"I think..." he said carefully, "That our father would not have liked that very much, considering all the trouble he went to put you on the throne," he said finally.

Margaery squinted at him. "But then," she reasoned, "I would have still been a maid. He could have married me off to..." she couldn't think of his name. "Someone else."

Her brother's chuckle was dry. "Stannis Baratheon has a wife, Margaery," he reminded her gently, and Margaery was surprised that her brother was able to utter that name so easily.

She said as much.

She felt her brother's hands stiffen around her own, and she instantly felt guilty.

"You don't have to talk about him if you don't want to, Loras," she said, the guilt swarming her. "I...You don't have to talk about anything with me, if you don't want to."

Her brother snorted. "And why wouldn't I want to talk to you?" he asked, and Margaery blinked as a tear slipped down her cheek, as she realized that her brother didn't hate her at all.

"Of course I don't hate you, you stupid girl," she heard his voice saying, as if from a long way off. "Move over and eat your ginger."

She took a bite, and then blinked again, as she felt the bed dip beneath her brother's weight, as he climbed in beside her.

"Loras..."

"Shut up and eat your ginger, Margy," he said, bending over to kiss her forehead before pulling the blankets over both of them.

Margaery felt unaccountably hot. "You're sweating," she said.

Her brother gave a throaty laugh. "You're sweating," he told her gently, reaching out and squeezing her hand again.

Margaery swallowed, affronted. "I don't sweat," she said, and then her brother was reaching a cool hand up to press against her forehead.

"Perhaps we should ask the Captain to stop after Dorne for a maester," she heard him say, a long way off now. "Even if we are about to be at war with them. I hardly think the Dornish will let us out once we're in, after all."

"That was a terrible joke, even for you, Loras," she heard herself saying, sleepily. Her brother was silent for a long moment, and then he burst out laughing.

"I never used to get sick, Margaery," she heard him say, just as she was starting to drift off. "That was just something I made up, so I didn't have to leave Renly often."

She knew it.

"Bastard," she muttered, and heard her brother laughing again, as he settled against her.


	288. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, I haven't forgotten the 'Eventual Happy Ending' tag.

"Water," Margaery rasped, and felt a warm hand pressing a cool glass to her fingers. For a moment, she was surprised any glasses had remained on the ship, after all of the rocky waters it had hit, so far.

She blinked up at her brother, where he stood above her, not quite meeting her eyes.

"How long was I out?" she asked tiredly, glancing around.

The worst of the seasickness, she thought, sitting up, seemed to be over, and the ship wasn't rocking quite so badly, now. She almost felt like she might make it to the chamber pot in the corner of the room by herself without being sick.

She snorted at the thought, downing the glass of water in one go.

Loras hesitated; she glanced back sharply at him. "Four days," he told her. "We've just passed Dorne."

Margaery breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, at least we didn't get shot down," she said.

Her brother sat down hard on the edge of her bed. "Don't even joke about that," he reprimanded her, and Margaery grimaced.

"Sorry," she said softly, glancing down at the empty glass in her hands. She shook her head. "Have...have you been here beside me the whole time?" she asked, giving him a wry smile. "The crew might talk, with so many Lannisters amongst them."

Gods, she still felt ill, as if she might dry heave at any second. But at least she no longer felt feverish, merely thirsty, so she supposed that was something.

"No," he said, and Margaery blinked, lifting her head, meeting his eyes. He swallowed hard. "Meredyth was here, some of the time. That Captain...Anyway, that's not what I wanted to talk about."

"Oh?" she lifted a brow. "We have to talk about what you want to talk about? I was rather enjoying gossiping about-"

"I'm sorry, Margaery. I..." He took a deep breath, and she fell silent, brows knitting. "I realized while you were sick...I mean...that is to say...I shouldn't have been so hard on you, after Willas...after he was killed."

Margaery couldn't meet his gaze. She stared down at the empty glass once more, and wished she hadn't drank it so quickly. Her mouth was suddenly much more dry than it had been when she had awoken.

"I don't believe you're at fault for his death at all," Loras said, and her head shot up.

"Don't say things like that, Loras," she said, colder than she'd meant to, and her brother flinched. "Don't say things you don't mean."

If possible, he flinched harder. Because he did mean it, and she knew that. Gods, their own mother had even wondered at why Willas had been the one to be targeted, and it wasn't as if Alerie spent her time plotting with the rest of them.

"You're not at fault for what happened," he repeated, and Margaery burst into tears.

She didn't know how long she sat there on her bed, sobbing, until her brother moved forward and wrapped his arms around her, held her in a warm, tight embrace that she found herself never wanting to leave.

"To be given a second chance at life, only to have it ripped from his arms only moments later. Tell me, Loras, what was the point?" Margaery asked hoarsely, when she could speak again.

Loras ran his fingers gently through her hair. "There was no point," he said softly. "Only the point that Cersei Lannister would never see herself under the thumb of any man, much less a Tyrell."

Margaery swallowed hard. "I told Joffrey not to annul the marriage," she whispered hoarsely into the darkness, because something about the pitch black cabin made it easier to confess such a sin as she lay in her brother's arms.

Loras stiffened at her words in much the same way he had the first time she'd said them, and something about that gave Margaery the courage to finish her thought.

"I told him that it would only push the realm into more chaos so soon after Tywin Lannister's death." She swallowed. "And so he had Willas killed, instead." She sniffed. "I was such a fool. I should have seen it coming."

"Do you remember what you told me, not so long ago?" Loras asked her quietly. "That nothing mattered but us," he repeated her words, this time not filled with vitriol. "You are not responsible for what happened to Willas, Margaery. You are not to blame because Cersei is a crazy cunt and her son is just as much so."

Margaery sniffed again, felt Loras' arms dragging her closer, until she was pressed against him so tightly she almost forgot how to breathe.

"Do you really believe that?" she whispered hoarsely.

She felt her brother kissing at her hair. "I'm sorry," he said. "You told us about that conversation with Joffrey, and all I could think about was how angry I was. But I wasn't angry with you, and I'm sorry..." he took a deep breath. "I'm sorry I made you think that."

Margaery felt her throat clogging. "He's really gone," she whispered, feeling cold all over. "Loras, he's really gone."

Her brother squeezed her shoulders again. "I know, Margy," he said softly. "I know."

She felt great, gasping sobs welling up within her, and Margaery cried out as they finally emerged, as she laid her head against her brother's shoulder and sobbed with the force of tears she'd been keeping in since the day she'd seen her brother murdered in front of her.

She'd been crying before, but this...This, she couldn't stop, couldn't control, not to speak, not to breathe, and moments later she found herself sitting there in a panic, barely able to pull in a few breaths when her brother ordered her to.

When the sobs ended, she was lying in bed in her brother's arms, the ship rocking slowly around them, and Margaery could breathe again.

Loras was staring down at her, nervousness and something else she couldn’t define in his gaze, and she felt sick.

"Better?" he asked her, and, after another breathless moment, Margaery nodded.

"Margaery," Loras said gently, and she could imagine she saw his catlike bright eyes in the darkness, even if she did not turn to look, "You don't have to say 'yes' to this. I want you to know that, now."

Margaery turned, squinting at him in the darkness. "Don't have to say 'yes' to what?" she asked him, fully expecting him to remind her of her promise to let him kill Joffrey.

But then, she thought he would demand a 'yes' for that.

"If your husband is truly impotent as you fear, then I will..." he looked away, clenched his jaw. "I swore to you, to our father and to Willas and Garlan that I would join the Kingsguard to remain by your side. That I would do whatever it took to protect you, and I mean to keep that oath."

Margaery nodded, not quite understanding this line of conversation anymore. She had already promised Loras Joffrey's head.

"You need a son," Loras said finally, and Margaery felt his arms around her tighten. "That is all, before Joffrey can be gotten rid of, you said."

Margaery nodded against her brother's chest, bemused. "Yes..."

She was usually much better at divining intentions, and yet Margaery looked at her brother's dark outline and could not understand what he was saying, for all that she attempted to parse it together, attempted to imagine the expression on his face.

Some part of her knew she should understand what he was trying to say, what he was offering, knew that, were he any other man, she would understand.

And yet, she stared in confusion into the darkness while Loras remained silent, before finally whispering, "Loras, what are you saying?"

She felt his Adam’s apple bob against her forehead. "Your lack of a son is the only thing keeping Joffrey alive, but if he's impotent, you'll be stuck with that bloody bastard for the rest of our lives. And I will not...cannot see that happen." He shook his head. "If this is what it takes..." he paused. "You were willing to marry Renly to make me happy, even if you knew he would never be your true husband. And...If this is what it takes to satisfy Father and the rest of them, I will do the same."

Margaery's forehead wrinkled in confusion, and some part of her knew that she should be getting this, but the words just wouldn't make sense to her. "Loras, you're in the Kingsguard, you can't marry-"

"For gods' sake, Margaery," he muttered, as if she were being particularly thick. She didn't much care if that were the case. "This is hard enough..." she heard him biting his lip, in the darkness.

"Loras?" she asked, and hated how small her voice sounded.

"If having a child is the only thing that will be rid of your fucking husband, if Cersei Lannister and her brother could pull it off once-"

And then Margaery understood what her not quite eloquent brother was trying to say, and was simultaneously touched and horrified by the implication, even as her rational mind told her that one day, it might be her only option.

One day, surely.

But not now. Gods, not so soon.

Gods, was this how it had started between Cersei Lannister and her twin? Cersei, unable to have her husband's children, had turned to her brother, conveniently on the Kingsguard and with her when other men could not be alone with the Queen...

"Loras, no." She reached out, cupped his cheek in her hand. "You are my brother, and you...I could never ask that of you."

"Which is why I offered first," Loras said, voice whisper soft in the darkness. "Margaery, you need a son. One who looks like a Lannister would be preferable, but the only real requirement is that it look like a Tyrell. We've never had issue that was only blonde."

Margaery sucked in a breath. "You've given this some thought," she whispered, and Loras nodded.

"I thought you'd appreciate that," he said, and Margaery nodded absently, not quite understanding the words beyond the roaring in her own ears.

She had done horrible things to achieve her place by Joffrey's side today. Had killed one man, and seen others killed. Had turned into someone she didn't quite recognize, anymore.

She had brutally deformed a maester, had allowed Sansa Stark to be beaten, had committed adultery against her husband, had allowed herself to enjoy some of his dark deeds, had killed a man only following Cersei's orders, however dark they may be, had sacrificed Willas' position as Heir of Highgarden to be rid of Cersei, had as much as killed Oberyn Martell.

But Margaery Tyrell did not know if she was capable of taking her brother into her bed for an heir. Was not quite certain if she was wicked enough to drag her brother down into the darkness consuming her.

"I..." her breath caught in her throat. This was wrong, she knew it was wrong, and yet.

And yet. She'd promised Loras he could kill Joffrey so long as she had a son, and the mere thought of lying with her husband again after what she knew he had done to Willas...

Her hands shook as she reached for her brother, as she thought about how these might have been the very thoughts running through Cersei Lannister's mind the first time she reached for her brother.

A loud clang interrupted her movements.

"What was that?" Margaery asked, glancing up in concern.

Loras' hand reached for the pommel of his sword. "I'm sure it was-"

A loud crash reverberated through the hull, sending Margaery flying out of her bed. She crashed onto the floor, throwing her arms out to break her fall at the last moment.

She tried to pull herself to her feet. But then the force came again, slamming her down like a rag doll. She was only barely able to see Loras out of the corner of her eye, barely faring better.

And then the whole cabin went up in flames.


	289. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol, I thought you guys would be more concerned about the burning ship than the incest scare but uh, here we are.

Sansa was dreaming again.

This time, though, she was at least aware of it, which was a strange feeling, in and of itself.

She had the distinct impression that she shouldn't have been aware of it at all, but that hardly mattered, with her paws slapping against the snow that shouldn't yet be in Winterfell.

But she knew where she was going, this time. Knew where the dream was leading her, and sure enough, she closed her eyes and opened them beside the river where her mother's body had been dumped, after she was slaughtered.

And there, rather than her mother, stood Margaery.

She wasn't dead, like Sansa's mother. Instead, she was standing naked in the stream, and Sansa blinked at her, for there was snow all around the river this time, and she didn't at all appear cold.

Sansa took a step forward, her paws indenting prints in the white powder beneath her, and Margaery glanced up, though she hadn't made a sound.

And then Margaery smiled at her, and Sansa felt her breath catch in ehr throat.

It had been so long, she thought, a thought that didn't quite belong to her, since she had seen Margaery smile.

Ages, it seemed.

Margaery held out a hand, beckoning, and Sansa followed it without thinking, padding into the river until she could no longer feel solid earth beneath her feet, but icy water alone.

She let out a yelp of surprise as the water permeated her fur coat, and she glanced desperately towards Margaery, who was beginning to move away from her, now. She took a gasping breath, and then another, forcing herself to fight against the current, to follow the sound of Margaery's laughter.

"Margaery!" she screamed, but the sound came out all wrong, and then she could see a flash of chestnut hair again, and Sansa desperately followed the sight, followed it until she was no longer wading through a stream, but standing in the courtyard of Winterfell, bemused.

But she didn't allow the feeling to hold her for long, not with Margaery standing before her with a wide smile, holding her arms out.

She was clothed now, wearing a deep, brown and white fur that Sansa thought looked vaguely familiar, and Sansa moved forward instinctively, throwing her arms up to embrace Margaery, opening her mouth to tell her how much she had missed her, and gods, please, never leave her again-

Margaery burst into flames just as Sansa's fingers reached her.

Sansa cried out, scrambling back on instinct. She watched with a fascinated sort of horror as the flames licked at Margaery's clothes, her hair - all without it beginning to burn.

But Margaery was screaming, the sound haunting and loud, and an overwhelming feeling of guilt filled Sansa.

If she had just come earlier, if she had reached Margaery faster, none of this would have happened. She wouldn't have lost her like this. She could have stopped this-

Sansa's thoughts abruptly paused, and she shook her head, bemused.

Because this was just some strange dream, and, as far as she knew, Margaery wasn't in any sort of danger. And even if she was, it was not as if Sansa herself could stop it.

But Margaery wouldn't stop screaming, and the overwhelming feeling of giult wouldn't leave her as the screams grew louder and louder, as-

"Sansa!"

She woke up in tears, screaming as she hadn't since the nights after her brother and mother's deaths.

Shae was standing before her, holding a small, hastily lit candle, and hurried to Sansa's bedside, touching her arm.

Sansa flinched away, crying even though she'd awoken from the dream. Unable to stop crying, though she didn't really know why she was crying in the first place.

"Sansa?" Shae's voice was terribly gentle. "Sansa, are you with me?"

Sansa blinked up at her, wide-eyed. "I..." She shook her head, and then found her head moving in circles for a moment, before she nodded. "I..."

Gods, she couldn't seem to force any other words past her lips.

"Sansa?" Shae sounded more concerned now, and she was moving closer, and no matter what happened in these next moments, Sansa didn't want the other woman touching her.

Couldn’t stomach the thought of it, for some strange reason.

She flinched away, and Shae's hand stilled at her side. She was sitting at the edge of Sansa's bed, hands carefully tucked in her lap after she set the candle down on the bedside table.

"You're all right, Sansa," she said, accent thick, and Sansa felt the first stirrings of guilt, that she had no doubt woken Shae from her sleep. "You're safe. It was just a dream. Just a dream."

Sansa sucked in one shuddering breath, and then another.

"Was that all it was?" she whispered, and Shae cocked her head at her.

"Do you want some water?" she asked, finally. "I think Tyrion might be persuaded to give you some of his wine, if you think you need it."

Sansa flushed. "I..." she leaned back a little, on the bed. "Maybe some tea?"

She knew it was late, and that the kitchens would be empty, a this hour. She also knew that Shae would move heaven and earth to get her that tea, if she intimated that she wanted it.

Shae gave her a long look, and Sansa almost broke down, under that look.

Because she knew that, instinctively, still pushing off the dredges of a nightmare she thought felt far more haunting than it had actually seemed. Knew that Shae would be there for her, that Shae would do just about anything for her.

And it only made her feel guiltier, for the way she had been treating Shae, recently. More guilty for the fact that she didn't know how to act around the other woman at all, no more than she did Tyrion, but she hadn't given Shae an honest excuse for why that was.

Because she didn't have one that she could put into words.

Sansa sniffed, reaching up to wipe at her nose, and Shae's expression softened.

"Do you want me to get Tyrion to sit with you while I go and get some tea, or shall we send him?" she asked, and at first Sansa thought that a preposterous idea, the thought of her husband getting her tea.

But then she thought of having to sit here in the semi dark with only Tyrion as her company, after the nightmare she'd just had and...she sniffed.

"Stay with me," she pleaded, and hated how young and childish she sounded.

Shae smiled. "Then I shall," she said. She didn't reach out and squeeze Sansa's hand. "I'll just go and tell him to fetch it, eh?" Her smile brightened. "Pity it isn't daylight, that the whole castle could see that. I'm sure some would find it amusing."

Sansa forced herself to smile, too. She was sure there were plenty enough in the Keep who would find the Hand of the King fetching tea amusing. She almost did herself.

"I..."

Shae reached up, petting at her hair again. "I'll be right back," she promised, and then she was starting to get up.

"No!" Sansa cried, and the other woman glanced back at her in concern. Sansa flushed, but held out a hand, desperate.

Shae gave her a small smile, and sat back down.

"Do you want to talk about it?" The gentle feeling of Shae's fingers running through her hair was the only thing grounding her.

Sansa licked her lips. "I..." she thought of Margaery's body, burning within the crumbling walls of Winterfell, and shuddered. "No," she whispered.

Sansa shook her head, turning her face away from Shae.

"All right," Shae said, and they lapsed into silence.

Sansa moved forward, throwing her arms around the other woman as the darkness consumed her.


	290. MYRCELLA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Okay guys, I honestly forgot that the lady who went with Myrcella to Dorne was also named Rosamund. This one is a Lannister though, so hopefully that doesn't get too confusing?

Her uncle hovered in the entrance of Myrcella's admittedly large, bold red and gold tent, set up just outside the Dornish Marshes for the evening. They had rode hard, which Myrcella had found a bit odd, especially after Arianne Martell had offered the use of a ship, and she was glad to be sitting down, for the evening.

Uncle Jaime looked...hesitant, which was a word she had never before used to describe her uncle; as if he didn't quite know if he was welcome inside her tent, and didn't quite know if he wanted to enter them, if he was.

Myrcella bit back a sigh, glancing at Lady Rosamund, who shrugged her thin shoulders and made to move around Uncle Jaime. He blinked, looking utterly surprised, and then moved out of the girl's way, which forced him to actually step into Myrcella's tent.

She gave Rosamund an encouraging smile, when the girl glanced back at her, and the lady shut the flaps of the tent behind her, leaving Myrcella and her uncle alone in silence.

They stood in silence for several long moments, the moments growing heavy as Myrcella thought about the cold bed she would be sleeping in tonight. She had ruled it a possibility that sleeping with her husband might scandalize her uncle, and besides, when he had set up their tents earlier, it had been rather clear who was to be sleeping where.

Myrcella had the feeling he hadn't even thought about it, that it hadn't even occurred to him that the second tent ought to go to Myrcella and Trystane, rather than having all the men folk sleep together.

She thought that image rather amusing, and wondered who had the worst of it, her uncle or her prince.

"Something funny?" her uncle asked, and Myrcella straightened her shoulders, forced her smile to seem a little more blank.

"No," she said, and then gestured to the table in the middle of the room. It was a good thing; she thought idly, that Ser Bronn and her uncle had thought to bring soldiers along with them, though they hadn't followed her uncle into his harebrained mission to "rescue" her from Dorne, earlier.

And well she was glad of that, for the brief amount of time when Dorne had been at war with her family's forces had terrified her, and Myrcella had no wish for such a war to start again, not on her account.

Still, she couldn't help but be curious about the giantess her uncle Jaime had brought with him, the one even now outside guarding Myrcella's tent, as Jaime had ordered her to, earlier. She couldn't imagine her brother naming that woman to their golden cloaks, straw though her hair may be. Her brother would have just laughed and taken the woman's heavy iron armor from her.

Which had Myrcella wondering just where she had come from, and why she stood so close to her uncle's side, these days, where no woman had ever gone.

Her uncle had introduced the woman as "Brienne," and given nothing more than that, and Myrcella hadn't asked at the time because she was too preoccupied with...whatever was going on with this plot to return her to King's Landing.

The woman was no great talker, at any rate, not like Ser Bronn, at least.

"Tea?"

He hesitated, again, and Myrcella was starting to worry that something was genuinely wrong. Her uncle had always been a soldier first, a warrior, bold in the way he protected their family and bold in the way that he made she and Tommen laugh, when they were younger and Mother had other important matters to attend to, such as ensuring Joffrey was ready for his future kingly duties.

She had started in on those duties rather early, Myrcella remembered, with a pang.

And then Jaime was sitting down, reaching as if to pour the tea himself with that golden hand that Myrcella found she couldn't stop looking at, before he hesitated again, seeming to remember that it was proper etiquette for the lady to be the one pouring the tea, after all.

Myrcella poured for both of them, and dropped two cubes of sugar into her own. Her uncle took it without.

Myrcella thought that, now that he was alone with her and away from King's Landing, perhaps her uncle Jaime didn't know how to act at all.

For he was nervous around her, more nervous than she thought the years which had separated them gave him cause to be, fumbling and awkward to the extent that even his sellsword teased him over it, earlier, when her uncle had nearly run into her, trying to set the tents up alongside his men, in the moment after she had taken off her coat, earlier.

Though, the more time they spent in that man's presence, Myrcella was beginning to realize he teased her uncle Jaime for everything, things she would never have countenanced her uncle taking in stride, in the past.

Perhaps her uncle was simply getting older, Myrcella thought, her lips quirking in amusement again.

"Do you have everything you need?" Jaime asked her, and Myrcella lifted her head, smiling.

"Of course," she said. "Well, I'd much rather be sleeping in a room than a tent, but this is nice, all the same."

Jaime nodded, glancing around. "I remember when I was fighting against the traitors in the North," he said. "My tent was rather like this one. Not quite the fittings for a princess, though."

Was that what she was? Myrcella thought idly, taking another sip of her tea.

"Oh," her uncle said, and then he was reaching into the pockets of his robes, and it took Myrcella a moment to realize that he wasn't wearing any armor. He hadn't been, when he had hatched his harebrained plan to rescue her, though she had gotten sort of used to it, in Dorne.

The men couldn't afford to be bogged down by all that heat in the fierce summers of Sunspear, after all.

But it just looked...strange, on her uncle, who had always worn armor, as far back as she could remember. And in the few times he hadn't been, he'd been wearing that white cloak, which Myrcella also didn't see on him, today.

Ah, well. Perhaps that had been her mother's idea, in case someone tried to recognize him, in Dorne.

Not that it would have worked, of course. The Lannisters did have such distinctive features, as Tyene was always teasing her.

And then she wasn't thinking about that at all, for Jaime was pulling out the necklace that had supposedly started all of this, the one that had been missing for so long but which Myrcella had consoled herself not to worry about, not when Trystane was giving her so many fine necklaces left and right, these days.

"Try not to lose it this time," Jaime said, a small smile in his voice, and Myrcella glanced up, her hands closing around the necklace as she took it from his hand. Their fingers brushed, for a moment, and she couldn't imagine what it must have been like for him, having his hand cut off, like he had.

"I'll never take it off again," she promised, utter sincerity in her voice.

He nodded, and then frowned, a little. "I know you didn't want to leave Dorne, but I'm glad you're coming home. Your mother's desperate to see you." Myrcella looked away. "And I'm glad Trystane is coming with us," he continued, sounding a bit desperate himself, this time. "He seems like a nice boy. You're lucky. Arranged marriages are rarely so...so well arranged." He shrugged, smiling at her again, and she wondered which marriage he was speaking of, just there.

"Do you think mum will like him?" she asked, trying to disguise the hope in her voice, but she didn't quite think she managed.

"Do you love this boy?" Jaime asked her gently. "Only...your mother will be more than furious that you were...as she put it...abducted into a scandalous marriage."

Myrcella giggled, and then frowned. "I think...I care for him quite deeply. He is...not what I expected in a man I would be forced to marry one day. I...we are very happy."

And it was true. She'd heard all sorts of awful things from her mother, and from the septas, in the days before her uncle Tyrion sent her off to be married in Dorne. Joffrey himself had whispered horrible things about what the barbarians in the South would do to her, once they got her hands on her.

The septas had prayed for her soul, once she passed, as if it were a forgone thing, that she was going to lose it, the moment she stepped foot into Sunspear.

But Dorne...Dorne had been like a dream, and Trystane a wonderful part of it whom she was glad she had been able to marry. He was nothing but kind to her, they shared half a dozen interests she didn't think any boy of King's Landing or the Vale would have understood, and she loved him ardently in turn.

Jaime gave her a half smile. "I am relieved to hear it," he told her, and he sounded genuine.

That was the thing about her uncle. When he said that he was happy for her, she really did believe it.

He was one of the few members of her family for whom that was true, Myrcella thought, frowning a little. Well, him and Tommen.

"Do you think mother will be?" she asked again, unable to disguise the frown tugging down on her lips, now.

Jaime froze a little in his seat. "I think..." he began carefully, "that your mother will see that you are happy, and she...will," he said, making a face.

Myrcella snorted, and her uncle gave her a wry smile. "Do you really believe that?"

Her uncle gave her a look. "Have you ever known your mother to like anyone besides her children?' he asked her.

Myrcella flinched. "She likes you," she said, in a small voice.

"I'm not so sure about that,' he said with a sigh, sinking a little further back in the chair. Myrcella blinked up at him, bemused. "Listen, there's something I want to tell you. Something I should have told you long ago."

Myrcella shifted where she sat, not liking her uncle's suddenly serious tone, for there were few enough times in her life that she could ever remember her uncle looking so serious, and they all boded ill.

She could remember growing up with him, more of a father to her than her true father had ever been, for he had always been there at her side, at the side of her mother, when Myrcella's father had been...off doing "kingly duties" as Cersei always put it, lips pursed every time, as if she thought that Myrcella had never aged and didn't have any idea what she was talking about.

Jaime always trying to make her laugh, just as Uncle Tyrion had done. She thought it was because they both suspected how hellish it was, to grow up alongside Joffrey.

Or, perhaps, how lonely she was.

But Jaime, while he was more often nearby than Uncle Tyrion, had always made it a point to be happy, where sometimes her uncle Tyrion wouldn't. Sometimes, he would tell her the truth about things.

Uncle Jaime had never tried to be serious around her, save for when it was important. Sometimes, not even then.

She had a flash of memory then, one she hadn't thought about in a long time but which she supposed she ought to, considering where she was going. A memory of her uncle Jaime, bursting into the nursery with a look of such solemn fury on his face, Myrcella had flinched back, as young as she was never having been given cause to fear her uncle before.

And he had swept her up into his arms, and glared at Joffrey as if the boy had asked Uncle Jaime for another story about the Mad King he didn't like to talk about, but with whom her brother had always been obsessed.

Myrcella shuddered, shifting in her seat and trying not to think too hard about why her uncel had come bursting into the nursery that day, to begin with.

Something rose up in her throat, something tight and hot, and suddenly she really, really didn't want to know whatever it was her uncle was about to tell her, whatever it was causing his face to look so grim.

She took another sip of her tea, and lamented that it was not yet cold.

"So..." Jaime cleared his throat, tapping his fingers on the table. "Now that you've seen more of the world," he said, and she couldn't help but take that as a slight to the dress she'd worn in Dorne, the one he'd been so disapproving of, "you've learned how...complicated things can be. People can be. The Lannisters and the Martells have hated each other for years, but..."

Gods, she didn't think she had ever seen her uncle this nervous, save for when she had watched her mother place Tommen into his arms, as a babe.

It made her feel a bit hot, and she took another sip of the tea. It burned, on the way down, reminding her of the time Arianne had let her try a sip of wine, when she was telling her what would be expected of Myrcella on her wedding night.

She hadn't liked the taste.

Myrcella's hands were practically shaking, as she set the tea cup down, once more.

"You've fallen in love with Trystane," her uncle soldiered on. "I mean, what were the chances? you happening to fall in love with the man you're assigned to marry?'

Myrcella giggled nervously, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"My point is-"

Myrcella never did figure out what her uncle's point was, just then.

For that was when they heard the dull thud of an arrow slamming against wood, and then her uncle was vaulting across the table, pulling her down to the ground with his full weight landing on top of her, reaching for his sword in its sheath with his non dominant hand.

Myrcella forgot to breathe, as she heard the sound of another arrow hitting wood, and then a scream.

"Trystane," she breathed, looking up in terror at her uncle. "Do you think he...?"

Jaime grimaced, wrenching his sword free and placing a finger to his lips. "Don't move, Myrcella," he told her, and she nodded frantically, her hair already clumping in the dirt beneath her head, and she bit back a grimace.

The frantic sounds of battle begin in the camp beyond their tent, and Myrcella could see shadows, outside of it. Her uncle pulled his sword up in front of him, and motioned for Myrcella to crawl over to the bed, where at least she would have it to shield her, she realized numbly.

She moved, placing herself against the hard wood and biting back the cry of terror that wanted to erupt from her.

She'd never had something like this happen, Myrcella realized. She knew that her mother and brothers had been besieged in King's Landing, when the traitor Stannis Baratheon had attacked it, but that they had survived, after her mother spent her time in the lower levels of the Keep, safe from harm.

But that had never been something Myrcella could imagine happening to herself. The worst she could imagine was when the ships were surrounding Sunspear, but even then, Myrcella had known that she herself was not in any danger from either side, and in any case, the ships were keeping themselves confined to the harbor, then.

And then her uncle was saying something, words that were blurring before Myrcella so that she couldn't hear him. She stared up at him uncomprehendingly, suddenly wishing that she had even once taken Obara's words about learning to defend herself seriously, back in Sunspear.

Myrcella had never truly thought that a princess should need such protections.

She was shaking, she realized, when her uncle touched her and she nearly threw off his hold. He was kneeling in front of her now, his lips moving, though she couldn't make out the words, and then he pinched her. Hard.

Myrcella yelped, and that seemed to be all that Jaime was waiting for, for suddenly his lips were by her ears and she could hear what he was saying.

"You need to stay here, all right?" he told her, and waited until she nodded. "I'm going to send Brienne in to protect you. Do you remember her?"

Myrcella hesitated for a moment, but not because she didn't remember who Brienne was. She knew who the woman was, but. She wasn't her uncle, and just a woman. Before Dorne, Myrcella had never seen a woman with a sword, and she could not quite imagine one with a sword without fiery dark eyes and black hair.

"Don't leave me," she begged.

Jaime moved closer, kissing her forehead. "I need to make sure the Prince is protected, Myrcella," he told her gently, though the words sounded so much harsher, in her ears. "But I can't be worrying about you leaving the tent. Stay here. For me. Please?"

She looked up into his green eyes, and found herself nodding. "I...Brienne..." she whispered hoarsely. "She'll be soon?"

Her uncle nodded. "Fucking Ser Arys ought to have been outside the tent already," he said, and Myrcella flinched at the expletive, and then at the reminder of how angry her uncle had been with Ser Arys Oakheart, when he had arrived in Sunspear and realized that the man was still alive, despite threats to his charge's life.

As far as she knew, the poor Kingsguard had been tending to the horses, for the duration of their journey so far.

Her uncle's features softened. "I'll be right back, if I can't find Brienne. But you aren't to leave this tent. And if..." he hesitated again, but this was the uncle she remembered, Myrcella realized.

In a battle, where he belonged, she recognized him.

Myrcella shivered at the thought that she was in a battle at all.

"If anyone comes," her uncle said, and then he was pressing something into her hands. Myrcella glanced down at it, uncomprehending, before glancing up at her uncle once more.

He'd given her a knife. A knife with a serrated edge, out of its sheath.

Her uncle waited until she understood, kissed her forehead again, and Myrcella didn't know what he wanted her to do with the knife, as he stepped out of her tent, but she didn't dare ask.

Didn't ask if the knife was to defend herself with. Her mother had always insisted, when Myrcella was younger, that she didn't need to learn such defense, not as a princess. No one was going to harm her.

It was Uncle Jaime, who so rarely interfered in Myrcella's upbringing, she remembered suddenly, save for when he tried to make her laugh or when he had taken her out of that nursery and back to his chambers, brushing her hair the way the maids did without at all thinking it was silly, who had demanded from Cersei, over and over, that he be allowed to teach Myrcella something.

She could remember snippets of a conversation held in an outer corridor, her uncle, "Do you really think she'll be safe enough never to need defense, Cersei? Look at what happened to Rhaenys Targaryen!"

"Rhaenys Targaryen didn't have you defending her," her mother had bit out, and that was all Myrcella had caught of the conversation. She vaguely remembered that her uncle and mother hadn't spoken for days, after the arguments.

Seven, she should have let Obara teach her something.

And then the tent flaps were flying open, and Myrcella cried out, raising the knife in a paltry defense in front of her, only to wilt at the sight of the great Brienne, stepping inside and instantly placing her hands up.

The blond woman licked her lips, eying Myrcella with something between concern and befuddlement, she thought. "Are you all right, Your Grace?" she asked, and Myrcella closed her eyes, fighting back tears.

And then Brienne was moving close to her, and the knife tumbled out of Myrcella's hands, hitting the furnished rug she sat on.

"Your Grace," the woman said, and Myrcella opened her eyes again, staring up at the other woman, but Brienne had her hands still raised. "Are you hurt?"

Myrcella shook her head, chewing hard on her lower lip.

Brienne nodded. "I'm not going to hurt you, Princess," she said. "Your...uncle told me to watch over you until they stop fighting."

Myrcella's lower lip was trembling, she realized, after a moment, and she reminded herself that she was a Princess of the House Baratheon, and that once upon a time, she'd been much better than this at disguising her fear before the enemy.

She hadn't even cried, the day she'd been presented to Arianne for the first time.

"Who...who's fighting them?" she asked, hoarsely.

The older woman grimaced. Even if she was a woman and a swordswoman, she wasn't the sort of man Myrcella would expect her uncle to trust so implicitly, though he seemed to, bringing her along on a rescue that rescue that hadn't really been necessary to begin with.

"Don't you worry about that, Your Grace," Brienne said finally, which Myrcella took as an admission of ignorance. Myrcella cocked her head at the woman, her earlier fear forgotten.

"That's not really a title for the princess," she reminded him, though she thought he ought to know that, serving the brother of the Queen Mother.

"How did you come to serve my uncle?" she asked, and Brienne stared at her for a moment, before snorting. Myrcella didn't see what about that question was particularly amusing.

"He saved my life while I was trying to save his," Brienne said, finally, and Myrcella's forehead furrowed, at those words. She wanted to know more, if only to distract herself from the fighting going on around him, but Brienne didn't look particularly amenable to questions.

Instead, she was staring out at the tent, as if she would much rather be on the other side of it, fighting.

"My mother must have been very grateful," she said softly, the words forcing their way out of Myrcella in the clanging silence.

Brienne grunted. There was the sound of an arrow hitting something which definitely wasn't wood, outside, and Myrcella flinched.

Brienne glanced at her, and then said, in that gruff voice, "Yes, well, I don't find myself spending much time around your mother, Princess."

Myrcella blinked up at this woman, surprised she'd bothered to respond, though she seemed to understand Myrcella's need for it, at least a bit. She could hardly remember a time, beyond when her uncle had been fighting against the Starks of the North and gotten himself captured, that her uncle wasn't at her mother's side.

She remembered Tommen's letter to her, written, she suspected, with much help from his septa, for he had never been one for reading and Mother had barely forced them, when Uncle Jaime had returned to King's Landing.

Returned for a wedding Myrcella herself had not been invited to attend, she thought, rather morosely.

In any case, she couldn't imagine she believed Brienne, that her uncle was not often in her mother’s presence, now that he was finally back home.

Home.

Myrcella couldn't remember the last time she'd thought of King's Landing as home.

Myrcella lifted her chin. "Do you mean you don't know?" she asked, and Brienne raised her chin.

"Her Grace has many more queenly matters to deal with than one knight-" she started, but Myrcella cut him off.

"I meant," she said impatiently, "you don't know who we're fighting out there."

Brienne grimaced, adjusting her grip on her sword. "Sellswords," he said, spitting to the side, and Myrcella grimaced at the sight. "But don't worry. Your uncle's a Kingsguard. He won't let anything happen to you." She pulled her shoulders upright. "And neither will I."

Myrcella shook her head, trying to look brave. "It's not me I'm worried about," she lied, and Brienne looked at her for a long moment, before sighing.

"Look Your Grace," she said moving closer, taking up the chair her uncle had vacated, earlier. "There is only one entrance into this tent, and I will sit between it and you until I am mowed down by the enemy. Do you understand?"

Myrcella didn't respond, for just then the raging sound of battle was growing louder, outside.

The tent flap flew open, and Myrcella screamed as a sell sword walked inside, sword raised as though he meant to throw it at Brienne's head.

Brienne raised her sword and charged the other man, throwing him into the table before the man could throw his sword, and the two of them broke the table in half, tumbling to the ground and beating at each other with their fists.

Myrcella grimaced, looking away as the fighting went on, biting her teeth to keep herself from focusing on the noises, both in here now and outside.

She blinked her eyes open after a moment, terror filling her as the soldier who had been fighting Brienne stalked towards her, and then froze, eyes roaming over her figure for several moments.

Myrcella knew what happened to pretty young girls when men had been fighting, their blood hot. She felt her fear clog in her throat as the soldier stared at her, but blinked several times when he didn't move toward her.

In fact, he turned around, back toward Brienne, and then the other woman was climbing to her feet, fighting him again.

Myrcella closed her eyes once more and breathed in deep through her nose.

And then there was a grunt, and she didn't dare open her eyes until Brienne was standing above her, holding out a bloodied hand.

She hesitated, stared for a moment, wondered what her mother thought of this soldier by her uncle's side, and then took it, getting to her feet.

"I told you I wouldn't let anything happen to you," Brienne said, and Myrcella forced herself not to look at the sell sword on the ground.

"Is the fighting...?" she whispered, and then, because she couldn't bear not to get an answer from the man, swept past him, towards the tent flaps, ignoring his angry call after her.

She shoved open the tent entrance, peering outside with wide eyes, because she just had to know that Trystane was all right, she just had to.

Trystane, it turned out, was very close to her tent, fighting with a drawn scimitar against another black clothed sell sword. Myrcella hadn't gotten much look at the one who'd come into her tent, but this one was clearly Northern, she realized with a start.

And then she shook her head, because that certainly didn't matter, just now.

The sell sword gained the upper hand, pushing her husband into the dirt and raising his sword above the boy's head with a flourish.

"Trystane!" Myrcella screamed, trying to run forward, but then Brienne reached out, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and yanking her back.

"Your Grace," she warned, the grip on her hand on Myrcella's shoulder bruising. "There could be others out there. Ser Jaime ordered me to protect you."

She stared at Brienne incredulously, turning back to stare in horror at Trystane.

He couldn't be hurt, Myrcella thought. He just couldn't.

"Do something!" she snapped at Brienne, but he just stared at her, face grim.

And then all of the sudden her uncle came running out of nowhere, beating the sell sword back just as his sword nearly ran her husband through, tossing Trystane into the dirt, but Myrcella noticed that the sword hadn't touched him.

She forgot to breathe, as she watched the sell sword take on her uncle. As she watched her uncle somehow beat him into the dust, despite the loss of a hand.

She hadn't really thought much about his fighting skills, when he'd arrived in Dorne and fought off her protectors. She'd been too shocked to see him there at all, and fighting people whose names she'd grown to know, over the years she'd been in Sunspear.

But now, she remembered that her uncle was a warrior.

It was almost comforting, and she tried to run to her husband once more, but once more, Brienne held her back.

"Not yet, Princess," she hissed in her ear.

Myrcella shook her head, not wanting to acknowledge the words. "I..." she shook her head. "I have to..."

The sell sword fell into the dirt, the blunt side of her uncle's sword slamming into his head, and went still.

Myrcella felt suddenly frozen, watching the man fall.

Jaime was already moving though, moving over to her husband where he still knelt in the dirt, and holding out his good hand.

Myrcella stared. She didn't think he'd voluntarily moved to touch her husband since he'd come to Sunspear, at least not in friendship, since the boy had ordered Ser Bronn hit for hitting him, earlier.

And they certainly had hardly spoken, though her uncle didn't seem to hate Trystane, which she supposed was something of a ringing endorsement, in her family.

Trystane looked up at him as Jaime held out his hand, clasped it, and allowed Jaime to pull him to his feet.

"You saved me," he said, and Myrcella strained against Brienne's hand on her shoulder to hear him, to hear the shock coloring his voice. Jaime grimaced.

"Are you all right?" he asked, glancing back at Myrcella where she stood, and she forced herself to smile at the both of them, relieved that they didn't look much more than cut, in a few places.

Trystane nodded quickly, glancing down at the dead man on the road between them.

"Then we should be moving before any more of them show up," Jaime said decisively, reaching out and grabbing the boy by the arm when he didn't move. Myrcella blinked. Move? Already?

But they'd only just fought these people. They needed...

"Trystane."

Trystane glanced up at her uncle, the shock bleeding out of his features. "It's Prince Trystane, actually."

Jaime gave a weak laugh. "Good. Let's get moving?"

He led the boy back to Myrcella's tent, as if sensing her need to make sure Trystane was all right, where Myrcella rushed into his arms, throwing her arms around her...husband.

She closed her eyes, burying her face in her husband's neck, and she could feel her uncle's gaze on her.

"Don't you ever do that to me again," she hissed out at her husband, and could feel his rumbling laugh, beneath her skin.

"I'm all right, Myrcella," he promised her, kissing at her hair.

She opened her eyes, gazing up at Jaime, and was surprised when her uncle...smiled at her, still weakly, but there, nonetheless.


	291. OLENNA

There were some things which Olenna Tyrell had had to do, during her lifetime, which she was not proud of.

Oh, she was proud of most of them, and where most other women of noble blood might have felt their blood turn green with shame, too. But Olenna did not see the point in shame; it, like the other pointless emotions which vapid young women and those old enough to know better allowed to control them, only got in the way of what needed to be done.

This was what Olenna had told herself for so long, she believed it.

But this...this thing, she was about to, this she was...not ashamed of, but annoyed by. There were worse things that Olenna Tyrell had done in her life, even worse when she had been Olenna Redwyne, but it irritated her that even in her late stage of life, she was still resorting to dealing with stupid men.

One would think that by a certain age, one could find oneself challenged, at least a little.

Tyrion Lannister, she had hoped, would be a challenge. At least he was no longer a bore, with the way she'd heard he'd gone off on their King, the other day.

She would have paid good gold to have seen that.

Of course, Lord Varys, odd little man that he was, had been happy to fill her in.

With a long sigh, knowing that this was all an attempt to distract herself, Olenna knocked on the door in front of her.

There was a long pause, and she could just imagine the man on the other side, groaning as he heard the knock, rolling himself out of his chair and to his feet, ambling across to the door...

The door opened, and Grandmaester Pycelle squinted out at her.

"Lady Olenna," he said, and sounded genuinely surprised to see her. As well he might; it was not every day that Olenna Tyrell found herself burdened with coming to the private chambers of decrepit old men. "Do come in."

He shuffled back, and she swept into his chambers. Disgusting, shit stinking chambers though they were. She wondered how many little girls this old pervert had fucked in these chambers.

The thought had her turning to Pycelle, wanting to cut to the matter as soon as possible. Not that that, of course, would be possible.

He was still very much Cersei's puppet, no matter recent issues between them.

"I understand that the Queen Mother has made Maester Quyburn, excuse me, the former maester, her personal physician. Where it was you, before," Olenna reminded the old man, and Pycelle grunted in derision.

"A shame if ever there was one," he muttered, and Olenna hummed in agreement.

"Some people cannot understand the loyalty of blood," she murmured, and Pycelle's head snapped up, his graying old eyes staring at her in confusion.

Olenna smirked. "I understand that you are a Lannister by blood, though...through distant relation," she told him, and Pycelle looked at her for a moment longer before puffing out his chest.

"Of course. Though my loyalty is to the realm."

Olenna snorted, wondered how quickly after learning of Aerys Targaryen's madness this man had turned back to his blood. "Of course." She folded her hands in front of her. "I would expect nothing less, of the Grandmaester of the Realm."

The old man's chest puffed out in pride. Olenna wondered how many young girls he'd paid for, this week.

"I wonder..." she moved a bit forward, aware that even in her old age she was still capable of this. The Grandmaester's gaze followed her. "I am possessing a...delicate problem, and as you are a maester first and foremost, perhaps you might be willing to help me."

The Grandmaester coughed. "My lady," he began, "I serve the Royal House faithfully, and you may rest assured that your secret will not leave this room."

Olenna blinked at him for a moment, and then smiled, slowly. "I am glad to hear it," she said, coughing slightly, knowing damn well that her words would go straight to Cersei, the moment she had left. "I would not wish to know that anyone was laughing at me. I am a Tyrell, and our pride is strong."

In fact, there was only one thing certain to ensure that Cersei did not hear about it.

Pycelle blinked at her. "Ah, of course. My lady, in your stage of life..."

"My stage?" Olenna asked, raising her eyebrows and staring expectantly at him. He cleared his throat, flushing pink. "Maester Pycelle, just what do you imagine I am here for?"

The old man coughed. "Well...I-I...perhaps you had better just tell me," he finally murmured, no longer meeting her eyes.

Olenna harrumphed, and the man stared at her, looking completely perplexed.

She had to admit, now that she saw it, she was surprised it had truly passed her by so long, these long, long years.

"Oh, stop this," Olenna said, reaching forward and putting a hand on his arm. He stared down at it, then glanced up to meet her eyes. "Tell me, am I the only one to see through this performance?"

Pycelle stared at her, uncomprehending, and Olenna snorted. "Is it possible that so many could be so stupid for so long?"

The old man straightened, and suddenly, standing before her, was a different man. Not a blubbering fool, not a cowed old pawn. Eyes not clouded over, but bright and cold. Olenna didn't like this new man.

When he spoke, it was with a new voice, one infused with a quiet sort of strength she'd come to see in her own son, the few times he let down his mask.

"There are times when I have trouble believing it myself," he said, not bothering to call her "my lady" that time.

Olenna thought it might have been the only time she felt respected by the old bastard.

"Then why do you bother?" she asked coolly.

Pycelle frowned. "Flowers, my lady," he said, and Olenna narrowed her eyes. "Like your house reminds us. Each one wanting to grow the tallest, bloom the brightest. And one by one, sooner or later, they all get plucked."

Olenna stared at him.

"I don't want to be the tallest or the brightest," he continued, and Olenna cocked her head, intrigued by this old codger for the first time since she met him, years ago in the Sept when she attended Elia Martell's wedding to Prince Rhaegar. "I only want to remain in the garden, until my time comes to return to the dirt."

Olenna regarded him a moment longer, and then snorted. "I thank you for your poetic candor," she muttered. "But I still don't see why

"Since the time I convinced the Mad King to open his gates to Tywin Lannister, I have served the interests of the House of Lannister unfailingly," Pycelle said.

Olenna raised a brow. "And what have they done to repay such loyalty?" she asked. "Do you merely cherish your old name so close?"

She was old enough to remember, after all, that he himself had once been a Lannister.

"They have built the strongest house," Pycelle said, meeting her eyes.

Olenna shifted in her seat. "And what happens when they are no longer the strongest house?" she asked softly.

"By that time, I will be rotting beneath the floor of the Sept of Baelor, if that great House has deemed my years of service worthy, of course." He eyed her speculatively.

Olenna cleared her throat, leaning back in her chair. "My granddaughter, the Queen, has recently lost a young lady of great worth to her. The girl remained here in King's Landing to serve me, batty old crone that I am, rather than accompanying her mistress home. I am afraid that I can be...quite a handful."

The maester cleared his throat. "Ah, lost, my lady?"

Olenna nodded waspishly. "Yes, I'm afraid the girl is missing. Lady Megga Tyrell? Now, I think that Cersei must know that such a disappearance of a noble lady, of blood, cannot go unanswered, which is why I believe the girl will never be found."

Pycelle squinted at her. "My condolences, my lady, but I fail to understand how the Queen Mother is implicated in the young lady's disappearance."

Olenna eyed him. "Do you?"

He looked away, and Olenna sprung at her chance.

"Tell me about the experiments that Maester Quyburn is so infamous for," she said, leaning forward in her seat. "Tell me about this mysterious resurrected man, and where he came from."

Pycelle cleared his throat. "And if I were to do so," he said, something glinting in his eyes like humor, "What would a flower do with such information?"

Olenna moved forward, caressing her hand across his. "Like you, I want to ensure that those I love remain in the garden," she said coldly. "This Quyburn fellow, pardon me, seems just as much a threat to the Queen Mother as he does to my granddaughter's handmaidens. And between the two of us, I do believe we might be able to spare them all."

Pycelle studied her for a moment, and then, for perhaps the first time that Olenna could remember seeing him do so, Pycelle smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Olenna's revelation about Pycelle here is based on a deleted scene between Tywin and Pycelle in the show, where he admits to not being the doddery old fool everyone takes him for. Forever sad it was taken out.


	292. JAIME

His sister was an idiot, Jaime thought, with no small amount of bitterness as he fingered the gold coin he'd found in the pocket of one of the men who'd come to kill Trystane, earlier that day.

And he knew it had been to kill solely Trystane, for Myrcella's tent, large and imposing as it had been, had been far more a target, and yet, despite multiple chances, none of the soldiers had gotten close enough to do her harm.

She'd given herself away when one of the guards had moved to attack Brienne, according to the blonde woman, saw Myrcella, and then backed down and let himself get killed, when he might have had the chance to kill her.

Of course, Brienne hadn't said as much, but Jaime knew that no Martell sell sword would bother with saving Myrcella if they were after Trystane.

And while he didn’t doubt Brienne’s abilities, not after so long in her company, he had a feeling that was what had happened.

Which, really, could only mean one thing.

If they had, he never would have forgiven Cersei for it, for she had no common sense at all.

Here they were, barely managing to sneak past the Martell camps set up along the Dornish Pass, what with this sudden war between the Martells and Tyrells breaking out, and Cersei had nearly gotten them all killed anyway.

He'd interrogated the one man they left alive while the rest of their men, or those who were left of them, including, unfortunately, Ser Arys, packed up for the journey ahead. Jaime doubted there would be more coming, but he had no wish to tempt fate.

He ensured, when he did so, that no one else was around when he did it, not Bronn, not Brienne, though she'd seemed suspicious, and certainly not the Prince, though they boy had pouted about it in a way that certainly reflected his age.

Myrcella had pulled him away with a smile which lit up her whole face, and though the boy didn't exactly look as though he'd forgotten about it now, he seemed content to let the girl distract him, even if she didn't seem to realize she had done so.

The man had revealed nothing, of course, because Cersei wasn't that stupid, whatever he thought about her current plots, and Jaime had killed him in a bout of irritation, and because it wasn't as if he could bring him back to King's Landing, in any case.

Cersei wouldn't allow him a trial, of course.

That was when he'd found the gold dragon in the man's pocket.

He knew his sister thought him something of an idiot, sometimes. And he never claimed to be the brightest of the Lannisters; his brother knew how to play a room against each other, his sister could lay out a plot years in advance and see it through without too much hardship.

But Jaime wasn't fucking stupid, like she seemed to be assuming today.

He knew now why she had demanded in her letter to Jaime that they take the Kingsroad back to King's Landing, rather than taking a ship. Knew that it was far easier to arrange for an assassination that way.

For fuck's sake, Dorne was already at war with the Tyrells. Did she want to start another one, while they were still fighting the fucking Iron Islanders?

And, more to the point, she was going to break her daughter's heart. No, she hadn't seen the way Myrcella had been with her...husband, since Jaime had first found her in Dorne, and he knew how protective she was of her children. She had posited to Jaime in her letter that no doubt the Martells had forced her daughter into bed with Trystane against her will, that they had allowed her to be raped for the sake of an heir.

Jaime had feared as much as well, when he had gone to Dorne. But he couldn't say he had seen two people in an arranged marriage as happy as Myrcella and Trystane seemed to be. And the boy didn't seem like such a bad sort, not at all.

He was certainly a fair sight better than Robert.

If she kept on in this way, thinking that she was protecting the girl, he thought, an anger filling him for Myrcella's sake that he hadn't felt in...years, then she was going to destroy Myrcella as certainly as she had assumed the Martells were doing.

The way she always did, for his sister, he realized abruptly, had never changed, not in all the time he'd known her.

He sighed, letting the breath out for a long moment before glancing back at his...niece, where she sat by the fire beside her young husband.

He hadn't known how he himself felt about it, when Cersei sent him the news that their daughter...her daughter had been married in the dead of night to the Martell boy, that she had been auctioned off without so much as the permission of her family.

No, he thought bitterly, he did know what he had thought of it. It had reminded him, rather too much, of how he himself had been named to the Kingsguard by the Mad King, without the permission of his father.

Oh, he'd been glad enough to have been given the honor, at the time, because he was a stupid young man and he and Cersei had been sure that she was to marry Prince Rhaegar, but he could remember the way Cersei cried, in the days after her marriage to Robert Baratheon.

Could remember the way she curled in his arms and begged him to take her again, because she was terrified that Robert was going to want a second heir, proof that his line was strong, and she couldn't stomach the thought of ever carrying his children.

She'd rather kill it in the womb, she'd said, and Jaime had shivered, and fucked her until she gave birth to Myrcella.

He shivered, unable to tear his eyes away from the girl. She didn't look as though she'd spent her nights crying, since entering Trystane's bed. In fact, she was glowing, in a way he'd never quite seen her do, in King's Landing.

And if she'd lost that stupid boy today...

He sighed, wiping at his face, and suddenly Bronn was there at his side. "Everything all right, mate?" he asked. "I noticed one of those fuckers nearly felled you, in there. We're gonna have to keep working on that aim of yours."

Jaime rolled his eyes, glad that Myrcella was far enough across the campfire not to hear the man's language. He had no doubt the girl had heard worse from Joffrey, of course, but he hadn't failed to notice the way she'd flinched when he used that same word earlier today, in the tent.

"I'm fine," he said, but Bronn could not fail to note where he was looking.

"Brienne kept her safe," Bronn said, the assurance unneeded, Jaime thought with some annoyance. "She's a feisty little thing. Can almost see the...family resemblance."

Jaime whirled on Bronn then, because he hadn't thought of the man's loose tongue, when he'd ordered him to protect Myrcella. He'd thought only of the fact that he didn't trust any Kingsguard sharing a bed with Arianne Martell, and certainly not one who hadn't bothered to write to the Crown when Myrcella's life was in danger.

"You haven't..."

Bronn snorted. "'Course not," he said. "Though I ought to demand a raise, for you thinking such thoughts of me. And you ought to realize she's just spent several years in Dorne, with people who hate your fucking family. I doubt she hasn't heard, by now."

Jaime closed his eyes, turning away from the other man. "I don't suppose my brother can still afford to pay you, no?" he asked, and Bronn shot him an annoyed look.

"He wasn't as moody as you can be," he said, instead of answering a question that they both knew, and Jaime snorted, doubting that very much.

"You've a wife to get back to, in any case," Jaime said, trying to sound bored. "I'm sure she wouldn't mind losing the scant amount you break in, if you'd come back and satisfy her."

"Oh, ho!" Bronn laughed. "I think I keep my wife quite satisfied, the times I come to visit her. She's never given me a word of complaint yet, about staying or going."

Jaime rolled his eyes, believing that.

He was never going to have a wife to get back to; the thought hit him suddenly, as he glanced back at Myrcella. And not just because he was a member of the Kingsguard, though that certainly helped.

But now...now, watching his niece and her husband, knowing what he did about that fucking gold dragon he'd seen in the pocket of one of their attackers, too thick to belong to the Iron Bank and too thin to come from anywhere but King's Landing, he almost wished he had.

Across the fireplace, Trystane reached out, placing the dried piece of meat on Myrcella's tongue, and her lips closed around his fingers.

Jaime was tempted to say something, to say that was certainly enough of that, never mind that they were married, and it was on the tip of his tongue to do so before he remembered that it wasn't exactly his place, after all.

Myrcella wasn't his daughter, this boy not his goodson. He hardly had the right to tell them what to do with one another, even in his presence.

He felt a pang, remembered that he had just been about to tell Myrcella the truth, before that assassin had nearly killed her husband.

She had asked him about it of course, on the road today, because she was a terribly curious child with an iron memory.

Jaime didn't think she had believed him at all when he told her he didn't remember what he had been about to say, that really, it hadn't been important, before distracting her with questions about her life in Dorne, as of late.

But he knew, even as the heavy feeling of watching his daughter grow up as someone else’s settled once more in his chest, that it would have been a mistake to tell her. To burden his daughter with that knowledge, now or at any time in her future.

Because she wasn't his daughter. She was Cersei's, and Cersei's alone. Cersei had been the one to raise her, Cersei had been the one to be mother and father to all of her children, even if with the younger two she had left that duty mostly up to the servants, for Robert had certainly rarely cared to take over such responsibilities.

But never Jaime.

And this attack, today...that had all but cemented the realization in his mind, that he didn't want to see this girl, this pure, beautiful, happy creature in front of him, hurt again.

Not from some assassin's arrows, not from the truth about her parentage.

Cersei could have killed her today, without even realizing it, ordering that charge on Prince Trystane.

Jaime had no intention of placing his daughter in the same danger, even if it meant he kept his silence for the rest of his life, he thought.

Idly, he wondered why it seemed so much more difficult, these days, than it had ever felt in the past.

It wasn't as if he went around wanting to claim Joffrey, after all, and that thought startled him, that earlier he had so dearly wanted to claim Tommen and Myrcella, but he didn't want to claim Cersei's eldest son, at all.

And if he wasn't ready for Joffrey, that ought to answer the question of whether or not Jaime was ready for any of them.

"'Course, I imagine that great wench of yours is going to have some complaints soon enough, if you don't do something," Bronn teased, and Jaime narrowed his eyes.

"Don't call her that," he snapped, and Bronn raised both eyebrows, and his hands.

"Fine, fine," he said, sounding mock wounded. "It's not as if you haven't called her that a thousand times."

Jaime ignored the dig. "Where is she?"

"Said something about a bath," Bronn said, voice lowering. "A naked, lonely bath..."

Jaime almost slugged him.

Myrcella laughed at something her husband had said, laying her head on Trystane's shoulder and watching the fire die out with a satisfied expression, Trystane's arm wrapping around her shoulder instinctively, it seemed.

They were both far too young to be married, Jaime couldn't help but think, but he thought they would be very happy together, providing that Cersei didn't make any more attempts to forever separate them.

Trystane seemed like a good husband to Myrcella, and she seemed genuinely happy as his wife.

And seeming them together...they were nothing like Robert and Cersei had been, in the beginnings of their marriage.

Jaime felt a pang, for they did remind him of someone, however. Reminded him of long summer nights camped out in the yards of Casterly Rock, huddling together as the moon shone above them, trying not to get too close in case one of Cersei's maids came running.

Reminded him of sweet, stolen kisses in the dark, and Cersei's happy smile, once so unburdened and freely given, but only to Jaime.

He shook his head, clenching his fist at the reminder, and half turned away from his niece and her husband.

He noticed Bronn looking at him with a knowing expression, and sent the man a glare, reaching for another piece of dried beef. He had a feeling his eyes, which were meant to convey that the bastard ought to mind his own damn business, conveyed something else entirely, however, when the man next spoke.

"Eh, lovebirds, keep it in your pants until it gets dark at least, eh?" he said, and Jaime shot the man a scandalized look.

Bronn smirked.

Trystane pulled Myrcella a little closer, and teased the older man, "You didn't seem so concerned about impropriety when you were making eyes at my cousin, did you?"

Bronn made a face, and muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, "Well, we two are already bad ones."

Jaime rolled his eyes as Myrcella giggled.

"She will miss you, I think," she said. "She had quite the soft spot for you."

"Did she?" Bronn drawled, sounding interested while trying to pretend not to be.

Myrcella nodded. "Oh, yes," she said. "I haven't seen her show such interest in a...man in quite some time."

Trystane snorted, as Bronn actually...flushed?

Gods, they couldn't get back to King's Landing soon enough, Jaime thought, even as he knew that the young man in front of him was probably going to get himself killed the moment they arrived.

He thought about that, leaning back on the cold hard ground and staring at Prince Trystane.

He was surprised that Arianne Martell had agreed to send her brother back into the den of lions, when he had seen how disturbed she was, that Jaime and Bronn had been able to make it as far as they had, into Dorne.

Clearly, she had known there was some sort of danger, in sending her cousin back to King's Landing alone, and without even a guard to accompany him, beyond Jaime.

But the letter her father had sent her from the Water Gardens, where, according to Tyene Sand, he had not left in some years, had been insistent, and it was due to this letter, whatever it had said, that Trystane had been allowed to accompany Myrcella at all.

And it was due to that letter that Jaime was beginning to wonder who was even ruling Dorne, at this point; Doran, hidden away from Sunspear by leagues, or his daughter, reluctant to send her cousin but sending him nonetheless.

He hadn't thought the boy appreciated the danger of going into such hostile territory before today, however. Hadn't realized, as he took the boy's shaky hand and helped him to his feet, that the boy was fully aware he might be going to his death.

Which had Jaime wondering just what the hell he was doing with them, at all.

"You're to keep an eye on him at all times, once we get back to King’s Landing," Jaime informed Bronn, then.

The other man looked up. "Even at night?" he said, and Jaime grimaced, reminded once more that his daughter was married now, and, however legal it was, she certainly seemed to consider it binding.

He wasn't going to be allowing any of that, however, until they returned to King's Landing and had the blessing of the High Septon. Cersei might just decide to kill him, next.

"Just don't let him out of your sight," Jaime said, and Bronn raised a brow.

"You suspect he's up to something?" he asked, all seriousness bleeding into his expression now, and Jaime just grimaced.

"I don't know," he said. "But those attackers, earlier...they didn't much seem interested in killing the Princess of Dorne, I noticed."

Bronn grunted. "What, you're saying Brienne wasn't some valiant knight, guarding her like that, almost as if you just wanted her out of the fighting, mate."

"Just keep an eye on him," Jaime said, tiredly. "And if he dies on the journey back, know that we'll have started a war."

Bronn gulped. "Aye, sir," he muttered. "Two eyes, then."


	293. SANSA

Sansa sighed, hugging herself without trying to look like she was doing so. Much as she did want comfort, listening a Joffrey stripped the lands and titles from two lesser nobles of the North who had apparently decided to champion Stannis Baratheon, now that he had control of Winterfell; she knew how dangerous it was, to show any weakness before the vultures.

Tyrion, she knew, called them the lion's den, but vultures Sansa knew them to be. Vultures who descended at the first sniff of blood.

She shook her head, forcing such morbid thoughts from her. It was not as if she had been called her to tell Joffrey how very grateful, yet again, she was to him for continuing to champion her cause in the North, after all.

Things could always be worse.

But she hadn't been sleeping well, and just now, with her eyes red rimmed and surrounded by what Shae had aptly called bruises, and her hands shaky from lack of sleep, Sansa was finding she felt rather dramatic.

She'd been having variations on the same nightmare these past few days, horrible nightmares that filled her with dread and had her waking up screaming nightly, without fail.

Shae had taken to sleeping in her chambers now, instead of Tyrion's, because she knew she would be spending the rest of the night there anyway. And Sansa might have felt guilty about that, if she could sleep.

But the sight of Margaery, burning alive in Winterfell, was seared into her memory, and it seemed that her mind wanted to think on it each night.

She'd taken to drinking cold cups of chocolate each morning, and then cold cups of water, and hoping that the war between the Dornish and the Tyrells would keep long enough for King's Landing to be supplied in chocolate, as it seemed to be one of the few things capable of keeping her awake, these days.

Shae didn't think it was doing her any favors when she lay awake for long hours each night, unable to fall asleep for all that she knew the rest of her sleep would be interrupted.

But Sansa didn't care, because at least she could make it through the days.

She shook her head to clear it as Joffrey moved on to the next bit of information needed to be imparted today; Shae had explained to her, earlier, what Tyrion had told her about the titles; that they were to be given to those considered more deserving, who would then fight for the Lannister cause.

Sansa couldn't say she was surprised. Winterfell had been given to the Boltons, after all.

But Joffrey never did get to handing away titles that had never belonged to the South to give away in the first place.

Instead, the great doors to the throne room burst open, and Joffrey's head jerked up from the scroll he was squinting down at so fast, his blond hair smacked against his forehead.

In any other situation, it might have been humorous.

"Who dares-" he started, motioning for the guards at the door to stop the intruder, but the man flew past them easily, running forward.

Sansa squinted at him. He looked...familiar, somehow, but she couldn't place where she had seen him before.

"Stop that man!" Joffrey shouted, and he looked a bit panicked now; for a moment, Sansa allowed herself to entertain the idea that the man was a desperate assassin, who might actually succeed in pinning Joffrey's head to that ugly throne.

Her hopes were dashed when the man finally spoke, just as the guards managed to grab him.

"Your Grace!" the man shouted, pushing past the guards seeking to hold him back. "Your Grace, a word!"

Cersei, where she sat beside the king in the seat usually reserved for her gooddaughter, glanced at her son with what Sansa thought was a panicked expression, but Joffrey merely waved a hand, looking a bit bored, now.

"Let him through," he ordered, and the guards let go of the intruder, but did not move away from him as they followed him to the front of the throne room.

The man stopped before the steps leading up to the Iron Throne, an indecipherable look in his eyes as he dipped into the lowest bow Sansa had ever seen a commoner give a king without prostrating themselves on the floor, and remained there for some time.

Joffrey rolled his eyes, clearly impatient. "You may rise...?"

It was clear that Joffrey didn't know the man, either.

The man lifted his head, and then Sansa froze, because now that he was close enough, she realized she did recognize him.

_When the boat sinks into the sea._

Sansa felt as if cold ice was running its way down her spine. She reached out suddenly, taking Shae's hand in hers and squeezing it so hard the other woman let out a surprised yelp, turning to stare at her.

But Sansa ignored her, already blinking rapidly although the man had yet to open his mouth.

Something was wrong.

Something was very, very wrong, because there was no reason for the captain of _The Maiden Slayer_ to be standing before the King now without the Queen.

"Captain Reyak, Your Grace," the man said, bowing his head.

Joffrey narrowed his eyes. "You're the captain of the..."

He suddenly went very pale.

"I am afraid that I carry grave news, sire," the Captain said, nodding, but his eyes almost seemed as if they were on Sansa as he continued. "The _Maiden Slayer..._ has fallen prey to a terrible storm. I am afraid that...there were no survivors."

Sansa's legs went weak beneath her, and she found herself almost glad she had grabbed Shae a moment earlier, or else she might have gone down, now.

"What?" Joffrey said, staring at the man.

The captain gestured to one of the guards who had tried to stop him at the entrance to the great hall, and Sansa blinked, for she hadn't noticed the guard taking something from him when he'd entered. But now, he was very clearly holding something.

"The Queen's own brother's...remains were hardly recognizable," the man said, as if from a great distance, and Sansa felt the blood rushing from her head.

Sansa gagged as she realized that the Captain was holding Ser Loras' breastplate, though at the very least it was devoid of a bloated, rotting corpse.

She turned her head, aware that she shouldn't be showing such weakness but uncaring, as she buried her face in Shae's gown. She felt Shae's arms carefully wrap around her, and clung to the other woman, as if in doing so, she could shut out the whole world and the news that had just arrived.

No.

No, this couldn't be happening. This couldn't mean what she thought it meant. This had to be some sort of horrible trick, because, by the gods, Margaery had promised to come back to her.

Had promised not to leave her here forever, even as she went to Highgarden and escaped the Lannisters.

She had promised.

So there was no way she could be at the bottom of the sea right now, not even with that fortune teller's prophecy. The woman, this captain, they all had to be mistaken, because there was simply no way that this had happened.

She had promised.

And then, as if reminding her of her weakness, Shae gave her a gentle little push, and Sansa pulled away from her moments later, taking a deep breath and forcing the grief from her features as best she could.

She could still feel Cersei Lannister's eyes on her, however. It was not quite as unsettling as knowing that, where he stood with the other lords of the Small Council, her husband was also staring at her.

She knew that she would pay for that little display of emotion; she always did. And yet, just now, Sansa couldn’t bring herself to care.

Olenna Tyrell let out an agonized cry from the crowd, leaning heavily on the arm of one of Margaery's ladies for support at those words. The girl looked just as wrecked as her grandmother, and it took Sansa several moments to realize that she was Alla.

It was the most emotion Sansa thought she had ever seen from the other woman, on her features just now.

Joffrey stared, looking nonplussed. Sansa imagined he could not have looked more shocked than she herself felt, and he was sitting up straight in the Iron Throne now, staring at the Captain. He wasn't even looking at the breastplate, though. "And...the Queen?"

"I searched, but...No one could have survived the wreckage, Your Grace," the Captain said, bowing his head. "It was a most horrible storm, and I barely survived myself. My most sincere apologies."

By her son's side, Cersei closed her eyes.

Sansa looked away from the young woman, surprised that she wasn't gloating, if this was really true. If Margaery was really...

Really gone.

Sansa felt hot tears pricking at her eyes, and she closed her own, before she let them spill in front of the entire court. Vultures, she reminded herself, even if a part of her wanted to rail against that, wanted to wonder what it mattered, when Margaery was dead.

Margaery was dead.

She shook her head, horror coursing through her. No, she thought. Perhaps the Captain was wrong. Perhaps he had missed her, in the...in the wreckage...

Joffrey snapped his fingers, and two of the Kingsguard moved forward, then, bowing before their king even if they both looked a little nervous. Well, Ser Meryn looked more...expectant.

Sansa felt sick.

"You will find what remains of her for me," Joffrey said, coldly. "No matter how long it takes."

Cersei's eyes blinked back open, at that. "Joffrey..." she started, brows furrowing, but Joffrey ignored his mother.

"She will be buried in the Sept, like every queen before her, and accorded all the honors of a queen, if we have to fish her from the sea for years. And...I should like to look at what's left of her."

Sansa couldn't stop herself from gagging again, then. She had no doubt that, however much Joffrey had claimed to like his little wife; he would enjoy looking at her bloated, dead remains as much as he did the Targaryens.

Her remains. Margaery's remains.

The world seemed to spin. Shae's grounding touch on her shoulders kept her upright.

The Captain dipped his head, still affecting such a tragic look. Sansa wondered how many times he had even spoken to Margaery. "Of course, Your Grace."

And then, as if it had just suddenly occurred to him. "Wait a moment," Joffrey snapped after the Captain, who had already bowed and made ready to leave. The man paused, turning back around and bowing again. "You said that there were no survivors."

The Captain nodded, still looking pained. Or...perhaps pained was not the right word, Sansa thought, cocking her head as she narrowed in on the same weakness that Joffrey had found in this story.

Vultures, she'd said. Perhaps she was one of them, to be able to stand tall amongst them after learning that Margaery was...

"Yes, Your Grace."

"And yet I see you here in front of me, living to tell the tale," Joffrey said, his voice infused with far too much calm for Sansa's liking.

The Captain seemed to realize his fatal mistake at the same moment that Sansa had. "Your Grace-"

Joffrey glowered, standing to his feet. "You should not have done that."

The Captain's mouth opened and closed. He looked more shocked by the words than afraid. "Your Grace..."

"You should have gone down with the ship, rather than abandon the woman to whom you've sworn your service," Joffrey continued, still staring at him. "Did you abandon her to die?"

The captain sucked in a breath. "Your Grace, I would never-"

"Kneel!" Joffrey screamed, and the Captain fell to his knees, lowering his head in a supplicating manner.

"Your Grace, I..."

Joffrey did not give him the chance to continue his pitiful pleas, flying down the steps before the Iron Throne and landing on the main floor of the great hall with far more speed than Sansa thought was possible.

For a breath, Sansa thought Joffrey was going to kill him, was going to swing Widow's Wail and take the man's head off.

"Your Grace..."

Joffrey kicked the Captain in the stomach, and the man curled in on himself with a startled gasp. The court fell silent as they watched the scene unfold before them, Cersei standing as if to object before she pursed her lips and fell silent.

Sansa's breath left her body for a moment; it was not often that she had seen Joffrey moved to violence of his own accord; he enjoyed watching, after all, and yet the kick had been swift and brutal, and Joffrey's face was a myriad of emotions that Sansa had not thought him capable of.

For a moment, she wondered why the Captain did not stand to his feet and pull his sword on the child kicking him like a foolish servant, but Joffrey was the King, after all, surrounded by his Kingsguard. Even if the Captain could likely overpower him, he would find himself killed for it.

Perhaps he still thought the King meant to spare him.

Clearly, he didn't know the King quite so well as Sansa Stark.

Nor as Shae, she thought idly, as the other woman's iron grip tightened around her shoulder.

Joffrey kicked the man again, and then again, until the much larger man had curled in on himself on the ground, coughing up blood onto the marble floor, his bones cracking loudly with each of Joffrey's kicks.

"Did you abandon my queen to her death?" Joffrey screamed at the man. "Did you let her drown? Well? Did you?"

The Captain let out a ragged breath. "Everyone was lost to the sea by the time I was able to regain consciousness, she was already...Your Grace-"

"I don't care!" Joffrey screamed, kicking him again, this time to the head, and the Captain cried out then, reached up to protect his head before his hands too were kicked out of the way, Joffrey's face turning puce with his fury.

"That's fucking treason!" Joffrey continued, heedless of the man's explanations. "You left my wife in the fucking ocean so that you could escape the shipwreck yourself, didn't you?"

Sansa had not understood until this moment.

She had looked between Margaery and Joffrey, had seen Joffrey's wistfully smiling face as he watched his wife when she wasn't looking, and she hadn't thought there was any part of Joffrey capable of true feeling.

Had thought he viewed Margaery the same way he had Sansa, as something pretty to play nice with because he needed House Tyrell, and then to torment the moment the Tyrells' backs were turned.

When Margaery argued that Joffrey loved her in his own way, and that he would do anything for her, so long as she aligned it with his own desires, Sansa had thought the other girl overestimated her own importance, just as she overestimated her brother's ability to protect her, when Sansa told her how horrible Joffrey was before they were ever married.

But she hadn't said anything, because she thought to do so would be cruel, because Margaery was entirely at Joffrey's mercy, and she deserved some comforts.

She thought she finally understood, now.

Now that Margaery was...

She was not the only one who had loved a Rose, and while it terrified her to think that she shared that in common with Joffrey, she could not find it within herself to feel pity for this ship's captain as she watched Joffrey's hard boots kick him again, and again, and again.

When blood spurted out of the Captain's face and onto Joffrey's clothes, staining light brown robes with splatters of red, Cersei called out to her son in a quiet, reproachful tone.

Tyrion, Sansa noticed, where he stood with the other members of the Small Council, said nothing. Perhaps he realized, as Cersei did not, that nothing he said would have stopped Joffrey.

Joffrey ignored his mother as if she had not even opened her mouth, kicking the man in a rhythm that was far too steady.

The Captain's screams echoed throughout the Great Hall, his blood pooling on the floor beneath Joffrey's boots, until he was no longer recognizable under Joffrey's ministrations, until Sansa looked at him and saw nothing but a man who did not realize he was already dead.

The Captain reached for his sword at one point, and Joffrey cackled darkly, kicked it out of his reach and smashed the bones of the man's fingers beneath his boots.

"First my wife, and now your king, you traitor's scum," Joffrey hissed at the man, just loudly enough for the words to reverberate throughout the chamber. Another kick, and then another.

Somewhere in the back of the chamber, Sansa heard the sound of horrified retching, and reflected that, some time ago, that might have just as easily been her. She felt nothing now, nothing but the soft sound of Margaery's laughter in her head, the tears staining her cheeks not for this man, but for the one person she had thought she still had left in the world to love.

Even Olenna Tyrell looked disgusted by Joffrey's actions, and Sansa felt her thoughts darken as she looked toward the woman.

Sansa felt the moment the Captain died, even if there was no outward sign of it as she watched Joffrey mutilate him.

She wondered why she had not been able to feel the same with Margaery, even so far away as the other woman was.

She should have been able to feel her, Sansa thought frantically. She should have been able to feel her.

Joffrey kept kicking the Captain until there was hardly anything left of the corpse to kick but a pile of cracked bones and mashed flesh, but Sansa hardly found the sight sickening when Joffrey pulled away, face streaked with blood and lips jutting out into a pout.

Cersei stepped forward, put a comforting hand on her son's arm. "Joffrey..."

He shrugged it off, glared at her. "Don't touch me!" he screeched, before turning back to glare at the dead man who hardly resembled a man, anymore.

And then kicked him, again.

"That's enough, Your Grace," Tyrion did speak up then, coming out from the circle of Small Council members with a pained frown, his arms crossed over his chest.

Joffrey turned to his uncle, panting.

"That's enough," Tyrion repeated. "He's dead."

He said the words not as if they were an excuse for Joffrey to stop, but as if he meant them in comfort. Sansa felt her throat close.

Joffrey turned to stare back at the dead man on the floor, breathed in and out heavily for several moments that seemed to last whole lifetimes on their own. And then he spun away from the man, back up the steps to his throne.

Sansa remembered to breathe again. She wasn't sure if she was glad that he had stopped, or disappointed.

"Find everyone who was involved in building the _Maiden Slayer_ ," Joffrey snapped suddenly.

The Grandmaester stepped forward, looking a tad nervous. "And what would have us do with them, Your Grace?"

Joffrey glared at the old man. "I want their heads chopped off and hung on spikes for killing my queen. And then...their bodies should be crushed. Give them to the smallfolk to eat." He smirked. "Margaery would like that. She always liked to include the smallfolk."

Then he looked down at the body of the Captain, once more. "This one first."

The bastard had deserved it, for allowing Margaery to die on his watch.

Sansa jolted when she realized the thought that had just come to her upon watching a man violently killed in such a manner, because no one deserved this. No one, surely.

She bit her lip, hard enough to draw blood, and when Sansa lifted her head once more, she found Joffrey staring directly at her, before he turned away.

"Well," Joffrey said, with more feeling in his voice than Sansa had ever heard from him, as he spoke the quiet eulogy to his wife, "She was so very perfect."


	294. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short and sad. Promise the next one will be back to Margaery, finally.

Sansa didn't remember returning to her chambers, after the Captain was brutally murdered.

She didn't remember sitting down on the edge of the divan in the middle of the Hand's parlor, and she certainly didn't remember anyone placing a blanket around her shoulders.

But then she blinked, and that was where she was.

Sansa glanced around, startled, and saw that Tyrion and Shae were standing above her.

Towering over her.

Sansa flinched, and Shae seemed to realize the problem, motioning for Tyrion to move out of the way with a small huff. For his part, Tyrion moved, taking the chair across from the divan.

Sansa was...glad. She didn't think she could stomach being touched by a Lannister, just now.

And she felt instantly ashamed for the thought, remembering what Shae had told her. That he may be a Lannister, but...

But what? The simple truth was that he was a Lannister, and the Lannisters had undoubtedly killed Margaery because she'd gotten in their way one too many times.

Just because Joffrey didn't seem to know about any such plots, seemed to be...genuinely sad, or perhaps that wasn't the right word that his wife was dead, didn't mean that the rest of the Lannisters weren’t in on it.

And Tyrion had never disguised his distrust of Margaery.

Sansa shivered, suddenly glad of the blanket.

Because she knew what she was doing. Knew that she was distracting herself from thoughts of Margaery by thinking of the Lannisters, when the truth was, she didn't want to think about precisely why Joffrey had sat there and kicked that man to death.

Margaery was dead.

Margaery, sweet, beautiful, perfect Margaery, was lying at the bottom of the sea a thousand leagues from King's Landing, her perfect body no doubt charred beyond recognition before it even sank.

Sansa flinched at the vivid image that evoked, curling in on herself a little further.

She spared an idle thought to her dreams this past week, to how images of Margaery burning had haunted her. But she hadn't burned, had she? She'd drowned in the sea, leagues away from any friends save for her brother.

Her brother, who was also dead.

What was the point, she thought, of constantly trying to make friends in this friendless place? Every good person she'd ever had had been stolen from her, now.

Even if she had allowed herself to grow close to her husband, Sansa had no doubt that he would be next.

Even if he was a fucking Lannister.

But none of that even mattered, because Margaery was dead.

Margaery, with whom Sansa had shared all of her deepest secrets. Margaery, who had been life to her, in this godsforsaken place, for so long. A reprieve from the horrible environment she found herself living in.

Hope.

That was what Margaery had been, for the scant less than a year they had spent wrapped in each other's arms.

And now that hope was squandered.

Dead, at the bottom of the sea.

"Lady Sansa," her lord husband said stiffly, and Sansa's head jerked up. For a moment, she had forgotten that he was even there. "I am...sorry for your loss."

Sansa stared at him for a long moment, ashamed that her eyes were glazed and she could not even bring herself to blink. His image swayed in front of her, and she found herself sinking down further into the sofa without really looking.

She was surprised the man was saying anything at all to her, after the way she had to threaten him in order to even keep the relationship. Was surprised he looked like he cared so.

Was surprised he had sounded like he cared at all about his nephew, after watching Joffrey beat the captain to a pulp, and she flinched, wondering if this, too, was another performance on her husband's part.

"She's dead," Sansa said softly, numbly.

She had grown so used to death here, and yet, somehow, each time she encountered another, it was just as painful as the last.

Her father. Rickon. Bran. Her mother. Robb. Margaery.

All of them dead, all of them stolen from her.

Dead, dead, dead.

She couldn't believe what a foolish little girl she had been, this last time. She knew what happened to all of the people she cared about, knew what would happen to this one, too.

And still, she'd allowed herself to hope that because Margaery's last name was not 'Stark,' that somehow, she would be different.

But Margaery hadn't been different, not in the end. She'd opposed the Lannisters, and, whether indirectly or not, she'd died for it.

Margaery was dead.

She shuddered, feeling harsh sobs coursing up through her, as the realization hit her.

Margaery, her last true defense against Joffrey, was dead.

Margaery, the one person in King's Landing who had made things bearable here for Sansa, though Shae and Tyrion had tried, was dead.

Margaery, the woman she'd never really gotten around to telling she loved after Margaery had proclaimed it to her in the dungeons, was dead.

Sansa sniffed, and then the dam burst.

Her loss.

Because Tyron knew the truth about them, had known all of this time, and done nothing aobout it. Had been surprisingly decent about the whole thing.

But what did any of that matter now?

And then Shae was moving, pulling Sansa into her arms and burying Sansa's face in her side. Sansa allowed herself to be maneuvered, unflinching as the other woman pulled her close and petted at her hair.

Because it didn't matter at all. Margaery was gone, and this was nothing but an empty embrace, from a woman who wasn't the one Sansa wanted at all.

"She's dead," Sansa sobbed into Shae's arms.

"I know, Sansa," Shae said, petting at her hair. "I know."

Sansa shook her head, because no, she didn't know. She didn't understand. She didn't understand, and the thought made Sansa suddenly furious, the way she had been furious with Joffrey when he showed her her own father's head on a pike and she'd wanted to kill him.

"Everything I touch turns to shit!" she cried, slamming her head down on Shae's shoulder, feeling the sobs well up, then.

Shae pulled back then, grabbed Sansa's cheeks in her hands and forced the girl to lift her head, to face her. "This wasn't your fault, Sansa," she said harshly. "This had nothing to do with you."

Sansa wanted to laugh in her face. She couldn't quite abate the tears long enough to do so, however.

Because Shae didn't understand. How could she? Sansa was not even certain that they believed in the Seven, in Lorath.

Hells, she wasn't even certain she believed in the Seven. But if...if they existed, then the Stranger had certainly cursed Sansa long ago, for it seemed that everyone she loved was taken from her, in the end.

She had thought things might be different, with a friend like Margaery. A lover like Margaery.

She was the Queen; untouchable even by Joffrey, and that wasn't just because she was the Queen.

It was because she was Margaery. And that was what Sansa had loved her about.

Had.

Sansa choked on her own spit.

"Oh, Sansa," Shae said, pulling her into an embrace Sansa neither wanted nor needed, but Sansa forced herself to go limp in the other woman's hold, to do nothing.

It had been safe, loving Margaery, for she knew that out of everyone in King's Landing, she was the safest with whom Sansa could place her heart.

Out of anyone, Sansa could afford to love Margaery without fearing that love would destroy the other woman.

She could not ask for the same for anyone in her family, for her husband who tried so badly to be kind to her, for a servant Cersei had made no secret of wanting dead because of that husband.

But she could, of Margaery. Could love her wholly, because there was no danger there, in Margaery being pried from her arms for it.

Funny, how Sansa could only admit that she loved her now that the other woman was dead and beyond hearing it.

Except it wasn't funny at all, and suddenly Sansa was sobbing again.

"I..."

"I know," Shae said, and seemed to be acknowledging something Sansa couldn't. "I know, my love. I know. You just cry."

And Sansa did just that, until the tears turned salty and tasteless on her tongue, until her eyes had grown puffy and dry, until her head began to throb from the pain of it, until her throat swelled in pain and she wanted to puke, she felt so ill.

And Shae held her through it all, where Margaery Tyrell no longer could.


	295. MARGAERY

"Loras!" Margaery screamed, as the fire ravaged the wooden cabin around her, as water lapped at her-

She glanced down. The cabin was rapidly filling with water, even as smoke choked at her lungs, now at her ankles, now at her calves, and Margaery felt her throat close with terror.

"Margaery!" she heard her brother shout, and then Loras was rushing forward, appearing out of the flames, or so it seemed, as he threw himself at her.

Margaery barely had the time to ask him what he was doing before she found herself falling flat on her back, slamming into the harsh wooden flooring beneath her. Or perhaps that was a ceiling...

She cried out in pain, smoke flooding her lungs once more, as her delicate back slammed into the hard wood, and she glanced up at Loras, crying out again at the sight that greeted her.

The sight of Loras, pinned down on top of her, heavier than he should have been because he was shielding her from the wooden beam which a moment ago would have fallen and crushed her.

And had now fallen on top of her brother's legs.

"Loras?" she whispered desperately, reaching out and shaking him. "Loras!"

Her brother slowly lifted his head, presenting Margaery with a pained grimace. "I'm all right," he gasped out, though he was pale enough, only illuminated by the fire rushing through their cabin, that she didn't quite believe him.

"I'm all right. I just..." he gritted his teeth. "Margaery..." he said, and there was a hardness to his tone that warned her of what was coming. "You're going to have to lift the beam off of us."

Margaery gaped at him, then at the heavy beam laying over her brother. She didn't think she could do it. "I..."

"Margaery," he repeated, forcing her with his tone to look up and meet his gaze. "You can do this."

She took a shuddering breath. "I..."

He reached out, squeezing her hand. "Margaery."

She took another breath, felt more smoke filling her lungs as the cabin was licked by flames, more rapidly surrounding them, as her back went wet, from blood or the sea beneath them, she couldn’t tell.

"Help!" she screamed, and Loras sighed.

"Margaery..."

"Help!"

"Margaery, no one is coming," Loras said, and Margaery stopped, turning to stare at him incredulously.

"Loras..." she gasped out, and was ashamed to realize she was crying.

He shook his head, and Margaery took a deep breath. "What do I do?"

Her brother sighed, either out of relief or pain, she couldn’t' tell.

"Reach under me," he instructed her, and Margaery moved with shaking hands to comply, even as the sound of fire around them temporarily drowned out his voice. "What?"

Or perhaps that wasn't fire, but rain, she thought, a sudden hope filling her. If it was storming, surely that would be rid of the flames soon enough, would it not? And then the crew would come, and rescue them.

 _"No one is coming,"_ her brother had said, and Margaery squinted at him.

She moved her arms beneath her brother, felt the wooden beam, heavy on his leg, and flinched. She couldn't do it. She wouldn't be able to move that beam with her brother lying on top of her.

"Loras..."

"You can do this, Margaery," Loras told her, shouting to be heard. "I'm right here. I can help, but you have to do this."

Margaery bit her lip, shaking her head. She could barely breathe anymore, and she sucked in one breath, and then another. "I..."

"Margaery, push!" her brother screamed at her, and she felt one of his hands falling over hers at the moment that she did so.

She had one hysterical thought, that moments ago, her brother had been talking about another situation entirely in which he'd be yelling at her to push.

Except it wouldn't be him, it would be a midwife, or a maester, she thought desperately, as her arms strained beneath the weight of the beam.

"I...I can't," she gasped out, as she felt it fall back on top of her. Heard her brother grunt, even over the crackling of fire. "Loras, I..."

Her brother was still staring down at her, and she wished she could tell him to turn around, even with the crushing weight of the beam on top of him, because then he might be able to push it off himself without her assistance, even if it was weakening-

She watched flame lick up her brother's pinned leg as he let out a scream, and that was all the sudden motivation she needed to throw the beam off of both of them.

She wondered if that was what it was like, to be a mother. To know your child was in danger and suddenly have a power within you that you'd never had before.

She wondered if that was why Cersei Lannister was the way she was for several moments, before taking a deep breath and purging such thoughts from her mind.

Loras screamed in pain as the beam flew off him and clattered to the floor beside him, and then he was sitting up, patting at his burning leg as if it was perfectly safe to do so.

When the flames had vanished from his leg at least, though they seemed to grow around them, he turned around, facing Margaery. There was a look of utmost determination on his face as he reached down and tore at Margaery's gown.

"Loras?" she wheezed out, and suddenly the world was spinning in front of her and Loras was growing blurry, as if he were a mirage that was about to disappear before her eyes.

Her brother slammed a strip of her gown in front of her nose, and Margaery reached up for it desperately, covering herself as she realized what it was for.

She breathed in deep, and thought the gown wasn't the greatest filter, but it would do. SHe glanced at her brother, and saw that he had his own strip of her gown pressed to his nose, but he'd ripped off more than that, the gown disappearing up around her thighs, and she blinked at him in confusion.

And then she followed his gaze, or rather, where he had been looking before he ripped her gown, and felt herself growing pale.

Another beam, burning, had fallen in front of the door to her cabin, a wall of fire dividing them from the rest of the ship.

A sinking feeling filled her, and Margaery closed her eyes, breathing in deep again as the cabin grew unbearably hot.

They were going to die in here, she thought, horror filling her. They were going to die in one of the worst possible ways that she could imagine, burning alive, trapped like rats in a sinking ship.

Loras reached out and squeezed her hand, and she blinked at him, eyes still watering from the smoke. Then he was on his feet, stumbling away from her, and Margaery blinked in confusion at him, because what was he doing, leaving her here-

Loras stumbled as far as he could through her cabin, and it occurred to Margaery that everything she owned of worth was burning in this cabin just now as well. Her gowns, the new book Willas had given her, his last present to her before he was killed-

She knew these shouldn’t be the thoughts filling her mind just now, but she couldn't think of anything else.

And then her brother slammed his shoulder into a bit of the cabin wall that had splintered, that was still burning, and Margaery screamed, even as she knew enough about fire to know that she should be conserving her air.

Her brother ignored her, slamming himself into it again. And then he let out a groan that she could hear even from where she sat, and Margaery stumbled to her feet, telling herself that she really shouldn't be staying where she was, not if their cabin was about to burst into flames and Loras was trying his damndest to fight their way out of it.

Just as she stood, the place where she had been sitting burst into flames, and Margaery cried out, stumbling away from it, her bare feet sloshing through the water rapidly filling the cabin.

And then her brother was grabbing the one chair in the room, which had been by her burning bed moments ago. His leg nearly buckled as he pulled the chair up into the air, slammed it against the curved wall farthest from the cabin door.

"Loras..."

They were underwater, Margaery distantly remembered. This whole cabin was under water, and it wasn't going to be easy to burst a hole into the wall, not with a wall of water behind that. Her brother would need the strength of more than just a chair-

The splintered wood gave under the next push of the chair against it, and Margaery cried out in alarm as water flooded the cabin.

"Loras!" she screamed, the latter half of the name disappearing as a wave of water rushed into her mouth, and Margaery choked, her hands flapping desperately at the air before she disappeared beneath the wave erupting into the cabin and swallowing her.

She knew how to swim, of course she did. In warm, still pools in the Reach, where one didn't have to worry about being dragged away by a current or disappearing beneath waves as large as one's body.

Margaery felt the icy water swallow her, and cold fear rushed through ehr at the same moment.

She was going to die here, Margaery thought horribly. She was going to sink beneath the waves outside of Dorne, and no one would ever know what had happened to her. Sansa would never know what had happened to her.

The water was tinted red with the fire above them, but Margaery hardly paid attention to that, instead felt herself being crushed against the floor of the cabin as the water pushed in around her.

And then, suddenly, it was as if the water reversed direction, sucking her out of the cabin when it should have done no such thing.

She saw her brother, floating in the water near her, and then he too, disappeared, as the world around Margaery felt heavy, and she found herself screaming again.

She was out of the ship, she realized distantly, though there wasn't enough air reaching her brain to think more than that. She was out fo the ship, and still somewhere deep in the sea, and she was going to drown before she ever made it to the surface.

And her brother was still trapped in that cabin somewhere, and she could barely see what remained of the ship now, as she turned to stare at it, burning away as it was, even underwater, which surely couldn't have been possible...

Margaery's thoughts of the ship suddenly died away as a figure appeared in the water before her, and she froze, felt air leaving her at the shock she felt.

Because she recognized this unmoving figure, floating in the water before her.

Margaery's eyes went wide. She stared at the young woman, floating stilly in the water, her eyes wide but unseeing, and Margaery let out another silent scream, the last of her air fleeing her at the sight of her handmaiden, pale and drowned in the water before her.

Dead.

Oh gods, Meredyth was dead.

Meredyth was floating still in the water, tangled in the pink gown she had been wearing the last time Margaery had seen her, and though she doubted Meredyth had been dead for longer than a few moments, already she seemed almost unrecognizable.

Margaery scrambled back, her limbs suddenly remembering how to move, and she realized now, seeing how the gown had tangled in Meredyth's limbs, why Loras had torn off so much of her own.

She didn't know where the piece of fabric she'd been using to cover her mouth had gone, but Margaery was suddenly very grateful for it.

She coughed, choking on water, scrambling madly away, because a dozen images were filling her addled mind, of Meredyth, throwing her head back and laughing at something Margaery had alluded to. Meredyth, pouring Cersei's tea while she struggled to keep a straight face. Meredyth, teasing Margaery in the nights before her first marriage, when none of them had known what to expect from Loras' lover.

Meredyth, dead in the water in front of her, and suddenly it wasn't just that Margaery couldn't breathe, but that her lungs were burning, and if she didn't-

Strong arms wrapped around her waist, and Margaery fought against them for only a moment, feeling her limbs weakening, before she was pulled above the surface of the sea.

She gasped and felt air burning through her lungs, cried out at how painful it felt to breathe in air now even as those strong arms deposited her onto a large piece of wood.

She wheezed, glancing up and meeting Loras' bloodshot eyes. She could only see that they were bloodshot at all through the reflection of fire in them.

She wheezed in another breath, and then she was coughing up water onto the wood they were both hanging off of, Margaery more so than her brother.

"I've got you," her brother gasped out, crushing her head against his chest until she couldn’t breathe, could hardly think. "I've got you..."

"Loras," she crushed out, and then her brother was pulling away from her, forcing a smile as he smoothed down her hair. She was breathing hard, shaking in her brother's arms, and for a moment Margaery knew nothing but her brother's body against her, cold but somehow offering warmth after her dunk beneath the sea.

Her brother cursed under his breath, and then pulled back, and Margaery sucked in a desperate gasp of her own.

It was only then that she glanced around, realized why her upper half no longer felt wet, but felt as though her gown was sticking to her.

They were on a piece of the ship, she realized idly. The hull, curved beneath her, her brother's upper half floating atop it as well, while his legs disappeared beneath the water. She could see he own legs, no longer hindered by the gown she wore, bared in the dark.

She shivered, teeth beginning to chatter as she remembered how Meredyth had looked, tangled in her own gown. Strangled by it, perhaps, before she had even drowned.

Loras reached out and rubbed at her shoulders. "Margaery," he said hoarsely, as if he had been saying it for some time, and Margaery turned to blink at him.

She felt as if her whole body was shaking as badly as her teeth.

"Did you hurt yourself anywhere?" he asked her, and Margaery blinked at him, uncomprehending.

And then Loras reached out and ran his hands down her body, and Margaery flinched away from him the way she had never done before, because all her mind could think of was that those were man's hands touching her-

"Margaery," her brother whispered, pulling back from her and looking slightly stricken, and she felt her cheeks heat, even in the darkness.

She looked away from him, and heard her brother pull in several ragged, desperate breaths, before seeming to get control of himself.

They sat on the boat for several more moments, and then Margaery realized that it really was raining. Pouring, actually, the torrent falling down on them in heavy, cold drops that had her shivering and pulling what was left of her gown closer around her.

"It..." she sucked in a deep breath, and then another. "Was it the storm?" she asked, glancing desperately back at her brother, not wanting to discuss at all why she had flinched away from him. "Lightning, perhaps?"

Her brother shook his head, face solemn as a loud crash could be heard behind them, as she glanced back and saw the remainder of the ship falling beneath the waves.

Perhaps _The Maiden Slayer_ had been an apt name after all, Margaery thought bitterly, and then cringed, thinking of Meredyth.

"There's no lightning," her brother said, voice soft, and Margaery blinked at him, uncomprehending.

"Then what..."

Her brother lifted one hand, and pointed, and Margaery was helpless to do anything but follow his gaze.

To the other piece of driftwood which seemed to have made it out of the crash, to the figure straddling it, rowing with a piece of wood away from the crash, away from them.

Her breath caught in her throat, and she reached out, gripping Loras' arm. "A survivor," she breathed, wonder filling her. Because if they had survived, perhaps others had as well..."

"Margaery," her brother said, voice solemn, and Margaery blinked at him. He shook his head, but Margaery ignored the warning.

"Help!" she cried out, toward the other piece of wood, but they didn't turn around, wherever they were, and her voice was lost in the wind and rain. "What-"

Her brother wrapped a hand around and her mouth and pulled her down, and she jerked against the touch, feeling uncommonly vulnerable.

Perhaps it had been her brother's suggestion that he give her an heir, she didn't know, but the thought of her brother touching her at all just now was abhorrent.

"He's not going to help us, Margaery," Loras told her, and she blinked at him in bemusement. "Someone had to have started the fire."

She shook her head, reminded of her brother's worry over how many Lannisters were on this ship before she pulled her mouth away from his hand. "But..."

"I saw powder on the ship," Loras informed her, the words vomiting out of his mouth. "The sort of stuff they use in Dorne, but I doubt it was meant to fight the Dornish."

Margaery blinked at him, uncomprehending. "What?"

"Margaery...I didn't think much of it at the time, though I did ask the Captain. He told me..." he grimaced, letting out a wheezing laugh. "Lied straight to my face, the fucker."

She shook her head. "What are you talking about?"

Loras sighed. "Margaery, he told me it was in case we were attacked when we passed Dorne. But I've heard the stories of what Tyrion Lannister did in King's Landing when Stannis attacked as well as you have. I know what I saw. I should have..." he grimaced. "I shouldn't have discounted that."

Margaery was shaking her head so hard it was beginning to hurt. "Loras, I don't..."

But she did.

"Why in the seven hells didn't you say anything?" she demanded.

Loras blinked at her. "Because I didn't think Joffrey would be stupid enough to kill his own wife," he told her bluntly, and Margaery blinked at him.

When she glanced back that way, toward whoever the figure had been but now, she couldn’t help but think it had been the Captain, she couldn't even see the man in the rain, in any case, and Margaery let out a long sigh.

"Loras..." she whispered hoarsely, hugging herself as she began to shiver again. "Do you..." she shook her head. "What are we going to do?"

If her brother was right and whoever else had survived had started the fire, they couldn't depend on the other survivor to bring help, to even anticipate that they were alive.

And what were they to do, but hang off this piece of driftwood until the nearest Martell ship came along and took them prisoner, now that her idiot father had declared war on Dorne?

She shivered again.

But her brother's answer shocked her more than the knowledge that Cersei had likely taken to the fact that Joffrey had given a ship meant for her to Margaery with ill grace, and ordered her dead, and someone had just tried to kill her and succeeded at killing Meredyth.

"You'll have to leave me."

Her head whipped around, and Margaery wasn't sure if tears or rain were staining her cheeks as she stared incredulously at him.

"Margaery, look at me," her brother said, voice quietly calm over the crushing waves around them. "Look at me."

She forced her desperate gaze up to meet his. Loras gave her one long look and sighed. "You're going to have to leave me, Margaery."

Margaery stared at him, incredulity filling her. "What?" she demanded. "Loras, what are you talking about? I'm not...I'm not leaving you."

He shook his head. "You need to leave me," he repeated, and then gestured down, to the driftwood he was hanging onto.

Margaery felt her stomach clench, even as she glanced down to where he was gesturing. Her heart leapt into her throat, at the sight of the dark blood staining the water around his leg.

And then her brother took the ability to make that choice out of Margaery's hands, and let go of the wood.

Margaery screamed as she watched his head slam against it a moment later, a particularly violent wave pushing him towards it as he let go. As she watched him disappear beneath the dark waves.


	296. MARGAERY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry guys. You thought I was just gonna let Loras die like that?

"Loras!" Margaery screamed above the crashing waves and torrent of rain, a slow panic filling her.

She had just watched her brother fall beneath the waves, the piece of wood she was half sitting on now nearly tipping as he let go of it, and she didn't think she could survive watching his body float to the surface, dead as Meredyth's had been.

"Loras!"

No, she couldn't do this. She couldn't lose him, too, so soon after Willas. She couldn't. "Loras!"

And then she saw him, sinking below the waves, and Margaery acted without thinking. She twisted around on the piece of wood, until her legs were hanging onto it and she was able to slip her arms beneath the water.

But he was too heavy for her, and she didn't know what to do, how to get him out of here. This wasn't like with the beam, where she had pushed it off of him; she needed his help, if she was going to get him free.

"Loras, please," she begged, or might have only thought the words, but then her brother’s eyes were snapping open, and Loras gasped in water as he followed her back to the surface, clawing for air.

She didn't wait for him to cough up the water he'd swallowed, when he did surface. Instead, she beat her hands on his chest, scowling at him.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" she screamed at him, and her brother coughed up water and looked genuinely sorry.

He grimaced, reaching up and rubbing at a stripe of red across his forehead, and Margaery's throat closed, at the sight of it. She moved forward, attempting to wipe it away, before she realized it was a gash as thin as her wrist.

"No," she whispered, terror filling her.

She knew why he had done it, of course. This piece of the ship he had managed to salvage was not big enough for the both of them, and already she could feel it beginning to clog with water and sink beneath their combined weight.

And her brother was injured, badly, she feared, now more even than before. He didn’t want her worrying about stabilizing him, not when it would mean choosing between the both of them.

Fuck him, she thought vindictively. How dare he do that to her, take that choice away from her. She was his queen, and he had no right, even if he had been trying to protect her.

How dare he!

But now, her brother looked dazed, and she worried that the blow to his head, when he'd slipped beneath the waves, had done even more harm to him than to mar his pretty face.

"Loras?" she whispered. "Loras, stay with me."

Her brother glanced up at her, confusion the only emotion she could read in his gaze, before he shook his head. "Margaery?"

She nodded, voice hoarse and throat clogging. He sagged against their piece of wood, lowering his head, and a quiet desperation filled Margaery. She tilted his chin up with her finger, pleading, "Loras, look at me."

He did, though his eyes were unfocused and glazed with pain. "Margaery-" he whispered, the word coming out faintly, and jumbled.

Margaery swallowed back a sob as she smiled and choked out, "Yes, Loras, it's me, Marg. I'm here. Look at me."

Her brother shook his head. "What..."

Gods damn him, Margaery thought, he wasn't going to do this. Not now, not here.

"Margaery, what..."

"I'm right here," she whispered, pressing their foreheads together. "I'm right here. Stay with me, Loras."

Her brother shook his head, and the confusion seemed to flee from him, for a moment. "Margaery, we're not going to make it."

"Not if you talk like that, we're not," Margaery whispered, struggling to be heard above the rain but uncertain if she could speak louder. "Loras, don't do that again."

Loras blinked at her, and then down at his legs, and he paled, where they sat in the shallow water of the wood they drifted on. "Margaery..."

"Look at me," she repeated, and her brother did. "Loras, I need you with me. Please."

Her brother shook his head, glancing over her shoulder, and it took her a moment to realize that he was judging the distance to the shore.

The shore, an interminable distance away from where they were, and they had not the luxury of an oar.

And then he glanced down at the sinking piece of wood beneath them, and closed his eyes.

Margaery hated the expression on his face, because she knew what it meant all too well.

"No!" she snapped at him, and his eyes flew open. "No, you're not going to give up now, do you hear me?" she snapped. "You have to stay with me, Loras."

"Just...leave me..." Loras said tiredly, rubbing at his injury with a grimace. "I'll only slow you down. You need to leave?"

He said it like a question, and she wondered how badly he had hit his head.

"I'm not leaving you," she snapped at him, and then, seeing his wince, her expression softened. "You remember that day in Highgarden, when we were children?" Margaery asked, squeezing his hands hard to get his attention. Loras blinked lazily up at her, and Margaery swallowed hard.

"That horrible day when Garlan took you riding for the first time before you were fostered and you fell off your horse and it kicked you? You were injured so badly, everyone thought that what had happened to Willas would..." her words choked in her throat, and she stared at her brother, wide eyed. "But you didn't."

"You promised you'd never leave me," Loras said, his voice colored by fatigue. A bone tiredness that she hated to hear in her brother, every time he brought up Renly, every time she asked him where her brother had gone.

She nodded feverishly. "I did. I sat by your bed through the whole of your recovery, and I never left you, Loras. I swore I never would. We were together always, because you're my brother. It killed me when you left me, but I knew you were happy, with Renly."

"Renly..." he swallowed hard. "I miss him so much. So godsdamned much."

"I know," Margaery whispered, "I know, but I need you to miss him for just a bit longer, Loras. Please. I need you."

Loras blinked at her. "But I..."

I won't leave you now, do you hear me?" Margaery repeated the words, stubbornly. "I'm not going anywhere without you."

"Renly..." Loras whispered, reaching out into the waves as though he could touch Renly, could see him now, and Margaery swallowed hard.

"Loras, please..." she pleaded, as she had never done for anything before in her life.

But Loras shook his head. "Margaery, please," he begged her, and she didn't think she had heard him sound so heartbroken since the day she had practically peeled him off of Renly's body, begging him to save her when Stannis' forces threatened to overwhelm them.

"Let me go."

She shook her head. "Fuck you," she snapped out, and her brother's eyes widened as a bit of clarity stole back into them. "Fuck you, Loras. You don't get to leave me like this. You're not abandoning me now, do you hear me?"

Loras blinked at her, and then blinked over her shoulder again, and she swallowed, not liking the look in his eyes, not at all.

She felt the wood beneath her stomach begin to splinter, could hear it cracking beneath her, and her next breath caught in her throat.

Fuck the Lannisters, she thought. If they thought they were going to kill the both of them, they were wrong. She was going to make sure her brother lived, even if she didn't. She was going to-

And then her brother's strong arms wrapped around her waist, and Margaery let out an involuntary yelp. She glanced at him, saw that his blood was still hemorrhaging in the water, and paled as his arms closed around her waist, as he pulled her from the rapidly breaking wood that had been their savior.

"Loras, what-"

And then her brother tossed her through the air like a ragdoll, and Margaery screamed as she went flying, as her body slammed into something else hard and wooden, but not breaking beneath her weight.

Her head slammed against it first, and she cried out.

The last thing she saw, before her world went dark, was the sight of her brother, disappearing beneath the waves on the raft they'd been using.

And the last thing she heard was a hoarse sound of shock that didn't sound like her brother's voice, at all.


	297. TYRION

"I will have a monument built in my wife's name," Joffrey said, grinning a little where he sat with feet up on the table in the Small Council, arms crossed, and Tyrion found himself wondering idly how Margaery Tyrell had even made a long enough lasting impression on his twat of a nephew, that he was still so fixated on her even now that she had gone.

Tyrion knew that there was something terribly wrong with the boy. The smallfolk called it madness, and the nobles simply called it cruelty and cowardice, but Tyrion could see well enough on a good day there was something more to it than that. No doubt to do with his incestuous conception, even if Myrcella and Tommen had turned out all right.

After all, most little boys did not go about cutting open cats to see what was inside. And, when they got bored of that, cutting open humans.

He grimaced, wondering again about the Queen whom Joffrey still seemed to so desperately mourn.

Tyrion had seen the way he kicked that Captain to death. Had seen the fury and the pain in his eyes, and knew that stepping forward before he had would have been ill advised. Joffrey needed to kill something, in that moment, and Tyrion would much rather it be some captain with dubious innocence regarding the whole thing than the obvious choice; the one who had no doubt arranged the death.

He still cared for his sister somewhat, after all.

Oh, he knew she'd likely been behind this. Joffrey might be a little shit and stupid as a brick, but he had been right about one thing, and that was that the Captain had been rather too eager to run back to King's Landing and tell his king of his failure to bring the Queen home. No sane man would have returned at all, at least if he was not being adequately rewarded.

And there was only one person in King's Landing who might have stood to gain from Margaery Tyrell's death. The rest of King's Landing had rather thrived on it, after all. There had been far less craziness, it had seemed, while Good Queen Marg held the King's hand. Tyrion wasn't altogether certain that was truly the case, but she had seemed to have a remarkable handle on him, and Tyrion counted himself at least annoyed personally that she was gone.

Especially with how moody Joffrey was; he hadn't yet taken his grief out on the rest of the realm, but Tyrion had a terrible feeling that it was only a matter of time until he at least took it out on Sansa.

He hadn't confronted Cersei about it. For one, he didn't want word getting out of it, for he was reasonably sure that the Lannisters had now killed three Tyrell heirs, well two and Ser Loras, and he had no interest in the rest of the realm discovering this, as well. The Tyrells may have put up with Joffrey remarkably while he was all but abusing their daughter, but he doubted they would do the same if they learned the Lannisters had likely killed her.

For another, Cersei would only deny it, and Tyrion, being what he was, would see through her lie in an instant. And then he would have to go back to his chambers in the Tower of the Hand and look at his wife, and know that she was barely able to pull herself out of bed because of his family, yet again.

Sansa was a wreck, he didn't mind admitting, since finding out what had happened to Margaery Tyrell. The girl barely left her chambers, barely left her bed, and then only with either the gentle coaxing or the harsh demands of Shae. She didn't seem to hear Tyrion at all, these days.

And Tyrion, he...didn't know how to act around her. He remembered when Tysha had left his life, however brief and startling her entrance and exit into it had been, and how despondent he had been, afterwards. Jaime had tried to cheer him up, to little avail.

He didn't remember wanting company at the time, and didn't wish to force his upon his lady wife, if she didn't wish it.

Besides, she had stated quite plainly before this that she didn't want him around, whatever Shae seemed to think of the matter.

And Sansa was not the only one suffering from the death, and badly in danger of endangering all of them for it.

But, even as he watched Joffrey kill the man alongside the rest of the court, as shaken as the rest of them but better able to hide it, he'd wondered. Wondered how Margaery Tyrell could have such a hold over the boy, for this wasn't normal, not even for him.

He'd heard the shocked denial in Joffrey's tone, when the Captain had told him what had happened to his queen. Had seen true grief on the features of one Tyrion had always thought incapable of it.

Oh, Tyrion had heard that he cried when Robert died; crocodile tears for a man who had been as horrified by his son as Jaime was, and they'd dried quickly enough when the boy realized he was now king.

But this...Joffrey was wearing black these days, instead of his mother's red, black like he hadn't even worn after Robert's death, and a golden choker hung around his neck, the only symbol of his mother's house at all.

He hadn't stopped talking about his wife, either, not since news of her death had reached them. To the point where, if she had bothered to come out of her chambers, Tyrion thought even Sansa might have grown sick of it.

And Cersei certainly seemed to have, for she was not even at this Small Council meeting, and seemed to have made it a point to avoid her son, in the last few days.

Tyrion had put a stop to his plans to feed the corpses of those "responsible" for Margaery's death to the smallfolk, the only way that he truly knew how. The one way that Cersei seemed incapable of; by lying to the brat.

He'd told him that his wishes had all been carried out, that everyone who had a hand in building the ship was dead, and had given them all twenty gold dragons and sent them on their way to Pentos. It seemed to be the best scenario for everyone, though Tyrion lived in fear that Joffrey would ask to see any corpses.

But Joffrey, Tyrion had heard, had been distracted lately. He had even summoned Lady Olenna to him before she left King's Landing, no doubt traumatized, to tell her how much he had cared for her dear granddaughter, and to let him know if there was ever anything she might need.

Joffrey had never been so generous, and now here he was, wanting to build a statue to his wife as if she had been one of the Seven, Tyrion thought darkly.

Had Margaery Tyrell simply played her part well enough that her husband had seen a kindred spirit in her? Tyrion couldn't think so. After all, she was only a girl, and not the most subtle one at that.

But a monument. That would cause problems, and even as stupid as Joffrey was, he had to know that. He had, after all, spent some of his childhood being taught in the ways of the Faith.

The Grandmaester cleared his throat, eyes dry today but face sallow and gaunt in a way Tyrion had never imagined it could be. "A monument, Your Grace?"

Joffrey bobbed his head. "My Queen was an exceptional lady, and if her remains are never found, it is only right that she should be remembered in an exceptional way." He cocked his head, cold green eyes lost in thought. "I want a monument built in her image, to commemorate her beauty and perfection for all of time."

Varys glanced at the Grandmaester, and then took a hesitant breath. "Your Grace," he said, keeping his tone even, "Perhaps, in light of the current climate within the city, a monument might not be the best way of showing your affection for the Queen. Taxes being what they are, the people will not appreciate it. The Sparrows, I am told, have begun declaring any and all statues that do not depict the Seven to be idolatry, and according to the Seven Point-"

"Then we shall depict the Seven," Joffrey said, his lips twisting into a shallow version of his signature grin, "The people loved my wife. She was as beautiful as any depictions of the Maiden."

Tyrion paled, stepping in before this situation could get worse. "Your Grace, claiming that your wife, however lovely she was-"

"You don't get to talk about her," Joffrey snapped at him, lifting a finger and shoving it at Tyrion. The anger in his voice surprised even Tyrion. "You never cared for her the way I did, and so you don't get to tell me how I want to remember her."

Tyrion pursed his lips. "As you seem determined to forget," he said darkly, "I am your Hand of the King, and as such, it is my responsibility to ensure that the realm is kept stable. I know of only one way to do that, and it is not by inciting rebellion amongst the smallfolk."

"No," Joffrey snapped, "Apparently it is by losing my war with Stannis Baratheon."

Tyrion gritted his teeth. "Your Grace, I understand your grief-"

Joffrey leapt forward in his chair, leaning hard over the Small Council table. "You know nothing of my grief," he hissed out. "Nothing. When have you lost your...your..." he cut off suddenly, raising a fist to his mouth, and turned away.

For a moment, he looked just like a little boy, and Tyrion blinked, and the image was gone.

The Grandmaester cleared his throat. "Perhaps His Grace would appreciate a recess-"

"I'm fine!" Joffrey snapped, sitting upright once more. "And I want that fucking monument built by the end of the month. My lady would expect nothing less than perfection. Artists from Bravos, if necessary."

Tyrion let out a long sigh. He supposed this wasn't the worst idea Joffrey'd ever had. He could always focus his attention on killing more people he considering indirectly responsible for Margaery's murder.

What was a little sacrilege, amongst kings?

He pinched the bridge of his nose, the horrible feeling rushing through him that something horrible was going to come of this.

"It will be expensive, Your Grace," the Grandmaester tried, one more time.

Joffrey grunted. "I don't care," he muttered, and Tyrion let out a long sigh.

"Fine," he said, and felt the eyes of the Small Council members blinking at him as one. "But in exchange for our full cooperation, Your Grace, there is one thing that we require."

Joffrey's eyes were hooded. "And what is that?"

Tyrion took a deep breath, and made the plunge. "Now that your lady wife is dead, regrettable though it might be, there are two points of order which must be seen to, Your Grace, and seen to as soon as possible."

Joffrey stiffened in his chair. "No," he said, and Tyrion sighed.

"Your Grace-"

"I won't do it," Joffrey gritted out. "I won't."

"Your Grace," Tyrion said again. "You must. For the good of the realm."

Not that Tyrion thought Joffrey cared a whit about that, of course.

"The good of the realm?" Joffrey echoed, scoffing. "She was my wife, not some pawn in your chess games, Uncle."

Tyrion blinked, yet again surprised by the vitriol in his nephew's voice, by the emotion he was displaying for this girl who, while pretty, wasn't the prettiest girl he had ever seen, and while friendly, had stood by impassively while Joffrey had his fun with the smallfolk.

Perhaps that was the problem.

Tyrion had seen beyond the curtain that was Margaery Tyrell while he plotted with her to free Sansa from the Black Cells, had seen a little more when she turned against him and went her own way. She was a ruthless woman, willing to do whatever it took to get what she wanted, and Joffrey must have loved her for it. That was the only explanation.

"There must be a funeral, Your Grace," Tyrion said carefully. "The Queen must be put to rest."

"To rest," Joffrey echoed blankly, tapping his fingers on the table. Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap. "The Queen's body isn't even found. What do you mean, putting her to rest?"

Tyrion grimaced. "Poor choice of words, Your Grace. But there must be a ceremony, even with no body to be found. We have been searching, and the people expect it."

"The people expect it," Joffrey echoed blankly.

"The Tyrells expect it," Tyrion corrected, and Joffrey fell silent then, looking ruffled for a moment.

"Very well," he said tiredly. "If the Tyrells expect it, then I suppose as King, I ought to give them that. They are family, after all."

Tyrion nodded, relieved at least about that. They had to do everything they could, just now, to ensure that the Tyrells were at least satisfied with the way things were going in King's Landing. "I shall inform the High Septon at once," he said.

"And the other matter," Joffrey said, "The Tyrells won't ask me for that. For all I know," his eyes shone, "She might have been pregnant, before she..." he coughed, loudly.

The Grandmaester spoke, then. "It is highly unlikely, Your Grace," he assured. Or perhaps disappointed; Tyrion couldn't be sure which Joffrey wanted more. "What with the journey to Highgarden, and the time she spent there, she might have been showing by the time that she left, and would not have been permitted to travel such a long distance by boat."

Joffrey nodded miserably. "Well, I suppose there is that," he said, and Tyrion blinked at him, for even if the Queen had been pregnant, it wouldn't have mattered to their current situation. She was still dead, and any child lost with her. "Still, I refuse to name my brother my sole and true heir until her body is found. I won't allow it."

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose. "Your Grace, Tommen is your sole and true heir. You must name him unless you plan to have a-"

"Don't say it," Joffrey gritted out. Tap tap. Tap tap.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "Very well, but my meaning stands. It will be a simple proclamation, but Tommen's education must be seen to, and..."

"I don't want to hear about it," Joffrey gritted out. "Is that not simple enough to understand?"

Tyrion sighed. "Of course, Your Grace."

"And you will see to all the funeral arrangements," Joffrey gritted out. "You seem happy enough to do so, after all."

Tyrion grimaced, and could think of nothing he would rather do less than sit in his chambers, knowing that Sansa was just across the hall, working on funeral arrangements for the woman she'd truly loved. "As you wish, Your Grace."


	298. SANSA

Sansa spent her days in listless agony, wanting nothing more than to crawl back under the sheets of her bed and sleep for days, though Shae refused to allow that.

She did let it happen the first day after news of Margaery's death hit King's Landing, which Sansa was rather surprised by, looking back. And the second.

The third, she marched into Sansa's rooms and threw the curtains opened, demanded that Sansa get up before she had Tyrion come into the room and make her get up, which of course had Sansa scrambling out of bed, and told her how things were going to happen.

Sansa hadn't much appreciated that, as she pulled on her normal robes, ill fitting and itchy, and listened.

"The King knows that the Queen befriended you," Shae said bluntly, that second day. "He knows that you have cause to mourn her, because she was using you for some purpose and therefore was kind to you. That is what she told him."

Sansa nodded, not much caring for this conversation. What did it matter, what the King knew? What did it matter, what Margaery had been plotting? She was dead now, and her plots with her.

Sansa shuddered, thinking of what Olenna Tyrell had been plotting suddenly, remembering Megga's words that whatever it was, it couldn't be stopped, now.

Good. Sansa hoped she was planning to burn down King's Landing.

She hoped she succeeded in wiping this horrific, stinking place off the map.

"But he will not understand why you wish to mourn the Queen more than a day, and Cersei will certainly not understand it," Shae continued mercilessly, and Sansa wanted to reach up and cover her ears, like a child.

She just barely avoided the impulse.

Sansa sniffed, because, even as far gone as she felt, she knew that Shae was right. That Shae was looking out for her.

If she reacted too suspiciously, Joffrey would find that he had someone knew to torment, as well, which Shae hadn't mentioned, but she might as well have, Sansa thought miserably.

And if Cersei decided to suddenly be suspicious, well...

What did that matter, either? Margaery was not around to kill for adultery, and they were hardly going to murder the Heir to the North after keeping her along for this long.

Sansa sniffed, wiping at her eyes. "All right," she said tiredly. "I'll get up and get dressed." She wanted to add, "You happy?" at the end of it, but didn't quite dare, with the way Shae was looking at her.

As if she were almost...afraid for Sansa.

And no matter how terrible Sansa felt, she didn't want to see Shae looking at her like that. Not anymore.

She'd been terrified of half her life at King's Landing. She was tired of it.

She'd been terrified of her father's death, while he'd been kept a prisoner in the Black Cells, and that hadn't kept him from dying. She'd been terrified to mourn her mother and brother, after the Lannisters had all but seen to their deaths.

She was not going to be terrified any longer. She was tired of it.

She had not allowed herself to mourn for her mother and brother when they were killed, beyond refusing to eat because the thought of eating, as her family had, just before their deaths, sickened her, and she could not allow herself to now, not when her husband was a Lannister and therefore an enemy, and she could not show such weakness before him.

But Margaery had helped her with that, in her own way, Sansa thought, remembering the many meals that Margaery had fed to her with her own mouth, with her own hands, later.

Sansa glanced down at the finely prepared meal in front of her, knowing that her husband had made it of soft foods and rice because he understood all too well her predicament.

She sucked in a breath, turning away with a feeling of nausea in her stomach.

There was a silence, and then she could hear Shae's footsteps padding out of the room as she fell back onto the bed and closed her eyes.

She went to the funeral.

Tyrion, oddly enough, allowed her to help plan it, which, while morbid, at least allowed Sansa to keep her mind off the fact that Margaery was well and truly gone. She was almost glad of that, save that she wasn’t, not at all. Sansa thought perhaps he was trying to help her, and she was not altogether convinced that he had not succeeded.

It was held in the Sept of Baelor, and all of the court was invited to go. It would have been seen as an insult if Sansa had not gone, especially after she managed the seating arrangements.

Sansa did not wish to go. She had almost pled sickness, the day of the funeral, but then she had thought of how Margaery might feel, knowing that Sansa could not even be bothered to go to her funeral, and she got up, dressed herself, and went alongside her husband, with Shae's concerned eyes on her every few moments.

The funeral was just as she expected it to be, just as she planned it to be. Grand and beautiful, and draped all in black. They had no body for the Queen to be laid to rest there, alongside Elia Martell and her children and the Kings of old, but but they placed a stone, empty coffin alongside the others, and Joffrey dropped a single, black rose atop it, looking miserable and almost near tears.

Sansa could not even move forward to touch the coffin of the one she'd loved.

Loved.

Sansa gulped.

She turned away as the High Septon spoke his beautiful words over the Queen's death, and knew that he was speaking of the Queen, and not of Sansa's Margaery, that beautiful girl whom she had loved with all of her heart, and who had loved Sansa in turn. Who had laughed behind her husband's back at him, and cried all the same.

Who had been there, when Sansa needed her. Always.

Sansa sniffed, and wiped at her eyes, and leaned heavily on her husband's shoulder for the rest of the ceremony, while trying not to do so.

It was just an empty coffin, she reminded herself. A funeral for an empty title. The King's wife. The Queen Consort.

Not Margaery. Not Margaery. Not Margaery.

Somehow, she made it through the rest of the funeral, and practically scrambled back to the Keep, forcing her husband to hurry after her lest he lose sight of her.

She spent her days in listless agony. Margaery was gone.

Somehow, it felt worse than knowing that her parents had gone. That her brother had gone, and she didn't know why, and she didn't know what that said about her, as a daughter, as a sister. No doubt, it said something horrible, and yet, Sansa couldn’t bring herself to think what.

She couldn’t bring herself to think.

When a new voice spoke, it did not belong to Shae.

"Lady Sansa," her husband sighed, his voice gently chiding. "You need to eat."

Sansa sighed. "I'm not hungry," she muttered into her lap, and heard her lord husband sigh once more.

Sometimes, she wondered if she would push him over the brink, with her stalwart refusal to eat.

But her lord husband always took the valiant way out, even when she wanted otherwise of him; he backed down when she wanted him to keep fighting, remained patient when she wanted him to lash out, spoke softly when she wanted him to shout.

Margaery would have done those things for her, if she were still alive. Margaery would have cared enough to do so.

Shae might have cared enough to do so, but when it was Shae and not Margaery, Sansa only found it grating, that she should do so.

Shae may care for her, and she may be forced to accept that now, with the way the woman acted like something of a mother to her, these days, but she couldn't incite Sansa to eat. She couldn't, not the way Margaery had, in the past, and Sansa didn't want that, not at all.

She just wanted...she wanted everything to stop, and she didn't know how to get that, not in a way that she deserved. That Margaery deserved to be mourned, for she did, and Sansa couldn’t even do that without it raising the worry that Cersei would realize just what Margaery had been to her.

Shae cleared her throat, and Sansa glanced up at her, lethargic and not wanting to say a word.

Thankfully, Shae beat her to it.

"Sansa, you have to get up," she said coolly. "You have a visitor."

Sansa blinked at her. "A visitor?" she repeated, staring at the other woman, for she couldn't imagine who outside of their strange little family would want to see her, these days. Megga had vanished, and Margaery was...

She was...

"Elinor Tyrell," Shae said, answering the question Sansa hadn't asked. "She's asked to see you. Shall I tell her you're ill, again?" she asked, and there was something less than sympathetic in the way she said those words.

Sansa hugged herself, feeling awkward. "I'll get dressed," she promised Shae, noting that Tyrion was no longer in the room with them, and feeling a strange surge of disappointment, at the realization.

Shae nodded crisply. "I'll bid her wait out in the parlor," she said, and was gone before Sansa could object.

Sansa pulled on the simplest gown she could find, even if it wasn't black, and followed the woman out into the parlor moments later, blinking at the sight of Elinor sitting on her sofa.

Elinor, dressed all in black from head to toe, her eyes somber as she took in Sansa in turn. She stood to her feet, reaching out and taking Sansa's hands in her own before Sansa had even realized what she was doing.

"Sansa," she breathed, squeezing Sansa's hands. "I wanted to see you, before..." she cleared her throat. "You look awful. Haven't you been sleeping?"

Sansa pulled her hands away. She had no wish to be fussed over by Elinor Tyrell. "I...Won't you sit down?"

Elinor nodded, taking her seat again, and Sansa gratefully sank into the sofa across from her.

"How are...how are the other ladies?" Sansa asked when Elinor didn't speak, instead staring at her with an expression Sansa couldn’t read.

Elinor cleared her throat. "It's been...difficult," she said, "As I can imagine it has been for you, being a friend of the Queen as you were."

"Yes," Sansa said tightly, unsure where the anger coiling up inside of her was even coming from, suddenly, "We were all her friends, weren't we?"

Elinor seemed taken aback by the vitriol in Sansa's tone, and then she sighed. "I...I regret that you and I could not become friends while she lived, Sansa, and that we do not now have the opportunity to do so, for...I think there were few else in King's Landing who understood her as we did, and I shall miss that more than anything."

Sansa's head jerked up. "Miss it?" she echoed, and Elinor nodded miserably.

"I thought you might hear at court today, with everyone else, but I was told you were ill," Elinor said, her tone knowing. Sansa blushed. "I...The other handmaidens and I, we have been ordered to return to Highgarden," Elinor said, and Sansa blinked listlessly at her.

"What?" Sansa stammered out.

Elinor's smile was sad. "Apparently, in times of great sorrow, it strengthens the hearts of the people to see a bit of happiness. Some shit like that, I don't remember. My father has called me home. He wants me to marry, and very soon. As I am no longer a...a lady of the Queen's," she gasped out, "There is no reason for me to remain unmarried, at my age."

Sansa blinked at her. "So soon?" she asked, swallowing. Margaery had only been known to be dead for a couple of days, and while she and Elinor could never be described as friends, she certainly didn't want to see perhaps the only other girl who truly understood what she was feeling gone forever, just as Elinor had said.

Married, as if Margaery had never existed in her life in the first place.

Even if she didn't much like Elinor, she didn't want that for the other girl, much as the girl seemed to like her husband.

A part of her just wanted Elinor to remain here with her, no matter how miserable she might be.

Elinor's smile was sad. "I dare not refuse the King's command, Lady Sansa," she said carefully. "I'm to leave tomorrow."

Sansa felt her throat close up. "I see," she whispered, and thought that perhaps crawling back into her bed seemed a good option.

Elinor stared at her for a long moment, but Sansa could not read what she saw in the other woman's gaze, didn't know what the other woman wanted from her at all. The staring seemed to last an age.

And then, finally, Elinor spoke.

"Sansa..." she bit her lip. "I'm sorry," she said, and Sansa stared at her.

"You're sorry?" Sansa asked. "For what?" she asked, and now it wasn't just Elinor's gaze she could feel on her, but Shae's as well. "I didn't know her nearly as long as you. If anything, it's me who should..." she choked on that last word, unable to continue.

Elinor gave her another long look, and then shook her head. "I...I don't know," she said finally. "I just...think it might be important, that we bury the hatchet now, so to speak, rather than keep fighting. I...You seem like a nice girl, Sansa, and I hope you do find some sort of happiness."

But there was something in her eyes, something belying what she was saying, and Sansa was frustrated that she couldn't read the other girl at all. For what was in her eyes might have been a warning, but Sansa couldn't tell what for.

"I..."

"I should go," Elinor interrupted her, standing to her feet. "We are leaving tomorrow, and there is still much packing to be done, I am told. Lady Olenna absolutely refuses to leave the Sept until she has to, and so we'll be doing some of the packing for her, as well."

Sansa nodded absently, as the other girl gave Sansa once last, forlorn look, and all but fled from the Tower of the Hand.

Sansa had no doubt that she would never see any of them again. What was the point, now? They had no lady to service any longer, here in King's Landing. And Sansa had no reason to ever go to Highgarden.

She sniffed at that, remembering suddenly what Margaery had told her once, that she wanted Sansa to be able to see Highgarden, at her side.

She took a shuddering breath, and ignored Shae’s knowing gaze, and then her head whipped to Tyrion, where he walked into the room. Something gave Sansa the impression that he'd been standing outside of it the whole time.

"Well, that was odd," Tyrion said, and the two women blinked up at him. He shrugged. "Lady Elinor intimated to the King that her father and Lord Mace had ordered her return to the Reach to marry," he said, and there was something darkly suspicious in his tone. "No one said anything about the rest of the Tyrell ladies packing up and leaving with her. Nor Lady Olenna."

His tone didn’t make it sound as though Tyrion found the situation _odd_ at all, as he’d claimed.

Sansa paled, at those words, and then stammered out, "I'm sure she would want them at her wedding," and didn't care how unconvincing she sounded, as she came to the same conclusion her husband no doubt had. "They are all good friends. And Lady Olenna is her family, by marriage."

Tyrion hummed noncommittally, and didn't have to say what they were both thinking.

The Tyrells were fleeing King's Landing. No, Sansa thought, with bitter irony; they were fleeing a sinking ship.


	299. SANSA

Sansa had finally stopped spending her days in bed, somewhere around the fifteenth day that she had done so, after the funeral. She thought Shae was about to begin tearing her hair out, but it wasn't like that.

She didn't understand, Shae, Tyrion, any of them.

Didn't understand what it felt like to mourn one more person after so many of them.

And, gods, the only other person in King's Landing who could mourn the woman she loved alongside her was _Joffrey_.

The gods must be laughing at her.

With that thought, Sansa had decided to go to the heart tree, in the Kingswood. She didn't dare to notice Tyrion's bemused expression, nor the worry in Shae's eyes. Instead, she insisted on going. Insisted that she needed to be there, that she needed to pray to the old gods, until her husband decided that perhaps it was for the best, so long as Shae and Pod accompanied her once more.

Sansa tried not to think about the fact that she'd still been having the same dream, about Margaery in Winterfell, burning alive as she had been, as she made her way to the heart tree. That the dreams had started after she visited this place, though she'd dreamt of her mother before.

She didn't want to know what it meant, that her dreams about Margaery burning were now about Arya.

Arya, who was probably dead, like everyone else who mattered in Sansa's life. In the dreams, Arya wasn't screaming, but laughing, as the flames licked at her skin.

Sansa was tired of trying to figure out what in the seven hells that meant.

She made it to the heart tree, and asked Shae to go accompany Pod outside of the clearing, because she wanted, no, needed, to be alone for a little while.

Shae had been all too happy to comply, with one more worried look thrown over her shoulder as she went, and the moment Sansa was alone, she fell to her knees before the heart tree.

And she prayed. She prayed to the old gods, for strength, for clarity, for something. Anything.

Because Margaery was dead, and so was Sansa's father, and her mother, and her siblings.

She was so alone, and she didn't know what to do, now. She didn't know what to do, now that she was alone in the world.

And she was tired of being afraid of what would become of her, now that she was. Of who she would lose next.

She didn't know how long she stayed like that, kneeling before the heart tree, before she heard the snap of a twig behind her, and Sansa froze, lifting her head and spinning around.

"Who's there?" Sansa demanded, and then blinked, at the sight of the man before her, for he was perhaps the last man she had expected to see. "Ser Dontos," she breathed in surprise.

She had not seen him since before the royal wedding, had not thought to see him again when he had not rescued her from this horrid place as he had promised to do for so long. Had thought that perhaps he had drown himself in wine, as Joffrey had once tried to do to him before she interceded on his behalf and gotten him the perhaps less kind fate of royal jester.

Had thought him a friend, and now saw that he was not.

But just now, he looked as drunk as he had ever been in the days following her saving his life, and Sansa found herself wondering if she had made a mistake, then. If what she had offered him, in the choice of being the King's jester over death, had not been the kinder option.

No, she shook her head. No, anything was better than death, surely.

She frowned at him as he moved to follow her; Margaery had been a better friend than he had ever tried to be, and though she had not offered Sansa escape, she had offered something equally as priceless. An escape of another kind.

"Lady Sansa-"

"I don't wish to speak with you," Sansa croaked out, hurrying to her feet and wondering where in the seven hells Shae and Pod were. "Go away."

She didn't need to look at him to know that his face had fallen like that of a loyal puppy; but Sansa was sick of listening to men's promises, men's excuses.

She understood now that Tyrion was just as trapped as she; he would never have married her, otherwise. But Oberyn Martell could have left King's Landing at any time, and he had stayed so that he could kill Tywin Lannister for an old, if deserved, grudge, and had dragged her down with him.

Mace could have not married his daughter to Joffrey, and she would still be alive. Her father could have stood by Joffrey as King, at least long enough to get his children out of King's Landing, and he wouldn't have died a traitor's death.

Her stomach clenched at the thought of how she had repaid that betrayal, and she rounded on Ser Dontos suddenly.

"Why did you abandon me? You gave me your promise to take me from this place, soon, one day, maybe-"

"For which I am greatly sorry, my lady," he said, bowing his head and cowering a little. "My plans for our escape at the wedding...fell through."

"Fell through?" Sansa snapped at him. "You have no idea the things that I have suffered because your plans 'fell through,' Ser Dontos." She shuddered just thinking about them. "But I don't need you anymore. Leave me alone." Her voice was remarkably weaker than she'd wanted it to be when she said those words, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

Ser Dontos gave her a look of utmost sympathy. "Lady Sansa..." he paused, hesitated, then, "You did not wear the hairnet I gave you to the wedding."

Sansa glanced up at him incredulously. "I didn't believe you when you said that it would save me. What does that have to do with anything?"

"You were supposed to wear it," he insisted, but Sansa merely blinked at him.

"And a good thing I didn't, with your broken promises." She turned away, disgusted, but froze once more at the words Ser Dontos said to her back.

"The Tyrells were plotting with Littlefinger to kill King Joffrey at the wedding. The hairnet I gave you, or, the crystals in it...they were supposed to be the things that killed him. Poison, smuggled in under a guise that would not be noticed. Then I was going to take you to safety."

Sansa turned around again, gawked at him. "What?"

"I realize that you have no reason to believe me-"

"I don't," Sansa said, but her voice was shaking, at that point. Not because she believed him. Of course not. She swallowed hard.

She knew how much Margaery hated her marriage to Joffrey, for all that it had made her queen as her family had so desperately wanted. That she wanted him gone as much as Sansa did. Could it be that Sansa had ruined the opportunity for her to be free of Joffrey by not wearing a hairpiece to their wedding?

But she knew the casual disdain with which Margaery seemed to view Littlefinger. Knew that Ser Dontos had to be lying, for this was too cruel a thought to bear. For the Tyrells and Baelish would make strange bedfellows indeed, surely.

Ser Dontos nodded. "I just...I don't know how to get you from King's Landing now, my lady. But...I wanted you to know that I did not mean to abandon you, then."

Sansa's lip curled. "It doesn't matter now, don't you understand? Nothing matters."

Because now Margaery was dead, and if Ser Dantos was telling the truth, that was Sansa's fault. Sansa's fault, because she had not bothered to wear a hairnet she had been told to wear on the day of the wedding, Sansa's fault because Ser Dantos had seen that and thought she did not want to leave this place after all.

"My lady-" Ser Dantos reached out to her, but Sansa flinched away from his touch.

"Get away from me!" she snapped at him. "Or I'll scream. My lady is not far from here."

Ser Dantos faltered, looking hurt. "I have no intention of harming you, Lady Sansa," he told her, looking down at the ground, and Sansa felt a small spark of pity for him. "I was only..."

The pity died quickly enough.

"I will scream," she snapped at him, and Ser Dantos fell silent.

"Why didn't you do it?" she asked, when he had done so.

Ser Dantos grimaced. "My lady..." he began, but Sansa shook her head, for she would have her answer, this time.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she demanded. "Did you think me so naive, so fragile, that I would not have agreed to the idea in an instant?"

Ser Dantos sucked in a breath. "My lady, I was under orders not to tell you..."

"By whom?" Sansa asked incredulously. "The Tyrells, or Lord Baelish?"

His face fell. "You do not believe me."

"I have suffered cruelly these past months," Sansa repeated, "And I would not have you come here and tell me that I am the one responsible for that suffering, Ser Dantos," she said. "I did not expect you to be as cruel as the rest, or perhaps I made a mistake in begging the King to save your life, so long ago."

Ser Dantos gave a shuddering breath. "My lady, I have nothing but the deepest sympathy for you-"

Sansa screamed.

She had warned him, after all.

The man's eyes went very wide, hearing that scream, and he backed away from her, just as Shae came tearing into the clearing like an avenging lion.

The woman took one look at Ser Dantos, where he stood in front of Sansa, and then moved as if to cover her, hands reaching into the folds of her gown where Sansa had long suspected she had a knife.

Sansa had all but forgotten her own knife, the one that Margaery had...that she had...

She gulped in a breath, and stopped screaming.

"Get away from her!" Shae roared, and Ser Dantos held up his hands, moving back.

"My lady, forgive me..." he entreated, but Sansa ignored him, half turned away as Shae hurried forward and wrapped her arms around Sansa, seeming to nno longer view Dantos as a threat.

"Get away from her," Shae repeated, "Or my lord Tyrion will see you hanged for trying to touch her."

Ser Dantos glanced between the two of them, and either seemed to realize he could say no more to plead his case to Sansa, or that Shae would not listen to him if he claimed he had no touched her.

Instead, he turned and fled the clearing.

Only then did Shae move, turning and pawing at Sansa's clothes, searching for injuries.

"I'm all right," Sansa stammered out, breathless.

Shae raised a brow, not stopping in her search until Sansa pulled away.

"I'm all right," she repeated, and Shae finally seemed to believe it to be the truth, pulling back from her.

"What happened?" she demanded.

Sansa shook her head. "It...it doesn't matter. We should go back to the Keep, now."

Shae's brows furrowed. "Sansa..."

"I said we should go back to the Keep," Sansa said, snapping more than she had intended to, and Shae gave her a long look, before nodding.

"Of course," she said, rather stiffly, and Sansa flinched.

"I'm sorry," she said, lowering her head. "It's only...he told me something I didn't want to hear, and I couldn't think of a way to be rid of him. I didn't mean to worry you."

Shae hummed. "Well, perhaps next time, don't scream," she suggested, and Sansa let out a watery laugh. "Just run to me. I will find you."

Sansa nodded. "All right," she agreed, and believed the woman. But she couldn't get Ser Dontos' words out of her head. Margaery...the hairnet, the wedding...

Oh, gods.


	300. SANSA

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy shit 300 chapters in, lol.  
> I just wanted to clear up something, because I've been getting a lot of comments on it and I don't want you guys to be shocked by the ending to this fic. The 'eventual happy ending' tag is def a series tag.

"Well, what in the seven hells happened?" Joffrey asked. "I was much fond of my jester. He provided the greatest entertainment, and was a gift from my lady aunt."

He turned to Sansa, who had gone very pale, at his words.

Ser Dantos had told her yesterday the truth about the wedding, and now he was dead. Surely, surely, that could not be a coincidence.

And she might have considered that Shae had been the one to do the killing, were it not for the fact that Shae had not left her presence since yesterday, even sleeping in her bed with her, worried about Ser Dantos, Sansa knew, even if she'd tried to convince the other woman that she was fine and unhurt.

Which meant that someone else had killed him. That it might have been...been someone who knew.

Which meant that what Ser Dantos had been telling her...it had probably been true.

Unbidden, her eyes sought out Mace Tyrell, where he stood in the crowd. But she wasn't thinking about him at all, for, from what little she understood of Margaery's family, he wouldn't have been the one behind such a thing.

No, this was much more his mother's idea, if she really had planned in an unholy alliance with Lord Baelish to kill Joffrey on the day of his own wedding.

Olenna Tyrell, who had never been anything but kind to her, from the moment she had met Sansa. Who had wanted to know the truth about Joffrey in order to protect her granddaughter. Who may not have approved of Sansa's relationship with Margaery, Sansa didn't know, but who had never stood in the way of it, for Sansa had no doubt that she knew.

The woman seemed to know everything, including what hairnet Sansa was meant to wear to her wedding.

Gods.

Olenna had not returned to King's Landing, with the news of her granddaughter's death, and Sansa didn't know if that was because she preferred to mourn her granddaughter in private, or if she had something else planned, but it made a perfect alibi, she couldn't help but think resentfully, for their current situation.

After all, she couldn't have killed Ser Dantos if she wasn't even here. And even if she might have done so, Joffrey believed her, like most of the court seemed to, to be nothing more than a feeble old woman.

Sansa sucked in a breath, and then another.

Just like they believed Sansa to be nothing more than a weak willed, naive child, apparently, who could not even be trusted to know what might be in her hairnet.

After she had spoken to Ser Dantos the night before, she had stormed back to her chambers, Shae barely managing to keep up behind her, and found the hairnet in question.

It had sat, innocuous and untouched, in the back of her dresser for sometime now, not worn because it hadn't matched her summer gown, the one she had worn to Joffrey's wedding.

Because it hadn't matched a fucking gown.

She sucked in a breath, and another.

She had turned around, and asked Shae whether she knew anything about poison, whcih she knew had rather startled the other woman, until Shae admitted that she knew more about poison than she had liked.

And Sansa...Sansa had told her to be rid of the hairnet. To make sure that no one saw her getting rid of it, and that it was unquestionably destroyed.

She suspected she had given away rather too much, saying all of that, but Sansa couldn't bring herself to care.

Margaery was dead, Ser Dantos was dead, Ser Loras was dead. People were dropping like flies around her, and she was tired of being nothing more than the naive little girl, if she wasn't going to use that perception for something, godsdamnit.

Shae had gotten rid of the hairnet yesterday. Ser Dantos was dead today.

Sansa sent her handmaiden and her husband's lover a considering look, and drew in another breath. Then another.

"Ah well," Joffrey said, with a shrug. "I suppose we can always find another jester. That one was always drunk." He smirked, turning a cold look on Tyrion, who looked bemused more than anything. "Perhaps you could take his place, Uncle."

Tyrion all but rolled his eyes. "His Grace seems in good spirits, considering," he said coldly, which caused the smile on Joffrey's face to vanish, "but I am afraid that I am too caught up in my duties as Hand of the King."

Joffrey gritted his teeth, and abruptly changed the subject.

Sansa reached out, touching Shae's arm. "I want to leave," she told the other woman, uncaring that there were certainly other matters to deal with and half the court might be full of gossip if she did so.

Shae gave her a long look, and then nodded. "Very well," she said, and practically cut a path through the crowd, so that Sansa could leave, neither of them noticing Tyrion's considering eyes on them as they did so.

Sansa made it back to the Tower of the Hand, a half formed plan in her head already, even if she had no idea how to implement it, and didn't quite know how she was going to get rid of Shae, before she did.

And then she remembered something Shae had told her, not so long ago, and the rest of the plan seemed to fall into place in her mind, as if it had just been waiting for that reminder.

Shae didn't know how to read.

Shae didn't know how to read, and there was no longer anyone else in King's Landing whom Sansa trusted.

She barely made it back to the Tower of the Hand, the way her heart was pounding in her chest. And she wasn't certain that all of it was fear at the thought of what might happen here in King's Landing, if she were caught.

A part of Sansa almost reveled in the thought that she might be caught, and that might not be entirely sane, but again, she couldn't bring herself to care.

Because finally, there was something she could do.

She barely kept herself from running the rest of the way back to the Tower of the Hand, and once she had, it was all she could do to sit still and look less than restless. Shae got her some snacks, comfort foods, Sansa thought, though she didn't find them comforting.

She didn't find most foods comforting, and Sansa wanted to be sick, wanted very much to be puke at the thought that she might have just caused the death of yet another man, but she had something more important to see to.

So she waited, and took a nap wherein she didn't sleep, but listened to Shae moving about their apartments, until finally she awoke and asked Shae to fetch her a quill and a bit of parchment.

There. Nothing suspicious about that, was there?

Until Sansa set quill to parchment, and couldn't quite think of the words to say.

"What are you writing?" Shae asked, sounding only morbidly curious.

Sansa shrugged. "I...I don't know," she lied. "I just...thought it might help. To...get something out," she whispered, the words sounding weak even to her ears, but Shae didn't seem to mind.

She merely shrugged, and asked, "Would you like me to fetch you some cocoa?"

Sansa considered her, and then shrugged herself. "If you like," she said, though she certainly wasn't very hungry, herself.

The thought of what she was about to do preoccupied her far too much.

 _My lord Stannis Baratheon_ , she wrote, and then scratched out the words, grimacing.

She knew what she had to do, of course. Knew what words she needed to write down on paper in order to guarantee what she had now convinced herself she wanted, but Sansa...didn't want to do it.

Didn't want to admit that her brother had taken her name out of the line of succession that there now existed no heir to Winterfell at all. At least, not but by right of conquest.

She took a shuddering breath, lowering quill to parchment once more.

 _My king Stannis Baratheon_ , she wrote, and hesitated, staring at the words until a blot of ink fell to the page beside the words. She bit the inside of her cheek, hard, until she felt it beginning to bleed, and was nearly sick at the knowledge.

Still, she kept writing.


	301. MARGAERY

When Margaery blinked awake, her head was pounding as it might have been after a night of drinking, and the blinding sun bleaching down on her eyelids wasn't helping.

She felt unmoored, and it took her several seconds to figure out why.

The ship. The storm. Loras.

Margaery jerked up where she sat, realizing too late that she was in a small fishing vessel which her movements nearly toppled.

"Hey!" a man's voice called, and Margaery jerked again, the boat tipping wildly, before she found herself face to face with the other occupant of this vessel.

He blinked at her, one hand held out in a way that probably was meant to be reassuring rather than threatening, but Margaery still flinched back from it.

She felt like a mouse drenched in salt, sitting on the edge of the small boat, shivering as her torn, soaked purple and crimson gown offered her little in the way of covering anymore, much less warmth.

The young man sitting across from her on the boat gave her a small, uncertain smile.

The morning sun accentuated his features, and Margaery found herself rather surprised to realize that he seemed familiar, even if she could not pinpoint why, exactly. He wasn't good looking; at least, he was not to her tastes, but she thought he might have been ruggedly handsome, to another girl. His broad shoulders were far too unsettling for her, however, for him to be more than that.

She stiffened; reached for the knife she always kept in her boot before remembering that it had likely been lost to the sea. And then that she had given it to Sansa, and therefore hadn't had it all.

She didn't much like the thought that she was alone in a boat in the middle of the sea with a man, but then, she supposed, he was her...rescuer?

She barely remembered what had happened, in those final moments before she had lost consciousness; could only remember her brother, tossing her forward onto a ship that just happened to be near enough to take one of them, before their raft splintered and sank.

Remembered her brother's firm hands on her waist, shoving her, and then they were gone.

Loras was gone.

She flinched at the thought, wrapping her arms around herself and sucking in a deep breath, and then another.

It was no longer night, and the scorching sun had heated her from the moment she awoke. She glanced down at the calm waters beneath their ship, and shuddered.

Too calm, as if there had never been a storm upon them in the first place, and Margaery hated that thought, the moment it entered her mind.

That the ship she had nearly died in had been taken by the sea, disappeared beneath the waves as if it had never been, taking her brother, Meredyth, and her life with it, so easily.

If only the waters could have been calm last night, she and Loras might have survived the experience.

She would not have to live with the knowledge that her brother's last act had been to save her. That his last words had been about going to see Renly once more, as if that should make her feel better about the situation, listening to her delirious brother talk about Renly.

"I was worried you wouldn't wake, lady," the man across the boat from her told her, in a gentle voice that was obvious tailored so as not to frighten her.

Margaery forced herself not to react to the fact that she was sitting in a boat with a stranger, a pile of smelly fish between them.

Gods, what had just happened?

She studied the stranger, because it was better than thinking about the answer to that question.

He was a boy, she supposed, more than a man, hardly younger than her. Perhaps that was some comfort, that he would not attempt to hurt her as another man might.

But then, Joffrey was just a boy in many ways, too.

"You looked more 'n half-dead when that man pushed you onto my fishing boat, and then-"

Margaery's throat closed as the memories of what must have been the early morning before came rushing into her mind. Of Loras, pushing her onto this boat with the last of his almost inhuman strength, considering the extent of his injuries, before the waves took him.

Loras. Gods, Loras was de-

The young man in front of her must have seen the expression on her face, for he abruptly changed tact. "We're almost back to the shoreline, lady. An hour more, at least. Perhaps...perhaps then we might get you some help. There's a village just off the coastline, and they'll get you sorted, I'm sure of it."

Margaery found her voice, then, her vulnerability making her snippy. She was a Tyrell; she realized her situation, in Martell land. There would be no help for her on the shoreline. At the very best, she would be killed.

Because Cersei Lannister would be happy enough for that to happen, and no doubt thought she had not even survived the wreck.

Perhaps they would seek to ransom her to Joffrey. She bit back a hysterical laugh at the thought, and wondered how much she was worth to her loving husband.

"And do you always fish so far from the shoreline, sailor?"

Her savior looked abashed. "I, er...I'm not much of a fisherman," he said, reaching up to run a hand through his hair before hastily scrambling for his forgotten oar once more. "Not much of a sailor, either."

"I can see that," Margaery said idly, though once she might have thought the words silently.

She was sick of playing games, of playing at words she didn't mean.

She'd been doing that for almost a year now, and what had it gotten her but two dead brothers and a husband who was happy enough to take the third?

He flushed. "Yes. But I only arrived in Dorne recently, you see, and it gets me by, mostly. I've started a smithy, but it's hard, on your own without a name," he continued, and Margaery nodded, as if she cared about his inane problems, in this moment.

Did the gods care, about the worries of mortals?

Should she care when her brother lay at the bottom of the ocean?

"What's your name?" he asked her, and Margaery swallowed.

She contemplated not telling him, merely sitting in silence until they reached the shoreline, and then leaving this boy and his inevitable reminder of what had happened to her brother forever.

"Margaery," she murmured, for she saw no point in lying, not now. Saw no point in anything, really.

Even if she had lied, she was not certain she was in the right frame of mind to remember whatever name she chose for herself.

For all her ambitions, she was not able to save Sansa from Joffrey's ministrations, was not able to save her brothers from the Lannisters. Had barely been able to save herself from a sinking ship.

"Margaery," her rescuer repeated. Then his eyes darkened. "Like the queen."

Margaery made a sound that might have been choking, before gasping out, "Yes, like the Queen's. And yours?"

He hesitated, and for a moment, Margaery recognized the look on his face as far too similar to her own. "Arry," her savior said, giving her an odd half-smile. "Arry Waters."

Waters. "Like the bastards of King's Landing?" she asked in confusion, for she knew they were called 'Sands' here.

Arry nodded, suddenly wary. "...Yes."

Her rescuer had just become slightly more interesting, and Margaery focused on him to keep herself from focusing on...on...

On all of it. On what her life had just become, that she was floating in a fisherman's vessel with a bastard from King's Landing.

"Why do you not live in King's Landing, then?" she asked. "I only ask because you said you had moved to Dorne recently."

And because it was better than thinking of the way the blood had dripped into her brother's eyes as he begged her to let him go. About the way he had slipped from her fingers, as if he wanted nothing more than to go.

Her rescuer's shoulders tightened.

Margaery shook her head. "Never mind. I...Find myself wishing to focus on something other than my own woes, is all. I...my apologies."

He nodded, looking suddenly sympathetic. "I just saw the ship going down when I found you," he said. "Storm started awfully sudden, seemed like, or I wouldn't have been out at all. That man...your lover?"

Margaery swallowed. "My brother," she murmured hoarsely, not meeting Arry's eyes, and he nodded.

"I'm sorry," he said, stiffly, and Margaery felt her heart crack, at the words. She turned away, looking out at the quiet sea in lieu of the man in front of her, because she couldn't think about his apology.

Couldn't think about what it meant, couldn't think about the fact that she would never see her husband again.

Couldn't think about Loras' face, as he begged her to leave him behind, to save herself.

"I didn't see the blaze until I was a ways out. What happened?" Arry asked, sounding hesitant and curious all at once.

For a moment, she contemplated not answering him. Even if he had rescued her, it wasn't any of his damn business what had happened, and she had no wish to relive it.

Still, she supposed she had better get her story straight now, before someone important asked the question of her.

Margaery licked her lips, and then lied, because this was her life now. To lie, to save her own life. The way Loras had saved her life. He had died for her. It had to mean something. "The storm," she said. "I think a lightning bolt might have struck us."

Arry nodded. "If you don't mind my asking, you don't look like you're from Dorne, either. And I don't know of many leisure boats passing by these days, what with the nobles at it again."

Margaery chewed the inside of her cheek, and thought fast. "We were a leisure ship," she told Arry. "We were planning a trip to...to Bravos, actually. From the Reach." She shook her head. "We only received news of the fighting after we'd left, and we thought it might be a good idea to turn back."

Arry grimaced. "Don't know why those damn nobles have to fight all the time. Seems like they could all just stick to their own plot of land and stay there."

He sounded rather more bitter about it than Margaery expected him to.

Margaery blinked at that, distracted for a moment from her pain by the words. "I couldn't agree more," she said, hugging herself a little tighter.

Because if only they had done that, if only her father hadn't been quite so greedy and ambitious, her brothers would still be alive. Both of them.

Fuck the nobility.

"I shouldn't have said that," the boy said then, looking shamefaced.

Margaery blinked at him. "Why do you say that?" she asked.

He grimaced. "Well, begging your pardon, but you certainly have the look of nobility about you. You said you were from the Reach?"

Margaery gave him a tight smile. She supposed that, in the gown she was wearing, even if it was only a nightgown and not her finest at that, she could not claim to be a commoner.

"I may be a nobleman's daughter," she lied through her teeth, "But I have no great love for war."

He nodded, still looking awkward. "I...I can sympathize with that, I suppose."

Margaery glanced away from him. "So..." she said hoarsely, fighting the tears that were threatening to choke her, because she was a Tyrell, and there was no way, by the gods, that she was about to break down before this boy. "This village you are taking me to. Is it...Dornish, or...?"

He grimaced. "Aye, my lady. And they've no great love of fair skinned lasses like yourself, these days, but they're a good sort, and they'll trust me."

Margaery didn't like the implication in that; that they wouldn't have trusted some random girl, otherwise. But then, she supposed, if they knew who she really was, there was no telling what they would do to her.

Perhaps she should have tried to lie about her name.

She took a deep breath, forcing some calm into her thoughts. Now was not the time.

"I should thank you," she said, forcing a tremulous smile. "You rescued me from certain death."

The boy blushed. "I...not like I had much choice to it," he told her. "I mean, your brother all but..." he grimaced. "Sorry. You're welcome, my lady."

Margaery nodded, swallowing hard. "I don't suppose there was anyone else...?"

Not that she much cared, considering that everyone else on that ship besides Meredyth, who she knew to be dead, was a Lannister, or that she thought this boy would have just left them in the sea.

The boy shook his head, wincing. "You, uh, you're lucky you were asleep, for a little while there,' he told her. "It wasn't...a pretty sight, this morning."

Margaery nodded. "I see. Do you think...?"

She never got the chance to ask what it was he thought, however.

She could see the shoreline from here, could see the outlines of the little village Arry had pointed out to her. Could see that it was burning, even from here.

So it was just typical that the pirate ship found them, then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right guys, suspension of disbelief here. I had this idea before season seven came out, and come on. I couldn't resist a good 'still rowing' joke here.


	302. INTERLUDE: KING'S LANDING

The rain poured down on King's Landing for a day and a half, slapping against the cobblestones of Flea Bottom as if the heavens themselves cried tears for the injustices done upon that corrupt, wicked city.

But the torrent did not stop the smallfolk of Flea Bottom from gathering in the square, clinging to their soaking clothes as they watched the display before them.

They stood as if the rain itself did not exist, a newfound power within their bones.

And, above the sound of the torrent, there was a wail.

The eyes of all turned toward the sound, toward the young woman who knelt on a raised wooden podium which had taken mere hours to construct, before a group of men whom all amongst the smallfolk knew, by now.

Knew, and either feared or loved.

"Do you confess?" the Old Man asked, and the young woman, not a lady nor a peasant, but the daughter of a cloth merchant, lifted her head where she knelt before him.

Tears blurred in her eyes, as the rain mixed with them, and the young woman, her face covered in dark ash, swallowed hard.

There was no fear in her eyes, just as there was only a little in her heart.

"I confess to the sins of lust, fornication, to gluttony, and once giving my loyalty to those who even now blaspheme the gods," the woman said, her voice trembling, though loud enough to hear by all within the square.

The Old Man smiled down at her, his leathered hands reaching out to touch her cheeks, to brush against them in a touch that was nearly gentle.

"The gods hear your confession, my child," he told her, and the woman lowered her head, shoulders shaking.

When she lifted her head, the Old Man was holding out to her a thin handled, leather whip, and she stared at it for several moments longer than she should have; the crowd began to shift restlessly.

With shaking hands, the girl reached out and took the whip from the Old Man's hands. She held it between two fingers for several moments, before looking up at the man with wide eyes.

He gave her a solemn nod, the meaning clear enough in it, and the girl closed her eyes, taking a deep breath.

Two of those men calling themselves the Sparrows stepped forward, grabbing the girl by the shoulders. They waited, for a raised hand from the Old Man, and wrent the fabric of her gown, ripped it from her body with little fanfare.

Her bare back exposed to the crowd, the girl let out a cry. Of shock, perhaps, at the cold rain on her skin, or at the thought of what was to come.

"Your finery is taken from you, for the gods brought you into this world without it," the Old Man said, "and it has only encouraged you toward sin."

She glanced up at the Old Man once more, her eyes tired, a spark of fear in them now. The Old Man nodded to her once more, and she nodded back to him. The Sparrows moved away from her, giving a clear view through the rain to the man.

"May the Father judge me justly," she whispered, raising the whip.

The crowd seemed to hold its collective breath as the whip fell.

The girl let out a cry of pain as the whip slapped down against the bare skin of her back. It did not split the skin, not yet, but the sound of pain filled the square.

"May..." the girl gasped as her back spasmed. "May the Mother grant me mercy," she cracked the whip over her shoulder once again, screamed as this time, it split skin.

"May...may the Warrior grant me courage," she continued hoarsely, voice growing softer, now. She cracked the whip again, screamed as it fell against her skin.

"May the Smith grant me strength," she whispered, and her back was a mess of crisscrossing cuts, now. She folded, beneath the strength of the whip, her back flexing down to her knees as she whimpered, her body trembling beneath the pain.

The crowd waited with bated breath, as she knelt before all of them, shaking as the rain washed blood down her back and onto the wooden podium on which she stood.

Her hands, where they clenched around the whip, flexed and flinched.

"The gods have granted you the honor of taking your confession, child," the Old Man told her calmly, "but only you can restore your salvation, purge your soul of the sins which you have chosen in your past."

The girl let out another cry as she forced her body to straighten, as she lifted the whip once more.

"May the Crone grant me wisdom," she screamed, her voice ragged, and the whip slammed down on broken skin. She screamed again, but this time, there seemed a strength about the girl, as once more she let the whip fly.

"May the Maide-the Maiden restore my purity, my innocence before the gods," she whispered.

The Old Man smiled, reaching out to touch her cheek, to flick away the blood she found there.

"May the Stranger strike me dead, should I continue to disobey the will of the gods so openly," she whispered, and the whip fell one last time.

She crumpled to the ground then, her back a mess of scars which would never heal, as one of the sparrows walked forward and took the whip from her hands.

"The gods have heard your penance, my child," the Old Man said, stepping over her and looking out to the rest of the crowd. "They have seen that you come before them with a penitent, true heart. As they will of all who come before the gods with a true heart."

He clasped his hands before him, bare feet slipping down from the podium to walk amongst the crowd. The people before him seemed to flinch as one, moving back for him, but the Old Man merely smiled, reaching out to touch the head of the first child he passed.

"The gods have seen fit to shower their displeasure upon King's Landing," the Old Man continued. "We live in a city infested with villainy and wickedness. A city of gluttony and sodomy and usury. The gods see all. They will not allow such wickedness to continue unpunished."

The people began to murmur amongst themselves, at those words, fear permeating the air.

"And when that day comes, and the gods throw down their wrath upon the heretics who destroy this city," the Old Man said, his voice raising, "May they grant us the strength to strike down that blasphemous idol which mars this city, and which our king builds. And until that day..." he paused, and the people seemed to be hanging on his words. "Let us burn those items which cause us all to sin. The items which indulge our gluttony, our lust for wealth. That even the poorest amongst us might show the King a better way."

The people cheered.


	303. MARGAERY

"Fuck," Arry breathed, and Margaery shot him an unamused look as the rope swung down from the ship looming over their little fishing vessel, nearly toppling it with the waves the ship was causing.

She gritted her teeth, taking a deep breath. The ship wasn't displaying any colors, as any banner men ships would have done, and she supposed there was some relief in the fact that she had not been set upon by Martells, or, perhaps worse, a ship sent out by the Lannisters to make sure she was well and truly dead.

But pirates were hardly an improvement to her current situation, either.

She didn't know much about pirates. The Reach may have bordered the sea, and Margaery knew that sometimes the lords of the Reach did less than reputable business dealings with them, but her grandmother and father had done well to keep her far from any such dealings, and Margaery knew that the pirates were often willing to double cross such deals, if they thought they could get something out of it.

Her brother Willas used to tell her stories about Pirate Kings when she was a child, and Margaery had adored those, especially the one about the Pirate Queen, but as she grew older, she'd found her interests applied elsewhere.

After all, her mother had insisted that stories about pirates were not suitable for young ladies, and while her mother did not often get her way in matters relating to her children, Olenna had agreed. Margaery had far more important things to be studying.

She grimaced at the thought, suddenly wishing she knew more about pirates. They couldn't all be thieving scum and rapists, surely.

"Well, well, boys," she heard a nasally voice call up as one of said pirates slid down the lowered rope, "look what I've fished out of the sea."

Margaery sent Arry a desperate look, but the boy looked just as startled as she did, and perhaps a bit more frightened, and for a moment she found herself wondering if she should just jump into the sea now.

She didn't.

The pirate jumped onto their fishing boat, and then leered down at Margaery. "Well, lassie," he said, smirking, "Don't suppose you're going to come willingly?"

She gritted her teeth. "Go fuck yourself," she breathed out, and glanced at Arry, blinked when she saw his hand reaching down beneath his seat.

The pirate stared at her for a moment, and then snorted, reaching out and wrapping a beefy hand around Margaery's wrist. She gritted her teeth, attempting to throw him off, and then she found herself staring down at her arm, instead.

Or rather, at the gruesome burns crawling their way up and down her arm, staining their way up from her wrists past her elbows.

She hadn't noticed them, before. Not in her hurry once she was out of the ship with her brother, and not after, when she'd awoken in Arry's little boat.

Now, however, looking down at them, Margaery felt panic welling up within her, her first imperative thought that her husband would no longer find her a great beauty, and it would color his opinion of her.

And then she wanted to laugh, for that was hardly her most pressing issue at the moment, and even if she did make it out of this situation alive and with her reputation still intact, even if she did somehow manage to convince people of who she was and made it back to King's Landing, there was no telling if her husband would even take her back without the burns.

She was a dead woman, conveniently so, and her husband might have forgotten all about her, by then. She did not hold much faith in him, after all.

Margaery blinked, and that was all the time that the pirate needed, forcing her to her feet just in time for Margaery to notice that the other arm was burnt, as well.

He wrapped an arm around her waist, and Margaery yelped, though she wasn't certain why, perhaps merely at the intrusion. The pirate ignored her, pulling a cutlass out of his boot with his other arm, and Margaery froze, staring at it as it came up precariously near her throat.

The pirate eyed Arry. "On your feet boy, or I cut the bitch's throat," he told him, and Arry, after a hesitant glance Margaery's way, climbed to his feet, putting his hands up where they could be seen.

"I'm not going to fight you," he assured the pirate. "but please, she's..."

Margaery cleared her throat. Loudly. If the pirate hadn't figured out from her dress' tattered state that she was a lady, she had no wish of bringing his mind to that realization.

Arry blinked at her, and then fell silent.

The pirate glanced between them, and then squeezed her a little tighter around the waist, a wicked grin marring his already ugly, tanned features.

His breath was rancid, as well.

"Ready, my lady?" he asked her, and Margaery closed her eyes, for there went that hope.

And then, before she could respond, Margaery found herself flying through the air, the wind ripping at what remained of her gown.

Her eyes flew open, and she was terribly startled to find herself soaring through the air, hanging for dear life onto the pirate holding her as he hung from the rope that had been hoisted down to them.

She felt a scream tearing its way past her throat, and then the pirate was moving closer, whispering in her ear that usually it was harder for him to make a woman scream, but Margaery barely heard the words.

She didn't dare to breathe again until she was standing on the solid deck of the pirate ship, her eyes very wide as she glanced around at the rather large crow of pirates standing before her.

The hand around her waist disappeared, and, as she glanced back at him, so did the man who had been holding her. She could only surmise that he was returning for her rescuer, and Margaery felt a spike of guilt, even if there was no telling that Arry would not have fallen afoul of these pirates anyway, that her rescuer should have to suffer these people on her account.

But she couldn't think about that for long, not with such a rowdy group of red blooded men staring at her half naked appearance, and Margaery resisted the urge to wrap her arms around her chest.

She had walked King's Landing with far less clothes on her back than this, after all.

Margaery lifted her chin, and stared them down.

They looked a disheveled bunch, though Margaery thought she could hardly expect more from pirates, their own clothes almost as tattered as hers, and as long as she was focusing on that she wasn't thinking of how her own brother's body probably looked at this moment, bloated and dead beneath the waters-

She cleared her throat, taking a hesitant step forward before remembering herself.

"Well lads, and who's this pretty lass?" one of the men leered, reaching out a grimy hand towards her and flicking at Margaery's hair with it.

Margaery closed her eyes at the unwelcome touch, willing her hands not to shake. It would not do to show fear before these men, for she knew how they would use it.

She was a lady, after all, and it was dangerous enough that they know that. Better they didn't figure out that she was terrified of what they might do to her.

That was the first lesson she had learned from her husband, the day Sansa Stark had told her what a monster he really was.

"Don't touch me," she gritted out, and the pirates circled around her laughed.

One of the pirates shouldered forward, past the others, to stand directly before her, looming over her.

He stood a good head taller than the other; his bald head covered with an elaborate purple hat that made Margaery want to roll her eyes, just looking at it, and a long black coat that went past his knees. His tanned skin looked nearly burnt, beneath the afternoon sun, and Margaery had to focus on her own scathing thoughts rather than succumb to her fear, at how close he got to her.

She knew immediately that he was the captain, even without the hints of the golden rings covering his fingers and ears.

He stepped into her space, smirking.

But Margaery wasn't looking at him, not at first. Instead, she was looking past him, to the other side of the ship, and beyond it.

Before, on Arry's little ship, she hadn't been able to see it, not until they were far too close to the pirate ship to begin with. She had seen the outline of the village before them only, had heard Arry's words about finding shelter there and maybe not being harangued for being fair of skin.

And those words had encouraged her enough, it seemed, or she had been in enough shock, that she hadn't noticed that the village was on fire.

No doubt the handiwork of the gentlemen in front of her.

Margaery grimaced, and turned her attention back to the pirate captain standing in front of her.

"My lady," he gave her a mocking bow, pulling off his plumed hat to let it whip through the air, as he went to his waist before her, and Margaery had to quell the sudden urge to kick him between the legs.

It would do nothing for her, after all, with so many of his men around her.

Margaery grimaced, and forced herself not to take a step back. She had faced down Joffrey often enough, Cersei, the rest of them. She could handle one pirate. She had to.

And then the pirate lifted his head, and she got another whiff of rancid breath and yellow teeth.

"Don't touch you?" the pirate asked, smirking at her. He reached out, using two fingers to tip up her chin, and Margaery gritted her teeth, staring him down. "And why should I-"

He cut off then, staring down her dress, and Margaery fought down a blush, yanking her chin away from him and taking a step back, though it meant stepping into Arry, where he suddenly appeared on the deck behind her, alongside their strange pirate rescuer from earlier.

But the pirate captain, or, she supposed he was the captain, was still staring, and she'd had enough of leering husbands to know that he wasn't staring at her breasts.

Margaery glanced down, and felt her legs nearly buckle beneath her as she went white with shock.

Her gown, at the stomach, was stained in a circle of blood.

Margaery stared down at the mess, and then felt her legs falling beneath her. The pain hit her all of the sudden, sweeping through her body, and Margaery bit back a scream as her knees hit the deck of the ship.

"Help her!" she thought she heard Arry call, but then, that might have just been her imagination.

"Fuck," she thought she heard the pirate captain mutter, and Margaery's mind echoed the sentiment, even if she could not bring her blue lips to do so aloud.

She needed to live, the thought echoed through her mind. She needed to live so that she could destroy those Lannisters, bit by bit, if she needed to.

She needed to live.

"Take them below," she heard someone ordering.

The world went black.


	304. TYRION

"What is going on?" Joffrey demanded, as his Kingsguard followed him up to the parapets where he had hung Eddard Stark's head for all to see, glaring down at the mob chanting below, just outside the walls of the Keep.

He'd been able to hear the mobbing from inside the Keep no doubt, Tyrion thought, crossing his arms over his chest as he glanced out at them.

He'd called for the King not long ago, and was almost surprised that the King had bothered to answer.

The mob was a step away from calling for his head.

And, towering above that mob, the beginnings of a statue which stood nearly as tall as the Keep itself, per Joffrey's insistence. A statue surrounded by an angry mob, insistent on not allowing the workers to pass.

The thing was almost finished, and while Tyrion knew the people had been unhappy about it from the beginning, somehow having learned that the King intended to call the statue both one of his wife and the maiden, he was honestly a little annoyed that they hadn’t been able to mobilize themselves before this, when Joffrey might have actually given up on the project.

Now, the boy could already see his vision looming out in front of him, and he rather liked it, Tyrion could tell. Unfortunately, for Tyrion doubted he was going to see the thing torn down to appease the people now, even if his wife had loved the smallfolk.

"Ah, Your Grace," the guardsman said, before looking at Tyrion nervously. Tyrion nodded his head, gestured for the man to spit it out. "The smallfolk are revolting over the new monument being built for the late Queen. They say-"

"What in the seven hells for?" Joffrey demanded, looking genuinely bemused, and Tyrion had to work hard not to roll his eyes. "They loved my queen. Called her," he snapped fingers, glanced at Tyrion.

Tyrion did roll his eyes, then. If the King had wanted a lapdog for his Hand, he should have hired Lord Mace, not his least favorite uncle, after all.

"Good Queen Marg, I believe," Tyrion told him, and then turned back to the guards. "What is their problem this time?" The gods knew the smallfolk revolted over one thing or another every fortnight, or so it seemed.

But he had a feeling that this time, things would be different. That this wasn't a mob they would be able to control, merely destroy. The thought sent a cold shiver down his spine, for while he knew Joffrey would not care about killing such a large group of people indiscriminately, the people had been happy to rise up against what they thought of as the unfairness of their monarch before the Tyrells had arrived in King’s Landing with their bread, and without a single Tyrell around...Tyrion had a bad feeling about this.

The guard cleared his throat loudly. "They say that the King intends to move the monument into the Sept, once it has been completed. That he has called it, begging your pardon, Your Grace, Queen Margaery the Maiden, and that he profanes the gods by doing so."

Joffrey chortled. "Since when do the smallfolk give a damn about the gods?" he asked, before his gaze darkened. "My wife gave them more food than the gods ever did, and that is all they care for."

Tyrion winced, for that about sealed the fate of the people in the courtyard below them. Still, he had to try one last thing.

"This is no doubt the doing of those Sparrows," he informed the King. The High Septon, after all, had already given his permission and support for the larger than life statue the King wished to move into the Sept.

"Then punish the Sparrows," Joffrey said, sounding exasperated. He waved a hand down at the mob. "Once the smallfolk see that their King does not condone these fanatics, they will move on to something else. Like begging for our scraps again, as they ought to."

Tyrion cleared his throat just as Joffrey was turning to go, and Joffrey groaned. "And if they don’t?” he asked mildly.

Joffrey turned to stare at him incredulously. “Then we make them, Uncle,” he snapped, “because that is what kings do. Rule.”

Tyrion reached up, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Your Grace...” he cleared his throat, not quite sure how to word the next words.

Because, unlike Joffrey, he had a hard time believing this little plan of his would work. Perhaps it was because he was more sane than his nephew, perhaps it was because the people below wanted blood, could practically smell it in the air.

There were enough of them, Tyrion realized faintly, to surround the entire Keep. They would have to send a raven just to get a message through the crowd and to the guards on the city walls.

Joffrey seemed to notice his expression. “What is it now?"

"The people...The Sparrows have induced the people to begin burning their fineries, their wealthy items," he said, glancing back down at the mob, at the fire growing rapidly in the streets before the statue. "As a sign of their repudiation of all things luxurious. And, as you can see, they're doing it. I hardly think they’re going to stop just because you kill some of them."

Joffrey bit the inside of his cheek. Even as stupid as he was, he couldn't fail to understand the implication, there. "You think they won't listen to their king," he said tiredly.

Tyrion hesitated, not certain he wanted to give Joffrey that impression at all, and then nodded, because fear seemed to be the one thing that ever got through to his nephew. Fear, and a now unfortunately dead queen. "It is a possibility, Your Grace," he said tiredly.

Joffrey clenched his fists. "How many soldiers do we have in King's Landing at the moment?" He raised a hand, not giving Tyrion the chance to answer.

Tyrion wasn’t sure he would have done so, anyway, because he had a bad feeling that the King had gotten the complete wrong impression from what he had just been told, and Tyrion wasn’t certain he wanted to be responsible for that, not at all.

Ser Meryn Trant, helpful bugger that he was, informed the King, and Tyrion raised a brow, for that was less than even he’d been expecting, and surely the Hand of the King ought to know that sort of thing.

Joffrey grunted. "Set them on this rabble, here and now. Teach them what happens when they speak against their King. And make sure the workers get through to the statue, afterwards. And...” he pursed his lips. “If they continue tomorrow, send the guard after them again. And again, until there are none left to question the will of their King."

As Joffrey turned to leave the parapets, the streets already ran with blood.

Tyrion glanced down at the grisly sight with a grimace, took a deep breath, and turned back to the stunned guards staring at him, in lieu of the people below.

“Well?” he demanded coldly, exhaustion flooding through him. “You heard the King. Get rid of this rabble. But Captain?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Ser Meryn had followed his King, as he always did. “Come to me before you decide to go attacking them again tomorrow, is that understood? And I want to know how many are killed, today. And only those who resist being told to leave the square, Captain. And dump their bodies outside the city, before Joffrey decides to string them up as a reminder to everyone. That’s an order.” His lips twitched into a humorless smile. “From your king.”

The man gave him a silent nod, and Tyrion couldn’t get away from the place quickly enough.

He supposed on a better day, he would have argued with the King more than he had, tried to convince him that the people were easily led and that the Sparrows were at fault for their actions, not themselves, but he just...was sick of fighting an uphill battle every second.

He was the Hand of the King, wasn’t he?

He'd just spent the better part of a day before being summoned to the parapets arguing with his sister and half of a Small Council, with Oberyn Martell and Mace's positions still left unfilled, about what to do with the situation with those fucking fanatics.

Joffrey hadn't even been there, though of course Cersei had been happy enough to convey his demands that something be done.

Tyrion couldn't decide if it was better when Margaery was here, insisting that her husband attend Small Council meetings to make sure he didn't make any sudden, unprecedented announcements and, gods forbid, actually learn something about the kingdoms he was ruling, or when she was gone and Joffrey didn't bother to show up to them at all.

As if slaughtering a bunch of hapless smallfolk who weren't even the Sparrows was going to improve their relations with the people, Tyrion thought, with a humorless snort.

His nephew really could be an annoying fuck sometimes, when he really set his mind to it.

The truth was, Tyrion wasn't entirely certain what to do about these Sparrows, or that any ideas he did come up with at the moment would be better than Joffrey's, especially with the mob right outside the Keep's doors.

He had thought about his father today, in the long hours he spent in the Small Council chambers, and how he had seemed to have all of Westeros under his thumb, while he was the Hand.

Of course, Tyrion had been Hand of the King before and knew it wasn't as easy as his father made it, but the man sure had managed to make it look smooth, keeping the meetings in the Tower of the Hand and keeping even Joffrey in line.

And that, of course, had sent Tyrion thinking about what his father would do, in this situation.

He had the annoying realization that his father might have actually agreed with Joffrey, that slaughtering the fanatics was for the best. Oh, he wouldn't have been happy with the way Joffrey ordered the smallfolk in that crowd slaughtered indiscriminately, but he couldn't imagine it was the bloodshed itself his father would have taken issue with.

After all, Tywin Lannister had spilled enough blood in his lifetime.

The thought brought him up short. Oddly enough, he hadn't thought about his father in some time. Wasn't sure if that was because he was purposely avoiding doing so, or if the man truly had finally stopped haunting him, now that he was dead.

He suspected it was the former.

Still, now that he was thinking of him, Tyrion couldn’t help but wonder what his father would do in this situation. How he would handle Stannis, the Boltons, Joffrey.

Cersei had all but implied that Tywin would be willing to give Joffrey a good whipping to get him back into shape, but he couldn't imagine Cersei advocating for Tyrion to do that, for all that she seemed to want a bit of peace in King's Landing.

So far, there had been no repercussions against him, or Sansa, for the way Tyrion had exploded at Joffrey in that Small Council meeting, beyond the boy pouting about it and refusing to attend another one, and Tyrion would rather keep it that way.

So long as the boy was distracted with pouting over how he wasn't treated like a King, he wasn't declaring war on anyone else.

Tyrion grimaced, rubbing at his temples as he made his way back into his chambers in the Tower.

He really didn't want to resort to a hapless slaughter of common people. He should have dealt with these sparrows some time ago, he knew, before things got this bad, but he'd been distracted. With his little wife, with Stannis Baratheon...

He groaned.

In dealing with them now, he could only think of a few ways to do so, all of them bad. He couldn't afford to give the sparrows the idea, after all, that they were powerful enough to meet with the King, or even with the Hand of the King, for negotiations, but he didn't want to relegate them off to someone else, not when he didn't know how that meeting would go.

And just trying to strong arm them into stopping clearly wasn't working.

Still, he could feel a migraine pulling at his temples, and he thought that if he never heard the name "Sparrows" again, it would be too soon.

He had far too many other issues to deal with, not the least of which being Stannis Baratheon.

The Boltons had fled Winterfell, it seemed, and were now taking up refuge in Frey territory, or somewhere around there. Truthfully, Tyrion had no idea where the fuck they were and couldn't be brought to care less.

They may have been House Lannister's newest allies, but they were hardly proving their use, these days.

He'd heard great stories about their willingness to drag down the Starks and take their place, and their family's brutality, and so far, he was less than impressed with all of them.

Rumor had it Lord Bolton's fat wife had just given birth to a son. Perhaps the man was growing soft with fatherhood.

He sighed, reaching up to pinch at the bridge of his nose as he sauntered into hsi chambers in the Tower.

Not that he would ever know anything about fatherhood. At this rate, if he didn't have a thousand bastards populating Westeros, there weren't going to be any.

He wondered if perhaps that wouldn't be a good thing. His father certainly would have thought so.

He didn't think there were any other dwarves who had achieved his position, much less had children. Perhaps the condition was contagious.

He sighed, pushing open the door to his chambers, very much expecting Shae to be asleep when he entered.

No such luck.

He was glad that the candle in Sansa's chambers seemed to be out.

Much as he worried about the girl these days, seemingly unable to stop doing so no matter how he tried, he really, really didn't want to endure another awkward conversation with her, not now.

He no longer knew how to speak with her at all, he was beginning to fear.

"You look exhausted," Shae said, where she lounged naked in his bed, and Tyrion groaned, just looking at her.

It seemed his lover wasn't asleep, and a part of him was glad for that touched that she had stayed up half the night for him.

She was beautiful, and lovely, and he wanted nothing more than to take her to bed and ravish her, but...she was right. He was exhausted, and he didn't think he'd get to the act of ravishing his lover anytime soon.

He doubted he'd manage it by the end of the week, much as he knew Shae was chafing against the restriction. She always grew rather restless when she couldn't convince him to sleep with her enough for her tastes.

He wondered if she had found herself another distraction, to tide her over until he was finished with his work. The thought had a flare of jealousy running up in him, and he ground his teeth together, wondering where it had come from.

But of course he knew where it had come from, he thought bitterly, thinking of the one woman he had loved in his life. The one woman before...

"I am," he admitted, going over to the bottle of wine his darling Shae had left on the bedside table for him, and drinking directly from it, brilliant woman.

She always seemed to anticipate his needs long before he did, Tyrion thought, with some fondness.

Shae made a noise of disgust, shifting away from him on the bed. "That's vile," she said, nose wrinkling cutely. "I left a cup there, too, if you didn't notice."

Tyrion glanced at it. "Too small," he said, pulling the bottle away from his lips.

"You're small enough for it," Shae muttered, and, after a startled moment, Tyrion laughed, abandoning the bottle and climbing into bed beside her.

"Is that jealousy I hear?" he teased her, forgetting his own and bending down to press a kiss to her bare shoulder. "Of a bottle of wine?"

Shae moaned a little, shifting to give him more room. "I could think of plenty better things for you to be doing with your mouth," she told him, and Tyrion laughed, at that.

"I'm sure you could," he told her, before reaching out and placing a hand on her hip, waiting for her to nod before he slowly stroked down it. "Is the child asleep?" he asked, a joke in poor taste, he knew even as he said it.

Still, Tyrion was sort of known for those.

Sansa might not be their daughter really, but it seemed these days that she was as good as, the way he felt as if the two of them were constantly worrying over her. He knew that she was a woman now, practically, even if she was too young for him.

But she wasn't his wife, not really, and his mind struggled to find an explanation for what she was in his life, these days. Shae seemed to have found her purpose in serving the young woman, these days, and he didn't know what to make of that, either. Not when he could remember well enough how jealous she had been of the other girl, when he was first set to marry Sansa.

Shae grimaced, half-turning in bed until she was facing him. "She is," she said coolly, and Tyrion sighed, not wanting to have another argument about this. He shouldn't have brought it up at all, he berated himself.

"Shae..."

"We need to talk about her, Tyrion, or you are never going to find peace in your household," Shae told him bluntly.

Tyrion blinked at her. "My...household," he repeated, slowly, and then let out a deep sigh when Shae only stared resolutely back at him. "What household?"

Shae blinked at him, and then pulled away, looking, for a moment, disgusted. "It is not as if she could help that," she told him, calmly.

And Tyrion...flinched, as he realized what she was talking about, something he hadn't even been thinking about, in Casterly Rock.

He knew that it was no fault of Sansa's that he had lost Casterly Rock, of course he did. He knew that Sansa had been backed into a corner by his pernicious sister and Joffrey, that there had been nothing she could do but their will, when Tyrion had been locked away in a prison cell and about to go on trial for the murder of his own father.

Sansa hadn't had a choice when she signed away Casterly Rock, and he shouldn't blame her for the loss of his own inheritance.

Didn't blame her.

But Tyrion also knew that, no matter what Shae might call it now, they had no household. They had nothing, in fact, but these rooms, graciously gifted Tyrion by the King, and just as easily taken away.

All because his sister had stolen his birthright from him. Had stolen Casterly Rock, where he might shuttle away his wife from the tender mercies of Joffrey, where he might openly show some care for his wife's maid.

He let out a long sigh, because what was done was done, and even though he was no longer suspected of murder, he was certain that, should he contest the inheritance, his sister would find some other way to hold onto it.

"What about her?" he asked, quietly.

Shae gave him a long look, and then sighed, reaching out and rubbing at his shoulder. "I spoke with her, earlier. She...explained some things, and I confess I might be more confused now than I was then."

Tyrion stared at her. "Well that's encouraging," he muttered, half tempted to turn away from her.

Shae glared at him, and he let out another sigh. "I'm listening, Shae. But I don't see what talking about it is going to do, now."

"And why is that?" she demanded, sitting up straight.

"She's told me quite clearly where she stands, I think," Tyrion muttered. "And made it very clear that she wants me to have no part in her life." His fingers itched for the wine again. "I am trying to respect her wishes, you know."

Shae glared at him, hardly looking appeased by the words. "She is a child. She does not know where her own two feet stand. She doesn't know what she wants."

"Shae..."

"She's lost her home, Tyrion," Shae interrupted, coldly. "Her home, her family, and her lover is leagues away. She's lost, and she doesn't need to push you away, as well."

He reached up, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Could have fooled me," he muttered, and Shae scoffed.

"And I suppose you never got in a fight with your father?" she asked coldly, reminding him of the way he had referred to Sansa as their child earlier, and he glanced up at her sharply.

No, hearing it like that, the metaphor didn't fit, not at all.

"I hardly think that has to do with this," he said, sitting upright in bed. He shook his head again. "I'm not her father, Shae. I'm her husband."

Shae was silent for a moment behind him, and then he could feel her arms wrapping around his back, resting there.

"Yes. She's your wife," she said calmly. "And she is a child. Get that straight in your head before she gets her own chopped off."

Tyrion blinked at her. "W-What?" he asked. "What has she done now?"

Shae's eyes shifted, and Tyrion's narrowed, looking at her. She knew something, he thought, worry filling him, and he didn't much like that thought, not at all.

"Nothing," she said, reassuring him and annoying him at the same time. "But it's only a matter of time. I knew a whore in Dorne who acted the way she did, who had that same look in her eyes, and the next thing I knew, she was being hanged for murder. So for fuck's sake, get your house in order."

And then she got up and stalked out of the room.

"Shae!" he called after her, but she didn't even turn around. Tyrion grimaced, rubbing at his temples as the migraine which had let up for a few moments while Shae had been nearby abruptly returned.

Gods, he'd fucked up. He knew that, the moment she walked out of the room, and the moment he remembered Sansa’s shocked face, when he had told her that if it was what she wanted, he would stay out of her way for good.

He’d proven how able he was at that in the next Small Council meeting he’d gone to, threatening Joffrey when he spoke about Sansa.

Gods, he was an idiot, and Shae was right.

He may not have paid much attention to her before they were married, guilt at the thought of what his family had done to hers, and what Joffrey had done to her, clouding his judgment where she was concerned, but Tyrion could imagine that it was better for her to have someone in her corner.

She'd lost the only person who she had truly trusted to be there before, after all, Tyrion thought with a sigh. Perhaps Shae was right. She usually was.


	305. SANSA

"What is this?" Joffrey asked, sneering at the large man skulking along behind Maester Qyburn. Just Qyburn, Sansa remembered, blinking as she lifted her head.

She didn't want to be here, but Shae was right. She needed to leave her chambers, needed to be out of her rooms and doing everything that Sansa Stark used to do.

The letter she had written depended on that, if nothing else.

She had sent it yesterday, when she could get away from Shae, going up to the parapets and finding the only raven still flying North, to Winterfell.

Her hands had been shaking the whole walk up there, the letter tucked away in her gown until the very last moment, and she couldn't remember how many times she had glanced over her shoulder and wondered whether or not she was being watched.

No one had come for her in the dead of night, however, and Sansa thought she might just be safe. That she might just finally, finally, be winning.

It was a strange sensation, to say the least.

But she could not allow it to get to her head. She had heard from her husband just the other day of the slaughter of the smallfolk who had gathered in the square the other day to protest the building of Margaery's statue. They were strangely furious about it, and while she knew that the Faith of the Seven didn't appreciate the blasphemous words Joffrey had used to describe the statue, Sansa had not at all expected their response.

Apparently, Tyrion had. He merely hadn't anticipated Joffrey's.

Sansa wasn't entirely certain why not. The King had seen all of Robert Baratheon's bastards murdered merely on account of who their father had been; surely this was a logical enough move, from Joffrey's end.

She supposed it was only a pity that the smallfolk had not been accompanied by those Sparrows at the time, who might have fought back and at least gotten a good licking in for the gold cloaks who had done the deed.

But the Sparrows seemed to have disappeared, even if their words lived on in the anger of the smallfolk. Joffrey had ordered their leader to be found and his head given to Joffrey, but so far, no one seemed capable of doing the deed.

Sansa didn't know how she felt about the Sparrows. On the one hand, she knew that the Crown loathed them, even if Joffrey refused to regard them, before this moment, as anything more than a nuisance. They preached against the finery and riches of the Capitol, and the smallfolk were listening, which was bad enough for the Lannisters, of course.

Had been bad for the Tyrells as well, but at least the Tyrells had plied the smallfolk with food. The Lannisters didn't seem to have the same fortune.

On the other hand, the Lannisters were no friends of Sansa's, and Sansa had a horrible feeling that while the smallfolk might have laid down and died in the past for the Crown, they might not be so eager to obey their king after Joffrey had slaughtered a good number of them over a statue.

And now they had Joffrey's attention, where they hadn't before, all because of that damn statue.

Sansa forced her thoughts away from that, because she remembered what Lord Baelish had once told her, that she was the worst liar in King's Landing, and she thought that perhaps the key to that was not to think at all.

An empty doll, the way the Lannisters wanted her to be.

Qyburn bowed deeply before the King, and Sansa flinched, her empty head filling with images of nothing more than Qyburn down in the Black Cells, torturing those girls. Of that girl down in the cells, who had begged them to kill her.

She flinched and didn't meet Shae's eyes, when she felt the other woman watching her.

"A gift for you, my love," Cersei spoke before Qyburn could, reaching out and placing a hand on Joffrey's. He pulled his away, and Cersei almost looked hurt. "Considering what has happened most recently, I thought you could use him."

Sansa didn't want to think about Cersei's hurts, however. She didn't want to think about that woman when all she could think about was Margaery, how Margaery had gone down in a ship and the Tyrells were fleeing King's Landing.

And she certainly didn't want to think about the great hulking giant standing before the throne, twice the size of any man Sansa had seen and with his face entirely covered by a golden helmet already.

She shivered, thinking of what she and Megga had found in the Black Cells, of what they had watched Maester Quyburn do to this very man, she had no doubt of that.

And now Megga was gone, and this man was standing before the King, very much alive, somehow.

"Maester Quyburn, doesn't your pet speak?" Joffrey mocked. The giant didn't flinch.

"His name is Ser Robert Strong, Your Grace," Maester Quyburn announced, not seeming at all offended by Joffrey’s unimpressed glance, "And he has sworn not to speak again until all of His Grace's enemies are dead."

Where she stood not so far from Sansa, Cersei was smirking. The sight of it made Sansa shiver as she watched this giant covered from head to toe in Lannister gold stomp before the Iron Throne.

She paled as he got close enough to touch her, and then moved past.

Joffrey grinned. "Then I should think a demonstration is in order. Ser Robert," he gestured to the foolish young sparrow huddled on the ground not far from where Ser Robert stood, in chains and awaiting the king's pleasure.

He had been the one Sparrow the King had been able to catch of late, considering their ability to hide in plain sight, and Joffrey was keen on letting the man suffer, Sansa knew. A moment ago, he had been contemplating drawing and quartering the poor man, but Sansa had a terrible feeling that this might be worse.

"This is one of the sparrows whom we caught disparaging my late queen's newest statue. He is an enemy. Avenge my lady wife, if you’re so interested in seeing all my enemies dead."

Ah, yes. Sansa had forgotten that Joffrey was back in the middle of one of is old games, determined to show these fanatics that he was still King in King's Landing.

She missed Margaery all the more, suddenly. Oh, she knew that Margaery had not always been able to curb Joffrey's more wicked tendencies, but it had felt...almost as if she had curbed them, somewhat.

Qyburn glanced at the Queen Mother, who gave him a subtle nod Joffrey didn’t appear to see.

Ser Robert Strong needed no more order than that, moving forward, and Sansa grimaced, and thought of nothing.

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

She wondered if that was how Margaery had endured it, watching these sights at Joffrey's side without a word, with even a smile.

Sansa was almost smiling when Ser Robert Strong bashed the sparrow's head against the floor of the throne room, as he instantly went limp and blood began to gush from him.

Sansa didn't grimace, like the other ladies standing beside her. She didn't flinch back, the way some of them did.

She watched, wordlessly, as Ser Robert picked up the sparrow he had killed, and threw him before the steps of the Iron Throne.

Silence had fallen over the room long before the sparrow was dead, but now, that silence seemed to fill the whole room, oppressive and far too loud.

Joffrey stared, pulling his feet up a little so that the blood did not splash against him, when it fell.

Beside him, Cersei looked smugly horrified.

And then Joffrey started to laugh.

"Well, that is a relief," he said, and Sansa stared at him. "Someone ought to be useful in the Kingsguard. Welcome to my Kingsguard, Ser Robert. Someone do find him a white cloak."

Tyrion cleared his throat, then, stepping around the remains of the Sparrow to give the King a shallow bow. “Your Grace, we do not even know Ser Robert’s-”

“I am the King, am I not?” Joffrey demanded, gaze darkening. “And I can name whoever the fuck I want to the Kingsguard, Uncle.”

Tyrion sighed, and took a step back. Cersei beamed.

Sansa looked back again, shivered as she saw the cold, dead eyes of Ser Robert Strong when he turned away from the King and began stomping through the crowd, all of which gave him a wide berth.

Thought of the young woman she and Megga had found in the Black Cells, begging them to mercifully kill her.

Megga, who had vanished without a word, supposedly pregnant by the man she had been betrothed to, though she had not looked at all pregnant to Sansa. Sansa appreciated that these things took time, but still.

Alla hadn't known. None of the Tyrell ladies had even gotten the chance to say goodbye to Megga, and even leaving in disgrace, she would have had time to pack up her things and say her farewells.

She was a strange girl, but Sansa thought that she might have even said goodbye to her, before she left for good.

Robert Strong bowed before the King just as he reached the double doors of the throne room, one last time, Quyburn hovering strangely close to him, almost as if he was worried the great lumbering creature would fall over.

Sansa thought of the way his legs had shook on that table in the Black Cells, and wondered if that was perhaps a concern.

Thought of the deadness in the eyes of that young woman, one of Cersei's own maids who had likely seen something she hadn't been meant to, and wondered if Megga was still alive, even, or if she had already turned into that young woman, herself.

Sansa thought of the letter that she had sent yesterday, and shivered. She felt as if something had irrevocably changed in the air, something horrible, and she didn't much like the feeling of what might just be coming for her, if she was found out.

Gods, she had been foolish. She had been foolish not to place the letter into the hands of someone she trusted, even if there seemed to be none of those left.

Sansa swallowed hard, and reached out, touching Shae's shoulder. The other woman turned to her, expression gentle.

"You said you would help me with anything," Sansa whispered to her, careful not to be overheard by the shocked nobles crowding around them, but then, everyone was at least distracted by this creature whom Sansa had met before.

Shae's eyes narrowed, and she suddenly looked very nervous. "What did you do?' she asked, and Sansa supposed she deserved that, if she thought about the letter she had promised herself she wouldn’t think about.

She flinched, all the same. "Nothing,” she told Shae, and pretended it wasn't a lie. "But I need you to help me find someone, and truly, this time."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. The zombie's back. Let me know what you think!


	306. MARGAERY

Her lips tasted of dusk rose tea and Sansa when Margaery awoke; listening to the noises about her before opening her eyes to alert anyone that she was awake.

She heard nothing, and Margaery sat up, wincing at the pain to her stomach as she glanced around.

She was lying on a hard surface in the darkness of a room that was rather cold, and Margaery grimaced as her muscles clenched in soreness, as she tried to remember where she was and why she hurt so.

Her world tilted, and a wave of nausea rushed through her, and Margaery barely managed to sit up enough not to be sick on herself.

When she was done, she glanced down at herself, noting that she was still wearing the gown she had been wearing during the shipwreck, torn at the bloodied stomach, and, upon further inspection, her ribs and the wound had been bound with thick bandages.

Margaery grimaced, attempted to reach down to touch the wounds, before realizing that her hands were bound to the wooden bars above her head.

That was when she saw the burns, squinting at them in the near darkness.

Her arms were covered in burns.

Margaery had not noticed before; she supposed in the adrenaline and the horror that made some sense.

Or, yes, she had, Margaery realized, swallowing thickly. She'd seen those burns when the pirate had grabbed her-

When the pirate had grabbed her.

Margaery's head whipped up, and she grimaced at the dull pain that raced through her body at the movement.

The pirates. The pirate ship which had happened upon she and her companion, the burning city behind them. Loras. The shipwreck.

She let out a grunt of frustration, glancing around at her surroundings for the first time.

She supposed that now she was paying attention, she could feel the soft shocks of waves thumping against the sides of the ship. The walls seemed to close in on the ceiling of the ship, and Margaery surmised that she was deep in its belly.

Of course, it hardly mattered, knowing where below deck she was, when she was stuck inside a cage barely larger than her own body.

She grimaced, tried to pull at the bonds around her wrists once more, only to grimace as pain lanced through her once more.

She must not have noticed it before because of the shock, she thought idly, and then shook that thought from her mind, because it didn't matter, just now.

What mattered was getting out of this place, no matter how.

"My lady?" a voice called, and Margaery took a deep breath, squinting into the darkness until she spotted Arry, where he sat in what looked like a cage similar to her own.

"Arry?" she called, and sat up a little taller, realizing belatedly that it didn't hurt her arms so badly, sitting like this.

"You all right?" she saw him shuffling in the darkness, trying to move closer, but he didn't seem able to, and Margaery took a deep breath, realized that he was probably as bound as she.

Margaery grimaced, glancing down at herself. "I'll live," she muttered, not at all wanting to be grateful to pirates for her current state. She shook her head in the near darkness, suppressing once more the urge to vomit suddenly rushing through her.

It was more or less the truth. She certainly didn't feel hale and whole, but she wasn't going to complain about her aches and pains to a near stranger when they had much greater difficulties to worry about.

Arry let out a relieved breath that she could hear even from where she sat. "I'm glad to hear it," he said, "Though I don't know what good it'll do."

Margaery blinked at him. He seemed to almost be becoming clearer, in the dark.

"Hmm," Margaery hummed, taking a deep breath. "How long was I asleep?"

Arry glanced at her. "Two nights and a day, m'lady. Far as I can tell."

Margaery's fingers tightened around their bonds, and she took a shuddering breath, and then another. Two nights and a day, and she had not yet been rescued from this hell by her adoring husband. That just went to show how dependable men were, for you.

"And our captors?" she was almost afraid to ask, but Margaery knew that she needed to get a read on their situation as soon as possible, if they were going to get out of here.

Wait a moment. If she was going to get out of here. Even if this man had rescued her from certain drowning, Margaery owed nothing more to him. He had also gotten them into this situation, and not put up a fight when the pirates took them captive, not that it would have done much good.

Still, Loras would have put up a fight, and a good one, at that.

Arry gave her a disgusted look. It was no great secret that they were captors, Margaery mused, else they would not both be sitting in cages across from one another.

"Pirates," Arry muttered.

"Yes, I'd surmised that," Margaery said coolly, shifting where she sat. The bars, it seemed, did have splinters, and if only she could find some way of cutting her bonds on them...

She would still be stuck in this cage, below deck in a pirate ship.

Margaery sighed.

The boy shot her a look that was almost annoyed. "Slavers, I think," he said. "Though I don't know what they're doing this far North."

Margaery shrugged. That wasn't her concern, just now.

She didn't know what was going to happen to her, leagues away from anywhere familiar and at the mercy of strangers, half naked and having to live with the knowledge that her brother was dead, that he had died within the space of weeks after Willas.

That the Lannisters were probably responsible for her death and returning to King's Landing might only put her in more danger.

But she knew one thing for damn sure. She was not about to become someone's slave, lost forever to everyone she had once known.

That wasn't how her story was going to end, not after everything else that had happened to her.

"Do you know how many?" she asked, and Arry blinked at her. She'd seen at least a dozen, aboard the ship, but that could mean the entirety of the crew, or that there were two dozen more below decks.

He grimaced in the dark. "No," he said. "They knocked me out cold, soon after two of them brought you down here."

She grimaced, for she'd hoped for a bit more than that, but no matter.

"Arry, listen to me," she said quietly. "We have to figure out a way out of here."

He stared at her for a moment, as if he couldn’t believe that she was dumb enough to think he didn't realize that, before saying quietly, "I'm not sure there is one, my lady."

Margaery shook her head, forcing down the panic bubbling up inside of her. "There's always a way out," she informed him, glancing around their surroundings once more. "We just have to find it."

That was another thing she had learned, as Joffrey's wife.

For a moment, she considered just shouting for the pirates and informing them of who she was. Selling her off to the highest bidders, who would no doubt be her own family, would fetch them a pretty penny, after all, and would perhaps get her home the quickest of any routes ahead of her.

But Margaery wasn't quite certain she was that desperate, wasn't certain that the pirates wouldn't rather have a turn in bed with the Queen of Westeros, and that was something she had to avoid at all costs.

She didn't know what would become of her, but she knew that birthing a brown baby would not help her in any case.

"I meant," and Arry sounded almost annoyed, now, "That there may not be a way out in your current condition."

Almost without thinking, Margaery glanced down at her stomach. She could see that the wound – the stab wound, and when had that happened? – had been stitched up by the pirates, and just the thought of that made her squirm with unease.

She’d been stitched up, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t be doing any heavy swimming, anytime soon.

Margaery shot him a look. "I'm fine," she gritted out, and then attempted to rub her bonds against the bars holding her. They may not be metal and therefore easier for this sort of thing, but she would take her chances with a particularly sharp splinter, if she had to.

Arry shook his head, clearly not convinced. "One of the pirates had a look at you," he said, and Margaery struggled not to feel mortified, knowing that. "You are still recovering from your injury and the fever-" he started, but she cut him off.

"It is imperative that we get out of here, don't you understand? And will not outlast my fever," she told him calmly. "We will go, or I will go on alone, and leave you here. Name your choice."

Arry blinked at her. "Even if we could get out of these cages-"

"We have to," Margaery insisted, and wasn't sure if that was her own stubborn drive or the panic welling through her, filling her.

She wondered if this was how Sansa had felt, in the Black Cells. Those long days she had spent locked away for a crime she had not committed.

Margaery had been sympathetic before. She was downright heartbroken, just now.

But...she couldn't think about that. She had to focus on getting out of here.

She had to believe that she could get out of here.

"My lady," he said carefully, "the village where I have just spent the last several months was just burnt to the ground. I heard the pirates laughing about how they had destroyed it, and how no one would do anything because of the war on."

Margaery cleared her throat. She supposed she was not...unsympathetic, that he had just lost his home and his livelihood, but she rather thought the more important thing was that they were both still alive.

"I don't think," he went on, "They're the type of pirates who care about hurting people."

Margaery sucked in a breath, and then another.

She'd supposed that, from the burning city behind their boat, and the way they had merely stared at her as she bled out in front of them.

But she supposed it was different, to realize that while one was trapped in a cell, entirely at the mercy of pirates whom she could only truly rely on Arry for a read on. Pirates who probably planned to sell the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms as a slave.

She didn't much care for that thought.

The door to what she supposed might function as a brig, this wretched place, wrenched open just then, and Margaery blinked, as the image of that very same door being engulfed in flames filled her mind.

And then a pirate was marching through that door, rather than her brother, a greasy man with graying hair nearly falling out of his scalp, and a slight limp.

Margaery pursed her lips, exchanging a leery glance with Arry.

Fortunately, for she decided she didn't much like the idea of this man's attentions on her, Arry was the one to speak first.

"What do you want?" he demanded, moving forward a little in his cell, as if he sought to shield Margaery from the pirate.

It was a nice gesture, she thought, but entirely useless, given that they were both bound in different cages.

"Food for ya," the pirate said, openly leering at Margaery as he dropped a piece of dried meat down into Arry's cell.

Well, she supposed that was better than starving, even if the meat looked rather moldy for dried meat.

The pirate moved forward, dropping the piece of meat down for Margaery as if she were a dog, and she grimaced, reaching down to pick it up with her bound hands as best she was able, sneaking a glance in Gendry's direction to see how he managed it.

He picked it up with both hands and ate like he didn't think he would see food again for a very long time, and Margaery didn't like the horrible feeling telling her that he was probably right to worry about that.

It wasn't as if slaves were going to be fed above the pirates themselves, on low rations, even if Margaery deplored the idea of eating with her hands, like a beggar, and thanking this greasy man for the few rations he did deliver her.

It took her a moment, thinking on all of this, to realize that the pirate was still standing above her, watching her eat with barely disguised lust.

Margaery grimaced as her stomach turned with a chewy piece of meat still between her teeth, and she didn't think she could finish the rest of it, what little remained.

She lifted her gaze, meeting the pirate's eyes, and tried not to flinch at what she was there.

Margaery was no stranger, of course, to a man's appreciate gaze. Ever since she had first matured into a woman, she had known that she was beautiful enough to turn heads, had learned to use that to her advantage.

Still, there was something very different about having a king's predatory gaze on her, and having this pirate's. This pirate, who was old enough to be her father, or perhaps older still, though she thought he had merely aged badly, staring at her with an open lust that told her everything he wanted to do to her.

She could endure it, she knew.

This wasn't like Ser Osmund. This man, this pirate, didn't know who she was, and he wanted her merely for her beauty, which she had dealt with her whole life.

With Ser Osmund, everything had been different. She had known from the moment he touched her that he had no interest in her physically, that his only interest was in destroying the reputation of the Queen, on Cersei's orders.

That had been terrifying, knowing that her life was in the hands of a man who wanted nothing more than to harm her because of duty. This, she would endure.

She had to endure it.

Because Margaery Tyrell was not going to spend her last days as the chattel of some pirate slaver.

Cersei Lannister would find that far too amusing for her tastes.

The pirate reached out then, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking, running a hand through her matted hair, beneath the bars.

Margaery grimaced, ripping herself as far out of his grip as she could manage, which was, all told, not very far.

The pirate let out a booming laugh, and reached for her again, but Arry's voice stopped him.

"Don't touch her," he gritted out, successfully diverting the pirate's attentions, and Margaery could have wilted from relief.

The pirate turned on Arry then, though, and a part of Margaery found that just as distasteful.

In this new life, whatever she made of it, if she made anything at all of it, she didn't want to owe anyone any favors.

"Oh?" the pirate smirked. "And what is she to you?"

Too late, Margaery realized he had likely come down here with acquiring that information in mind, and her jaw ticked in irritation.

"She's my newlywed wife," Arry blurted out beside her, and Margaery froze, eyes flying open.

The pirate pulled back then, looking somewhat surprised.

"And ye took her out to sea the moment you married her?" he asked suspiciously.

Arry lifted his chin. "Yes. For a celebration. It's a lucky thing we did, or we might have ended up like the rest of that village. She's a maiden," he said. "You won't touch her."

The pirate glanced between the two of them, and then started to laugh. "Sure, lad," he said, dropping Margaery back down. "We won't touch her. The Southerners'll pay better for an untouched maid, anyways."

Margaery shivered at that tone, at how dry and uncaring it was. As if, had he known she was used goods, he wouldn't care at all not to use her.

Still, the pirate backed away from her then, turning and leaving them alone with a slam of the door, and the sound of a latch falling into place.

Only then did Margaery remember to breathe.

"How did you know that would work?" she whispered to Arry, in the darkness once more.

Arry snorted. "Sea pirates. All the same, no matter where's they're from." He glanced at her. "I'm sorry." She blinked. "For the liberty."

Margaery blinked again, and wondered when her body had stopped feeling like her own, that she no longer thought of such touches as liberties.

She shook her head. "You saved me from a far worse fate," she said, for she had no doubt that the moment that pirate had finished with her, she would have been tossed to the rest to have their way with her, as well.

Arry shrugged. "Still," he insisted.

She shook her head. "I'm still not sure why that worked," she said.

Arry shrugged. "Claiming you're a maiden might have done the trick," he told her. "If we really are to be sold as slaves, you might fetch a higher price, like he said."

Margaery shook her head stubbornly. "You might be willing to lie down and die," she gritted out, "But I'm not becoming someone's slave."

"Hey, now, I just meant-"

"I'm not a maiden," she blurted out, and Arry blinked at her. She didn't flinch under that gaze. "So this plan of yours...I'm sure the slavers would want to prove that I'm a maiden, and I'm not."

Arry shrugged. "Didn't think you were, m'lady," he told her, and Margaery raised her eyebrows at him. "No offense."

Margaery leaned back against the metal bars of her cage, closing her eyes. "Still," she said, following his line of thought, "I suppose it will be better to become the bed warmer of some Southern lord rather than a pirate, eh?"

Arry blinked at her. "M'lady, I didn't mean-"

"I'm going to get out of here, Arry," she repeated coolly, eyes still closed. "Whatever it takes. Are you with me?"

She opened her eyes, met his steadily. He grimaced.

"Aye, m'lady," he told her. "I'm with you."

Well, Margaery thought, glancing around at their surroundings, she supposed that was something, at least.

She still had no idea how they were going to escape this place, the two of them against a ship full of pirates, but she knew one thing for certain. If they were, she was going to have to get out of this cage, first.

She doubted the pirates would all traipse down here at once to tell her how many were in their number, after all.

No, that she would have to find out for herself.


	307. MYRCELLA

Myrcella took a deep breath, stepping off the ship without a backwards glance, and forced a smile.

The sun streamed down on King's Landing today, making it appear almost golden, and as Myrcella stared at it, she could almost pretend that all the horrors she had suffered here as a child had never happened. That the place really was as beautiful as it looked.

Her husband, outranked by her now that they had left Dorne, walked two steps behind her, and Myrcella wanted to look back and see his reassuring gaze, but she forced herself not to. This was a pageant, after all, and she was no doubt to be the main star of it.

Instead, she looked forward, towards the rest of her golden family, all of whom had turned out to greet her, now that she was home.

She remembered leaving this place, a lifetime ago, and seeing only her mother and Uncle Tyrion at the docks to see her off. Now, Joffrey was here, standing almost regal beside his mother, his face twisted into a pout that let Myrcella know he hadn't changed at all. Tommen stood in front of him, a hesitant smile on his features, and Myrcella felt a pang, at how long she had been separated from her youngest brother. Tyrion stood behind the both of them, not quite meeting her eyes, and wearing the sigil of the Hand of the King.

Myrcella remembered that Arianne had told her her uncle was now Hand of the King, now that Grandfather was dead.

Myrcella hadn't known her grandfather well; he preferred to invest himself in the family as a whole, rather than her in particular, and she had always been of the impression that he saw her as nothing more than one to be married off, one day, as indeed Uncle Tyrion had done.

Still, she had mourned, learning that he was dead. He had always sent her the most extravagant gifts, on her namedays. Gowns almost too beautiful for a princess, a horse, once, she remembered fondly, beautiful bound books, even while she had resided in Dorne.

But it was her mother Myrcella looked to now, standing tall beside Joffrey, beaming at the sight of her daughter returned. Myrcella had no doubt that it was her mother who had insisted upon Myrcella's return, never mind that Uncle Jaime had said it was the King. She knew her mother well enough for that, at least.

Myrcella stepped onto the docks, smoothed her skirts, and walked forward to greet her family. Behind her, she could hear the slow tread of Trystane's footsteps, of Uncle Jaime and the rest of their entourage.

She ignored them, with difficulty.

Instead, she curtseyed before the King.

"Your Grace, my brother," she greeted him, with the sunny smile for which all of King's Landing had once loved her.

Joffrey gave her a stiff nod, and Myrcella found herself blinking at him in surprise. He seemed almost...subdued, she thought, though that was never a word she had thought to associate with her brother.

Then she turned to her mother.

"Mother," she whispered, and suddenly all the pain of being separated from her mother these long years drifted away, at the sight of her again.

Her relationship with her mother had always been...different, than the one that Cersei shared with Joffrey. Never as close, and for a long time, Myrcella had resented that.

But, even if she had loved her time in Dorne, with her new family, she had missed some of her old one.

"Myrcella," her mother breathed into her hair as her arms wrapped around Myrcella's slight form, and Myrcella melted into the touch. "My dear girl, you're finally home."

Her mother stank of wine. More so than Myrcella could ever remember her father doing.

Myrcella pulled back, hoping that her mother mistook the grimace on her face for a smile.

"Hmm," her mother said, looking her over with a small smile. "The last time I saw you, you were so small, so young." Her features tightened. "I won't let them take you from me again."

Something about the tone of her words was foreboding, and Myrcella swallowed, desperate to reassure her. Uncle Jaime's words about her family not taking to the marriage very well haunted her, and she would do anything she had to to prove that she was happy with Trystane. "I was quite happy in Dorne, Mother. You had no cause for worry."

Her mother blinked at her. "I would think that the threat of an attempt on your life was cause enough to worry, my love."

Myrcella shrugged. "Princess Arianne protected me. As did Trystane," she assured the woman, but, if anything, those words only seemed to heighten the anger her mother was hiding badly under the pinched expression on her face.

"Yes, well," her mother said stiffly, "But you're home now. That is all that matters."

Myrcella was not going to allow her mother to brush off Trystane like that. Instead, she turned, holding out a hand to her husband, and felt a little jolt when he reached out and squeezed it, one she hoped her mother did not notice.

"My husband," she informed her family, ignoring the way Tyrion gave a small smile, at that. "I wish you all to meet him."

Joffrey turned up his upper lip. "Your husband," he repeated the words slowly. "I don't remember giving consent for that match, Sister."

Myrcella forced her smile to remain in place as she watched Trystane bow before her family. It was the last time he would do so, she promised herself.

"I wish you all to know the happiness of our marriage, Brother," she assured him. "Though of course, I ask for your blessing."

Joffrey sniffed as Trystane stood upright, boldly wrapping an arm around Myrcella's shoulders that made her flinch, but not for the reason her mother seemed to assume, as she stood taller.

Myrcella loved Trystane, but he could be quite...protective, in the way that all Dornish lovers seemed to be, fiercely passionate to a fault. She didn't wish that to put off her family, not now, when they so needed her brother's blessing.

"I apologize for my sister's rash actions, in having the marriage go forward before we recieved your blessing, Your Grace," Trystane said, dipping his head towards Joffrey. "But she knew of our ardor for one another, that we did not wish to be parted for much longer. I fear it was my own fault, for speaking so much of my love for your beautiful sister."

Joffrey glanced between them, and then let out a sound rather like a sigh. "I am glad to see that my sister is happy with her husband, all the same," he said after a moment, which had Myrcella openly staring at him without thinking.

She didn't think her brother had ever cared for her happiness in the past, after all.

"Thank you, Your Grace," Trystane said, as Cersei gritted her teeth. "I shall endeavor to always make her happy."

Joffrey hummed. "It is lucky that Uncle Jaime went to Dorne on his own to fetch you when he did, all the same," he said, voice deceptively light as he glared openly at their mother, and Myrcella blinked, for she had always thought her brother just as close to their mother as she was to him. She had missed much, it seemed, during her time in Dorne.

She wasn't certain she regretted that.

"Else we might never have seen you again."

Myrcella forced a curtsey. "How do you mean, my lord?"

Joffrey's eyes flashed, but she did not know if this was at the use of his title, though she could not imagine it to be that, or something else. "My lady wife Queen Margaery traveled a longer distance than you, just these recent months. She was...lost, at sea, just past Dorne."

Myrcella blinked, more at the open emotion in his voice than at the words. "I...My condolences, Brother. I had not heard."

Joffrey was outright glaring at their mother now. "Yes, it was very tragic."

"Dead?" her uncle Jaime asked, eyes swiveling to her mother with an accusatory glare of his own. Myrcella blinked between all of them, and squeezed Trystane's hand a little tighter in her own, until her husband flinched at the grip.

Her mother lifted her chin, eyes flitting from Jaime to Myrcella and then back again. "Yes," she said demurely, "Quite a tragedy."

Myrcella took a deep breath. "I am sorry to hear of that, Brother," she told Joffrey. She knew nothing of this bride he had taken, but if the woman had managed to subdue him somewhat, as he seemed to be now, perhaps they would have gotten along.

And her brother did look miserable, speaking of happiness and staring out at the sea every few seconds, as if he thought no one would notice.

Myrcella had not thought it possible for her brother to love another besides himself and their mother, but perhaps she had been wrong.

Cersei clapped her hands together. "Indeed it was," she agreed, "Fortunately, the King will soon have the opportunity to find a new love, a new chance at happiness that might help him to forget the pain of his recent loss."

Joffrey's head jerked up, and he turned to stare at their mother, anger flashing in his eyes. "What are you talking about?"

Cersei adopted a rather cool smile. "My son," she said, reaching out and placing a hand on her son's, only for him to shrug it off. Myrcella stared. "You must marry again, for the good of the realm, of course. A king must have a queen. There are many suitable young wome-"

Joffrey stared at her incredulously. "No," he said finally, the word stuttered out through clenched teeth.

Cersei's smile faded a little, but did not disappear. "I am certain that is only the grief speaking, my love."

Joffrey shoved her arm off. "I don't need a queen, Mother," he gritted out. "I had a queen, and she's fucking dead now."

"Give it some time. Think on it."

"I won't," Joffrey snapped.

Cersei raised a brow. "My son," she said, tone dripping with condescension that Myrcella found very familiar, "I understand the great burden of grief you have fallen under, with your wife's recent death, believe me, I do. But you must prove to realm that you are still a capable and virile king. You must marry again, and this time conceive an heir."

Joffrey's fists clenched, and Myrcella found herself stiffening, at his side. She also found herself a little annoyed that her welcoming party once again revolved around her brother, rather than her.

Trystane sent her a little smile, as if he knew what she was thinking, and Myrcella flushed.

She let out a loud yawn, and was only slightly disconcerted when all eyes turned to her. "Well," she said, with a happy smile, "it has been a long journey, and I feel overtired." She turned to Joffrey purposely. "I don't suppose you will be quite angry with me if I retire for the afternoon?" she asked him, pleasantly.

Her brother stared at her for a moment, and then waved a hand, dismissing her.

Myrcella moved to walk past him, but her mother's voice stopped her.

"Your rooms have been prepared just as they once were," she told Myrcella, and Myrcella turned around, slowly, knowing enough of her mother to recognize what that meant.

"Just as?" she asked, forcing sweetness into her tone. Tyrion snorted.

"Chambers have been prepared for Prince Trystane just across the corridor," Cersei assured her, though there was nothing assuring in her gaze, not at all. "I am sure the two of you will be glad of the opportunity for...rest."

Myrcella gritted her teeth. "I see," she said, and dropped Trystane's hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do let me know what you're thinking!


	308. SANSA

The court was having a banquet in Myrcella’s honor, and in honor of that giant monstrosity that was the statue Joffrey had commissioned for her, though that was rather less so.

Sansa honestly didn't know how she felt about the statue. On the one hand, she knew that a lot of the smallfolk were angry, because Joffrey had compared it to the Maiden, or the Mother, whatever it was he had said, but Sansa thought she was perhaps more bothered by the thought that Margaery's face would loom over them only from this statue.

That this statue was how she would be remembered.

That, if the statue remained, as Joffrey seemed to determined for it to do, it would be the _only_ way that people would remember her, in the years to come.

And Sansa...Sansa didn't want some great, ugly statue to be the only way she remembered Margaery’s face, years from now. Didn't want to look back years from now, if she was still a captive here, if something hadn't happened by then, whether it be her rescue or her death, and see Margaery's face only in something Joffrey had created.

The banquet was tonight, and Sansa didn't want to go, but of course she knew that she would have to.

She knew that the servants had been preparing this banquet for all of a week, that it was to be grand and wonderful, and that all of the court was invited to it, for Joffrey wanted them all to share in his wonder at the statue being built for his wife, no matter that it was sacrilege to do so.

Sansa supposed if the King was to go down, they must all go down with him.

The Tyrells, of course, were already gone from King's Landing. Rats fleeing a sinking ship, Sansa reminded herself.

So the ones invited to the banquet in the Princess' honor looked painfully out of place, almost bored, where they sat, none of them with quite the affluence of the Tyrells.

Sansa felt bored, and she had loved Margaery, even if most of this banquet was not, in fact, in honor of her. Still, she didn't want to be here. Didn't want to be here mourning the woman Margaery had publicly been, when none of these people, not even Joffrey, knew the true woman.

None of them.

The banquet, handled by Cersei, was somehow one of the most elaborate thing that Sansa had ever seen, with golden, wrapped roses hanging from the posts of the grand table, and overhanging the doors to the long hall where the feasting was to be had.

Sansa almost rolled her eyes at that, almost pointed out to her husband that it was odd, wasn't it, that the feasting hall was decorated with so many roses, lining the long, linen table, when none of them were here?

She wondered if Cersei had ordered it that way on purpose.

But then she remembered that she was on her best behavior, because of that letter, and she needed to make sure that nothing she did gathered notice.

Of course, Joffrey didn't much care about that.

The moment she moved to sit beside her husband at the great table, across from where the King himself would be seated, he moved in front of her, extending his hand for her to take as if she had every reason to do so.

Tyrion cleared his throat, loudly, and suddenly the eyes of the entire room were upon the three of them.

Joffrey ignored him, giving Sansa a look that was almost...

He stepped in front of Tyrion, smiling at her.

"Lady Sansa," Joffrey took her hand and kissed it with all of the ardor of a lover. "Would you care to accompany me? I'm sure your lord husband won't mind."

It was not a request, and Sansa found herself swallowing and dipping her head, unwilling to glance back at her no doubt scowling husband. She certainly didn't want to cause a scene. "If that is what my lord the king wishes."

He gave her hand a gentle squeeze, and Sansa blinked at him, unsure how to react to him at all.

And then he led her in the long walk all of the way around the table, until they came to a rest where the King was to be seated, near his mother, and Sansa blinked at him, feeling her stomach rise up into her throat.

He pulled out her chair for her, the chair at his right hand, and Sansa blinked at him, because she could see Cersei, staring hard at her where she walked alongside Grandmaester Pycelle.

Because Sansa could not escape the significance of this. She knew that she should not be here, at the King's hand, not even when she was married to his uncle.

This was the place for a wife. Or a mistress.

She paused, where she walked, and Sansa forced her gaze away, didn't look at Tyrion where he sat across from her at the table.

Joffrey's hand brushed against her shoulder as he moved away, and then he sat beside her.

"Your Grace..." she took a careful breath, and Joffrey eyed her, lips twisting into a slight smirk. "I..."

She didn't know what she was going to say, really. Didn't really understand that there was something that she needed to say, only thought that something was wrong with this, but she wasn't certain what she could do to get out of it, just now.

She didn't want Joffrey's attentions. That was the last thing she wanted, just now especially.

Joffrey pulled his own chair in, and called for the guests to eat.

"My good queen Margaery will be well missed by all of us," Joffrey said, a cold smile on his face. "With this statue, she will be remembered forever. When it is completed, we will place it in the Sept so that the gods will forever be shining down on her. Now, eat. My lady would not have wanted us to live in mourning forever, and we have to welcome back my dear little sister," he said, sending a smirking little grin in the direction of his younger sister. Myrcella, where she sat near her husband, having demanded that seat even with her mother's disapproving gaze, all but rolled her eyes. "Who has been away from us too long."

Prince Trystane's hand tightened around his wife's. Myrcella grimaced. Cersei scowled into her water glass. Joffrey sat.

Sansa took a careful bite, and then another, after the King had done so, and the food tasted like ash in her mouth.

"Is the food to your liking, my lady?" Joffrey asked her, and once again, Sansa felt uncomfortable under his attentions.

"It...it is, Your Grace," she agreed tiredly, and took a sip of the water that had been set out for her, wishing suddenly that it was wine.

He reminded her, she realized suddenly, of before she had realized his true colors, back when he was romancing her as the kind Prince Joffrey, son of King Robert.

She shivered, and wondered what her life might have been, before. If only Joffrey had turned out to be the prince he had pretended to be, she might have been happy, here.

She shook such thoughts from her mind. That wasn't going to help her now, after all.

She took a shuddering breath.

The other guests seemed to be studiously avoiding them, all but Tyrion, whose eyes had never left her, and Sansa was careful not to look up at him during the course of the meal.

"What was that, my lady?" Joffrey asked, his tone darkening as she could now normally expect it to.

Sansa forced a smile. "Nothing, my lord," she assured him, and tried to summon up something of the girl she had once been, the one so willing to make Joffrey happy.

She didn't know why he was suddenly playing this game, why he was suddenly being nice and flirting with her, but she knew that she was in dangerous territory, and not just because of whatever this particular game was.

Joffrey glanced at her again, and his expression weirdly...not predatory.

Sansa didn't know what to make of that.

"I asked you to sit with me because I wanted to talk to you," Joffrey said suddenly, and Sansa blinked at him, for she couldn't remember a time when he had ever wanted to talk to Sansa about anything but what he wanted to do to her, and she tensed.

"To me, Your Grace?" she asked, turning to stare at him.

He gave her a cold smile. "You were...close with my lady the late Queen," he told her, and Sansa blinked at him. "I know that you were friends; she told me as much."

Sansa sucked in a breath, careful not to meet Joffrey's eyes. He couldn't know, she thought. There was no way that he could know. No way.

"I...yes, Your Grace," she said softly. "She was my friend, I think."

Joffrey gave her a smile that might have been cruel and might not have been; she was disturbed that she had no idea.

"She was my wife," he said. "And with the rest of the Tyrells returning to the Reach to mourn..." he hesitated. "I hoped that we might...talk."

Sansa stared at him.

She supposed that this might be a normal thing for a normal man to do. To seek comfort in someone else who had lost Margaery, and that perhaps they might both find healing from that. There were so few people in King's Landing who had understood Margaery, after all. The Tyrells were gone, and Sansa was worried that it was going to throw the two of them together, once more.

She wanted nothing less than that.

Well, she wanted one thing more than that. She wanted Margaery not to be dead, to be alive and here, and telling Joffrey to stay away from Sansa, and telling Sansa that everything really was going to be all right.

But things were different, now. She couldn't afford to think like that anymore.

But Sansa couldn't forget who Joffrey was. Couldn't forget that this was Joffrey she was talking to, who didn't have feelings like a normal man would, who wouldn't seek out comfort if he thought it made him look weak.

There was something she was missing from this, and it frustrated her.

"I...I am sorry for your loss, Your Grace," she said, forcing the words out. "As dear a friend as she was to me, it must be difficult, to have lost a wife."

 _And you didn't even know who she was_ , Sansa thought. _I lost so much more than you could ever even imagine, because you didn't know her at all._

Joffrey looked at her, and with his next words, it was almost as if he'd heard her thoughts.

"You know, she told me all about your friendship," he said, and his words were dark as he leaned forward to whisper in her ear, not even seeming to notice Tyrion glaring at the two of them across the table, nor Cersei, hands reaching idly for her wine glass before she turned away from it.

"She...she did, Your Grace?" Sansa asked hoarsely, and was overcome with a sudden urge to reach for her wine herself.

"She did," Joffrey confirmed. "She told me how you were nothing more than a plaything, an idle way for her to pass her time, when she was bored. She knew you thought of her as a friend, and she found it...amusing."

The words stung when Sansa knew they shouldn't have.

She remembered Margaery telling her that this was how she had disguised their relationship when Joffrey started to grow suspicious of the amount of time that she spent around Sansa, knew that Margaery had only said these things because she was worried that Joffrey would once again think of a way to torment Sansa, or see Sansa as one of Margaery's weaknesses.

Margaery hadn't meant those words, just as she hadn't meant many of the things she had said to her husband.

Still, they stung.

Sansa opened and closed her mouth, and didn't know what to say. She reminded herself that Margaery had been a different person around Joffrey than she was around Sansa, because she had to be, and that Joffrey didn't know the woman she was underneath the false smile and the beautiful gowns she wore.

"You were a toy for her," Joffrey said, snickering. "Wasn't she perfect?"

 _Yes_ , Sansa thought. _She was perfect for you_.

She hated the thought, the moment it entered her mind, and yet it wouldn’t leave.

And then Joffrey did something she wasn't expecting, after the words he had just said, no doubt meant to hurt her.

He leaned across her chair, draping his arm over the back of it, and kissed her full on the mouth.

Sansa gasped at the unwanted kiss, but didn't dare pull back, and didn't dare bite him, like a part of her wanted to. She simply sat there, limply, as he kissed her, and wondered what in the seven hells was happening.

"Your Grace!" she heard her husband shout, and then Joffrey was turning away from her, taking a large gulp of wine before he blinked at her husband, where he was standing in front of his chair across from them.

"What in the seven hells are you doing, Your Grace?" Tyrion asked, his tone mild enough, but Sansa could hear the undercurrents of fury in it.

Behind Tyrion, Shae's hands were shaking, where they held his wine bottle, ready to refill it.

Joffrey grinned, reaching out and squeezing Sansa's shoulder. "I didn't mean to offend you, Uncle," he said, tone far too jolly. "This was merely a bit of affection towards my lady aunt, who is so distraught after the death of my queen. Wasn't it, Lady Aunt?"

Sansa gulped, as she felt all eyes from the banquet on her. She nodded, lowering her head.

Blank as a doll, she reminded herself. Blank as a doll, lest they see beyond that at all.

Tyrion clenched his fists. "I would thank you not to lay a hand on my wife again," he told Joffrey coldly, and then gave Sansa a look, full of concern and exhaustion and she wasn't certain what else. "She has been ill lately. Perhaps I should escort her back to-"

"No," Joffrey snapped, and the hand on Sansa's shoulder tightened.

She was almost glad she had written the letter, now.

Tyrion's face screwed up in annoyance. "You are looking rather pale, Wife. Perhaps it is time to retire for the night," he said, almost ignoring Joffrey. "Are you quite well?"

Sansa met his gaze, swallowing hard. "I..."

"I am the King," Joffrey spat, "And I say that she stays." He turned to Sansa, then. "After all, you did agree to be my companion for this evening, did you not?"

Sansa cleared her throat. "Of course, Your Grace." She gave her husband an apologetic smile. "I don't mind staying."

Tyrion scowled, and took a long gulp of his wine.

Anything to keep Joffrey's suspicions off of her. Anything at all, she thought, desperately.


	309. MARGAERY

She dreamt of flames and disfiguring scars and pain, pain that she hadn't felt while it was happening, because she hadn't known to feel it.

But she was feeling it now, horrible and present and unceasing, and Margaery screamed and screamed, even as no sound emerged from her throat.

She knew that something was wrong. That very likely, she wasn't awake, that this had already happened and she shouldn't be feeling it again, but that didn't stop the pain she felt, just now. A horrible, all encompassing pain, and then a voice, a sickly sweet familiar one, cutting through all of that pain to call to her.

" _Margaery_."

She grimaced, reaching up her hands to bat the sound away, because a part of her wanted this pain, reveled in it, because at least then she could feel something-

"M'lady!"

Margaery's eyes snapped open.

She was still sitting locked away in the bottom of a rocking pirate ship, and Margaery blinked the sleep from her eyes as she attempted to shift in the uncomfortable position she was being kept in, her wrists cramping.

She glanced over at Arry, where he sat in the cage beside her, and he sent her an apologetic smile.

"You looked like you were having a bad dream," he told her, and Margaery wanted nothing more than to hug herself, just then.

She couldn't, and that burned as much as the scars she couldn't remembering feeling on her arms.

"I..." She licked her lips. They felt like sandpaper. "How long was I...?"

Arry grimaced. "Don't know," he told her, looking shamefaced. "Fell asleep sometime after you did."

Margaery forced herself not to react visibly to that. It was hardly his fault; after all, that she had fallen asleep as well, even if she had wanted to keep guard to make sure no pirates came down here in the middle of the night to ravage her.

But the pirates seemed remarkably uninterested in them, save for the same man who brought their food what she assumed to be every few hours, and changed their chamber pots, as embarrassing as it was to debase herself in such a way in front of a boy she hardly knew, kind as he was to turn his back.

So uninterested that Margaery was beginning to be suspicious, because they had certainly seemed interested in her when she stepped foot on their deck.

Perhaps Arry's gamble about her being a virgin had worked, after all.

She wasn't certain how long they had been kept down here, but she had been expecting more from her captivity, so far, and it was setting her nerves on edge, if she was being entirely honest.

Arry was the one bright spot in their predicament. He seemed as frustrated as she, though less likely to take his frustrations out with a lady present. He also seemed uncomfortable around her, and Margaery tried to cut him some slack with the knowledge that during her life, she had interacted with remarkably few peasants for such an extended basis.

Oh, she went down into the city to visit them and hand out her charities as much as she could, to remind the people of how she loved them, but it was not as if she had ever spent the night beside one.

And now here she was, sleeping in a cage beside one as pirates decided her fate.

"I don't suppose anyone has come down while you were awake?" she asked Arry, who shrugged a thin shoulder.

"Not that I know of," he muttered, and wasn't that a sobering thought. "M'lady."

She blinked at that, for this was not the first time she had noticed the almost bitter way he said the title, though she hadn't thought much on it before, distracted as she was with rather more important matters.

She was thinking about it now, though.

"Did a lady wrong you in another life, Arry?" she asked him, the corners of her lips twitching as she sat up a little taller in her cage.

He eyed her, now looking almost suspicious. "Yes," he said finally. "One did. Or perhaps I wronged her." He shrugged, as if it didn't really matter either way, but she could see the pain underneath those words.

Margaery raised a brow. "Will you tell me about it?" she asked him, and he grimaced.

It wasn't as if they had anything else to do down here, after all, and Margaery knew that she could use all the allies she could find.

"It's not exactly a tale for a...lady such as yourself," he told her, sounding almost embarrassed about it, and wasn't that interesting.

Far more interesting than her brother's pleading voice, echoing inside her head, telling her to let him go.

"And I suppose my time as the slave of pirates won't change your mind on that," she said, pouting a little the way she sometimes did with Joffrey when she thought it would get her what she wanted.

Arry didn't so much as budge. "I don't think so," he said, and dear gods, was he _blushing_?

The boy was sweeter than she'd thought.

She could use that.

Margaery shifted her hands around the bonds holding them, and forced a bright smile, forcing down the guilt she might have felt over the thought of using yet another person.

She didn't have time for such things, after all.

This boy, whoever he really was, for she had seen his hesitation when he introduced himself to her as 'Arry,' may have rescued her from a raping, and rescued her from the sea before that, but she couldn't say that he was entirely on her side. He didn't seem to think there was much chance of escape, at any rate, and she needed him to help her, she knew, if she was ever going to get out of here.

Loras would have already tried to escape at least once, and Margaery squared her shoulders at that thought.

"I never really thanked you, earlier," Margaery said, extending her neck a little, for she remembered how much Joffrey had liked that pale appendage, "For saving me from a ravishing. It was very gentlemanly of you, to stick your neck out like that."

Why did you do it? hung in the air, but then, she supposed she already knew the answer to that. This boy was bigger than her, hells, he was bigger than most of the pirates they had encountered so far, and if he'd truly wanted to, he might have managed to fight some of them off and jump into the sea, if he'd thought he could make it.

But he hadn't. And he had fished her out of the sea, as well, even if her brother had been shoving her onto his little boat.

She was unaccustomed to such...lack of regard for what one might get out of the situation themselves, beyond their own lives.

Still, she supposed she could sympathize on that one thing.

Arry snorted. "I didn't much want to see that, in any case," he said, but he was still blushing, and Margaery moved forward as far as she dared, in her little cell. "Besides, you already thanked me, if I remember correctly."

Margaery tutted. "I believe in rewarding those who help me," she said shortly, feeling just a bit discouraged by his lack of a response. Still, there was no need to give up quite yet. "When we get out of here, my family will no doubt pay you handsomely for protecting my virtue, or what's left of it, after all."

Arry eyed her. "I..." he looked almost panicked, then, and Margaery wondered what it was he was running from.

She recognized the hunted look in his eyes all too well.

Because he didn't want her money, she could see that, not if it meant interacting with her family, even if he had no idea what family she was actually from.

"Or perhaps you'd like payment of another kind," she said, cocking her head, studying him. "I'm sure that could be arranged."

He shook his head, scooting back as he barely managed to gasp out, "I...No thanks, m'lady," he said. "I think I've had a bit much of that, of late."

Margaery laughed, tried to make it sound airy. "Yes, I've heard things about Dorne," she said, though she didn't think that was what he meant. Still, he didn't correct her. "Still," she went on, "I'm sure even I could find something you might want. It isn't every day that I come across such a gentlemanly savior."

He grimaced. "Actually, I don't think there's anything you might have that I would want, m'lady," he eyed her. "No offense."

Margaery could admit that she was more intrigued, now, rather than less. "Not at all," she said. "Do you have something against nobles in general, or was it a specific lady who hurt you?"

He made a face, twisting a little more away from her, and she did not try to move closer, then. "In my experience, they always bring trouble," he said. "As, indeed, you seem to have."

Margaery grinned. "Yes, they tend not to care who suffers in their wake," she agreed lightly. "I know just what you mean."

He snorted. "I'm not certain of that, m'l-"

"Please don't call me that if you're going to say it like that," Margaery interrupted him, and Arry blinked at her.

"Huh?" he asked intelligibly, and she bit back a sigh. Perhaps he was not so interesting as she had thought. He'd proved less than interested in her overtures, and if she was going to get his help to get off this ship, she might have to resort to something else.

She was a little frightened to realize she didn't have a plan for that, yet. Clearly, she was slipping.

"Like you want to spit, but don't quite dare," Margaery told him, her smile gone, now. "I'd much rather you simply spat."

He blinked at her. "Uh," he said finally, and then cleared his throat. "I think-"

She never did get to find out what he thought.

The door opened before Arry could respond, and his mouth abruptly clicked shut, his eyes turning in worry over to the man who now entered the brig, or wherever it was the pirates were keeping them.

Margaery grimaced, just looking at him.

He had been the one, she remembered, who had started to walk towards her, before he noticed the blood on her gown. Who had seemed to be the leader of this bunch.

The captain, no doubt, from the way he held his shoulders, and the fact that he carried no food with him. Plus, there was his velvet coat, which she rather doubted the captain of a pirate ship would have allowed anyone else to wear, if he could help it.

And pirates kept ships nearly as tight as navy men.

Margaery sat up a little straighter, in her cage.

She wasn't going to cower before him, not now. She didn't know what these pirates were planning for them, besides the likelihood of slavery, but she wasn't going to be caught cowering before them now, nor before whoever they planned on selling her to.

Not that she planned on being sold at all, if she could help it.

The pirate stalked forward, glancing between the two of them for a moment before his gaze settled upon Margaery.

"Leehm tells me you're his wife," the pirate said, meeting her eyes as he gestured towards Arry.

Margaery studiously didn't look in Arry's direction. "Yes, and I can speak for myself," she said calmly, because she hadn't seen the boy say more than a few words to their captors, and she didn't trust his ability to lie above her own.

Well, there were very few people she did trust to lie above herself.

The pirate captain smirked, at that, giving her a onceover that was at least more interested than Arry's gaze had been. "I can see that," he said.

Margaery didn't flinch. "If you let us go now," she said, keeping her voice strong as she dared, "You won't suffer for it."

If she could trust in anything, it would be her husband's rage, if he ever found out, that is. If he didn't already think her dead, that is, and the likelihood of that was wrong.

She didn't trust to Loras' theory that it had been Joffrey behind this. She may have been wrong about the level of control she could assert over her husband, but she knew that he would never have sanctioned her cold blooded murder.

No, if Joffrey had ever wanted to kill her, if Cersei had somehow turned her husband against her, he would have wanted to see Margaery's face as he did it. He would have wanted to watch her suffer, for such a personal betrayal.

Joffrey hadn't done this, and perhaps he didn't already think her dead. But if Cersei truly had, if this had all been some sort of plot to see her dead, then Joffrey would have likely already been convinced that Margaery was not returning from the grave.

Margaery sighed, biting the inside of her cheek. She was just going to have to do all of this herself.

The pirate captain stared at her for a moment, and then laughed. "Smart girl," he said, wiping at his eyes. "You know, the lords of the South would pay a pretty penny for a girl like you, with a mouth like that."

Margaery didn't blink. "I'm sure they would," she agreed placidly.

He raised an eyebrow. "And you think your lords would pay better?" he asked, glancing at Arry now, as if he had just noticed the boy. Margaery didn't fail to mistake his realization that she was perhaps the more powerful of the two of them, despite Arry's build.

Even with her dress torn as it was, she was clearly a lady, and Arry was clearly not.

She lifted her chin. "As I said," she said, letting her lips twitch with a smile she didn't much feel, "I'm sure they would make it worth your while."

She didn't dare say why, though. Not without a measure of this pirate, not without knowing how he might react to the knowledge that he had the Queen of Westeros in his thrall.

The captain glanced at her for a moment longer, and then snorted, turning his attention to Arry, now. "I don't suppose you're a good fighter, with shoulders like that."

Arry lifted his chin. "I'm a blacksmith," he said.

The captain rolled his eyes. "But are you any good with a blade?" he asked.

Her stubborn fellow captain didn't back down, and for a moment, Margaery felt a bit of admiration towards him.

"Hand me one and I'll let you know," he said, and the captain roared with laughter. Margaery bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood.

"I'm sure you'd like that," the captain said. "I have a couple questions, first."

"Ask away," Arry snapped, gaining some confidence, it seemed.

Margaery grimaced.

The captain snorted, and then pointed a long, thin knife in Margaery's direction. She straightened where she sat, barely able to swallow down her panic as she met Arry's eyes.

"Who is she?"

Margaery's heart sank.

She didn't know much about the man in the cage beside her, save that he'd had a lady betray him in the past, and that he had rescued her, and had moved as if to protect her before he had gotten captured with her.

And he didn't know much about her. Neither of them had any reason to trust one another, if it was them against the pirates, save that they were both fated for slavery if they didn't leave this place.

But Margaery couldn't know if this boy wouldn't amply betray her, in order to get off this ship himself.

She didn’t know if she wouldn’t do the same, but Arry had the means with which to do it, if he only realized that.

She'd been a fool, and she'd _given him her name_. Margaery was not so great a fool that she did not recognize the power in names, and she had just given hers away, to a boy she had no idea if she could trust.

And she didn't know how this pirate would react, knowing who she was. So he couldn't find out, not until she did know.

There might be some advantages, to telling the pirate who she was. He might decide she was worth a great ransom, and go to King's Landing with her, where she knew Joffrey would pay handsomely for her return.

Or he might decide he liked the idea of fucking a queen. Margaery couldn't risk the latter.

Arry's jaw twitched and he didn't once glance at Margaery. "My wife, like I said."

The captain raised an eyebrow. "You don't seem terribly well suited to one another," he said. "Strong as you are, I can't imagine you fighting off other suitors for a pretty face like that one."

Margaery swallowed hard. "You don't know anything about us," she said, as levelly as she could manage, summoning all of the bruised dignity of a wife that she could manage.

It wasn't as hard as she expected it to be.

The captain met her eyes, the first time he had done so since he had walked into the room, and Margaery disliked rather greatly the way he was staring at her, as intently as Joffrey ever had, with his prey.

All the same, she had not realized how dead his eyes were, before this moment. "I wasn't talking to you, luv," he told her, and that time, Margaery did flinch.

Because he was staring at her the way Ser Osmund had, as if she were nothing more than a chess piece, nothing more than a slab of meat to be moved around at his will.

She shivered, and willed her hands not to shake, where they clutched white hot to her bonds.

"She's my wife," Arry repeated, looking nervous, now. "I told you that."

The captain pursed his lips. "And I suppose you enticed a lady of better breeding to come down to Dorne to wed a nobody blacksmith like yourself?" he snorted. "You must have a cock of steel, boy."

Arry met his gaze. "I..."

But the captain wasn't looking at him anymore, was instead looking at Margaery again, and Margaery found that she could not tear herself away from that gaze.

"I’ve no need of a blacksmith. I don't suppose either of you know anything about accounting," the pirate captain said. And then, grumbling even lower, "Or reading."

Margaery lifted her head before Arry could respond. She knew he was a peasant, and it would look strange for him to know how to read. Hells, if she was really pretending she was his wife, merely a polite fiction at this point, it would look strange enough that she knew how to read. The pirate might take it as an admission that she was, in fact, not.

But that was a risk she was willing to take, if it meant getting out of these cells.

"Why?" she asked him, as calmly as she could manage, not meeting Arry's gaze at all, now.

The captain squinted at her, his expression unreadable. "Do you?" he demanded, and Margaery bit the inside of her cheek.

"Yes," she said. "Though I consider myself wise enough to guard any and all traits I am confessing to on a pirate ship carefully, if I value my own life and its newfound existence."

The pirate stared at her for a moment, and then began to laugh. He reached inside of his long coat then, and for a moment Margaery thought that all hope was lost, that he was really going to-

He pulled out a ring of keys, and Margaery's breath caught in her throat as he brought up the key to her cage in particular.

"Well, imagine that," the captain drawled, "Wife of a peasant blacksmith, knowing how to read. As I said. Cock of steel."

"I do," she said, lifting her chin and pretending not to notice the euphemism her words caused, the captain chortling lightly at them. "And I'm fairly good with numbers, as well, since you wanted to know."

At least, her maesters had always thought so, and she had at least half of a chance of being better at them than anyone else on this ship.

If she knew where they were, what the name of the village was that these pirates had obviously just attacked, that might help in an escape, too.

The captain eyed her dubiously. "Try anything," he told her, even as he inserted the key into the lock of her cage, "And he dies. Brutally. Ever heard of keelhauling?"

Margaery grimaced. Yes, she certainly had, and it was not something she would wish even on Joffrey. "I won't try anything," she promised. "So long as your men do not...try anything in turn."

The pirate captain glanced between the two of them, and then laughed. Well, Margaery thought bitterly, as she heard the door to her cage snap open, at least he found their situation amusing.

Someone ought to. Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, or rather, the wife of said King, sitting in a cage in the middle of a pirate's ship.

Perhaps there was something to laugh about, there.

She grimaced as the captain bent down and cut her ties with a knife that seemed to come out of nowhere, and then he was hauling her to her feet.

"And I don't care to, beyond that you," he stabbed the knife in her direction, "At least know how to read."

Margaery gritted her teeth as he dragged her around to face him. She was very much cognizant, at the moment, that she wore nothing but a torn up bloodied gown, but she was rather afraid to hope that the pirates aboard this ship had anything more suitable to wear, and that even if they did, they would offer it to her and not rather parade her around naked, if she made any complaints.

So, with one backward glance at Arry that she hoped signified that she thought of him as her husband, Margaery turned and allowed the pirate captain to drag her out of this dungeon room.

She was glad of the ability to at least drink in fresh air, even if smelled terribly of the sea, once they had left the stuffiness of that little room.

They did not make it far, however, before Margaery found herself deposited through another door and into what could only be the captain's quarters. She found herself a little surprised that they were so close to the dungeons, but then, she supposed, she was fortunate that she'd not run into any other pirates, along the way.

The pirate captain forced her down behind his desk, which seemed to be made of a mismatch of parts rather than being a regular desk and Margaery shot him a glare as she slammed down into the seat, trying not to wince at the pain that rippled through her body because of it.

The pirate captain stabbed at the pieces of parchment folded down on the desk. "You'll read those," he told her. "Out loud, so's I know you ain't lying about being able to read. And if you try to cheat me, bitch, I'll cut out that tongue."

The words weren’t even said in a threatening way, just matter of fact, and somehow, that was worse.

Margaery lifted a brow at him, forced herself to smile coyly. "And why would I lie about that when my husband's life so depends upon it?" she asked.

He gave her a thin smile. "I don't know what a woman prepared to lie about who she sleeps with might also lie about, my lady," he told her, and Margaery lifted her chin, smile vanishing.

"He is my husband," she informed him primly. "Perhaps you simply don't understand enough about love to appreciate such things, but I'd appreciate it if you stopped accusing me of what isn't the truth."

The pirate captain snorted. "Read," he snapped, and this time, she heard the order in his voice, the implied punishment if she did not do as she was told.

Margaery glanced down at the parchment, and nearly wilted in relief when she found that it was simply common tongue, and not some obscure trading code.

"The sale of twenty fish, three gold dragons," Margaery read, grimacing down at it. "The sale of three fish, two silver pieces. The sale of..."

It took her barely a moment, then, to remember that these were items that had been confiscated from that burning village, that no doubt she was reading about items bought and sold by some merchant which now sat in the pirates' stores, and the captain before her wanted to make sure that they were all accounted for.

Because he had stolen them, and very likely killed whoever had owned them.

She gritted her teeth, coming to a pause.

The village had been burning. Burning, the way her ship had burnt, the way most of the people aboard said ship had likely burnt, and she doubted that there were any more survivors of the flames in that village than there had been aboard her ship.

She gritted her teeth, took a deep breath.

Perhaps, she thought idly, she could try and compare this to taxes. Items taken from the people, however illegally.

That might just manage to make her get through it without thinking of the men and women who had been slaughtered for the items she was listing off. Items that, if the pirates felt they had been cheated of, they could simply go onto the next village, or the next ship, and steal from them, as well.

"Something wrong?" the pirate captain asked her then, leaning back in his chair and crossing one leathered leg over the other in a rather self-satisfied smirk, for he knew exactly what was wrong, Margaery thought.

She took a deep breath. "Nothing," she said, forcing her voice to be as pleasant as possible.

He would think that she had come from this village. That it was just now dawning on her that her fellow villagers, her friends, had all been killed for these items.

Who knew? Perhaps he had taken the papers because he damn well knew how to read, and he wanted to be cruel to her, though of course he hadn't known he would encounter any survivors.

She cocked her head at that, realizing something strange for the first time.

The pirates hadn't taken any survivors for their loot, when they burned the village, not that she could see. Oh, she'd heard of villagers who'd never seen a day aboard a ship joining pirates to save their own necks, and to leave their rather miserable existences, but even if there were none of those, one would think there would be women other than Margaery herself, filling those cages.

Even if they hadn't thought to sell slaves, which, clearly, the thought had crossed their mind, in dumping Margaery and Arry there, she'd have thought the women in the village would be in for a bit of a rape.

She shivered, and wondered what that meant, that, in the same day, no doubt, there were no such women here, save herself.

She bit her tongue, though, and kept reading, steadily ignoring the way her hands shook as she did so.

Besides, she thought, she might as well show a bit of emotion, for a village which was supposed to be her own. The captain would no doubt find some perverse pleasure in that, the way Joffrey often did, in his own victims.

In Sansa.

She clenched her teeth as she read.

And she read, and read, until her voice was hoarse and she seemed to have satisfied the pirate as to her ability to do so, going through several pieces of parchment full of inventory, of names whom the items had come from, of whom they had gone to.

The pirate finally waved a hand. "Then you can read," he told her, and Margaery lifted her head, all but sagging in relief.

Even in her current situation, she couldn't resist baiting that, though.

It was the sort of character trait which, she thought, had made her uniquely suited to marrying someone like Joffrey.

"How do you know I didn't just make all of that up?" she couldn't help but ask.

He sneered at her. "You seem to have a remarkable lack of care for your own safety," he told her, standing from his chair and towering over her, and Margaery forced herself not to reel back. "Even when I threatened your...dear husband, with one of the worst deaths imaginable, if one does manage to die from it, you didn't flinch."

Which she would have, Margaery knew, if she'd cared about the boy at all.

She grimaced.

"Perhaps I merely misunderstand the danger to me," Margaery said coolly. "You need me alive to finish reading," she thumbed through the rest of the parchments, "Quite a few more papers, it seemed. Unless there is someone else aboard this ship capable of it, but then, I don't imagine you would have let me out of those cages, otherwise."

The pirate captain's fist, where it loomed above her head, clenched. Margaery forced herself not to react, to instead smile.

Even a woman who had just lost her village, if she had any backbone at all, would be capable of that. Would want to see her captor outplayed, and would want to revel in it, at least a little, if she had the chance.

"You really shouldn't have played your hand like that, just to see my pretty face once more," she told him sweetly, and then turned back to the parchments. "The sale of one-"

The fist, this time, slammed into the wall over her head, and this time, Margaery yelped.

The pirate glared down at her, panting. Margaery sat a little straighter in her chair.

"We have everything you're reading on the ship," the pirate answered her earlier question, and Margaery blinked up at him, surprised at how even his tone was. "I just want to make sure we didn't miss anything, when we were raiding the village we just came from."

Margaery did flinch, then, staring up at him silently as he took a step closer to her desk.

But of course, he could be reasonably sure that they hadn't missed anything, she thought snidely. Whatever had been left, they had clearly burnt to the ground.

She hoped they'd melted all the gold, too.

"And once I'm satisfied that we've had, I'll need you to count up the gold we've found, too," the pirate continued. "And after that," he smirked, "Well, I won't have a use for you, will I?"

Margaery couldn't resist; "What, can a pirate not count shiny pieces, either?" she asked coldly.

The pirate did smack her, then. She had been expecting it from the moment they were alone, and then when he had pounded that fist into the wall above her head; a part of her had even wanted it, with the anger she felt thrumming through her, at the moment.

He was clearly a violent man, judging by his profession and his ability to rise so high in it in a sea of cutthroats, and she wouldn't put it past him to do violence on her. Wanted it, just a little, and wanted to do violence in turn.

She didn't allow herself to succumb to that anger, however, merely glared up at him as she reached to rub at her cheek, feeling it begin to bruise already.

Joffrey, for all his weakness to violence, had never touched her face.

"I won't need you for anything, after that," the pirate captain repeated coldly, and the look he sent her made Margaery shiver.

Margaery didn't stop rubbing her cheek; it had rather hurt, actually. "My mistake; and here I was thinking that you were planning to sell off the beings inside the cages you keep on this ship. After all, they don't seem suitable for any other type of cargo."

The pirate eyed her. "Just keep reading," he snapped.

Margaery settled back into her chair, confident that they had at least tied, on this round, if she hadn't won outright. She could certainly settle for that. "The sale of three furs for..."


	310. MYRCELLA

"I want to speak to my brother," Myrcella said, sweeping into her little brother's chambers coolly, Tommen's septas and servants glancing up as she entered, all looking varying degrees of surprised to have a visitor at all, and didn't that just tell her everything she needed to know about how her brother had fared since she had gone to Dorne.

The guards outside had let her pass without a word, which was a welcome change from earlier.

None of them, of course, were going to keep her forcibly away from her brother anymore than they were her husband, but her family, all save for her Uncle Jaime, seemed determined to do so on their behalf, pulling Trystane away with all manner of excuses, as if they thought he might rape her beneath the roof of their own home.

As if he wasn't her husband at all.

Myrcella rolled her eyes at the thought. She was getting tired of being neglected by her husband, and if her family didn't cave about that soon, she might do something rash, because of it.

She'd already been meeting with him in secret as much as she could, which was difficult here, with her handmaiden as a watchdog over her shoulder each moment, despite how kind and generous she had been with her time in Dorne. Here, of course, she was back to being Cersei's creature, as every young Lannister girl was supposed to be, rather than the carefree young girl Myrcella had gotten to know so well in Dorne.

Myrcella couldn't even bring herself to resent the betrayal. She knew that it was only to be expected, now, and that in truth, she shouldn't have been surprised by it the first night she arrived in Dorne, and her mother placed extra guards outside her room that night, a clear warning to her beloved Trystane.

But if her mother thought she was going to be able to keep Myrcella away from the man she loved, she was being terribly foolish about this whole thing. Myrcella knew her mother had never wanted to send her to Dorne to marry, not really, but Myrcella was a princess, and even then, she had understood her duty. She had understood that, as a princess, she was meant to marry a handsome prince.

And she had done just that, so her mother's foolish pettiness over the whole matter was ridiculous, as far as Myrcella was concerned, no matter how much her mother loved her children and had never wanted to let them go. And if her mother wasn't going to see that, well, then...Myrcella would just have to avoid seeing her mother until the lesson sunk in.

Still, at least she was able to see her favorite little brother while she was spending far too little time with her husband, which was better than nothing. She truly had missed him.

The septas exchanged glances, looked about to speak, and Myrcella pointed towards the door.

"That means get out," she told them prettily, raising an imperious eyebrow when they didn't move, "If you didn’t realize. Or do I need to call the guard to escort you out so that I can spend a few precious moments alone with my little brother?"

The servants and septas fled, shutting the door behind them, and Myrcella watched them go with a smirk before turning back to her brother, who was sitting on the carpet playing with his cat, completely undisturbed by the scene behind him.

She supposed it must be normal for him to have septas and servants fretting over him at all times, rather than his own family, given how long Myrcella herself had been gone.

She moved forward, smiling at him as he lifted his head towards her. "Myrcella!" he said, a wide grin on his face. He didn't get up for her, but Myrcella found that almost refreshing as she sank down onto the carpet beside him.

"Tommen," she murmured, reaching out and ruffling his hair. "I thought I'd come and visit you. Did you miss me?"

Her brother's face fell. "More than anything," he told her. "But Mother and Uncle said that you were doing your duty in Dorne, just like I would have to do, someday, and that you have been very brave about it."

Myrcella pursed her lips, and wondered how much happier her isolated little brother might be in a wide open space like Dorne, or if being out among so many people so often, when he was so obviously shut in here most of the time, would only frighten him.

She had flourished under all of the attention, but then, she had always flourished under attention. Tommen was not like her or Joffrey, both of whom had always enjoyed the spectacle.

Albeit very different spectacles, of course, Myrcella thought, a slight frown pulling at her features.

"Yes," she said softly, "As I hope you will one day be." She shook her head, forcing such morbid thoughts from her mind. "What are we playing?"

The cat, Ser Pounce, if she remembered correctly, whom Tommen dearly loved and whom Myrcella was surprised Joffrey had yet to gut, for he had only been a small kitten when she left, glanced up at her and let out a sharp yelping sound that startled her.

Tommen grinned. "I've been trying to teach him to stop climbing up on my bed in the middle of the night," he admitted. "Mother says it's unseemly, but he doesn't seem to understand that."

Myrcella laughed, imagining their mother's anger at the thought of a cat climbing up on her composed son in the middle of the night and finding the image all too clear.

"Well," she said, "that is the difference between a Ser and a Prince, I suppose."

Tommen shrugged, and Myrcella stood up from her spot on the floor, legs aching a little. She'd found that to be a problem lately, and wondered at the cause. She was hardly old, after all, and hardly needed to worry about becoming pregnant.

Not that she had ever known if that was a symptom at all, before going to Dorne. Her mother had certainly never informed her of such worries, though Arianne had been happy to.

In some ways, Arianne was far too happy to fulfill the role of Mother which Cersei had neglected during most of Myrcella's childhood.

"What's this?" Myrcella asked, picking up the sword she found hanging from the wall beside Tommen's bed.

Somehow, she couldn't imagine their mother allowing Tommen to have a sword lying about his chambers, nor her teaching him how to use one.

She'd been altogether furious for Joffrey's safety, when Myrcella's brother had wanted to learn, terrified that if he did, he would suddenly be put into situations where he would need to use one, but their father the king had insisted, saying that Joffrey needed to know how to defend himself.

It was one of the few times her father the king had intervened in any of their childhoods.

Tommen jumped to his feet, running to pull the sword down from the wall, and Myrcella blanched a little, seeing him with it, reminding herself that Tommen was her favorite brother for a reason, after all.

"Queen Margaery's brother Ser Loras was teaching me the sword," Tommen told her proudly, holding the sword up in the warrior's stance Myrcella remembered Trystane using, when he practiced himself against the Sun Guard in Dorne.

The sword Tommen was holding was light and small, perfect for his little frame, and Myrcella smiled, just looking at it.

"I'm sure you liked that," she said with absolute conviction, and tried not to think of all of the times she might have wished for a sword, when she was young and growing up in King's Landing. She still wished that it wouldn't be strange for a young woman to learn the sword, the way it was strange to see Brienne of Tarth wield one.

Lady Brienne, Myrcella had found out, on the journey home. That was even stranger.

"He was very nice to me. He said I was very good at it," Tommen said, his expression sobering, just then, and Myrcella felt a small pang, reminded that Ser Loras and his sister the Queen had just gone down in a horrible shipwreck, and that Tommen had known them both.

"Mother didn't want him teaching me the sword, and she was very angry about it when Joffrey insisted on it."

Myrcella blinked at that, for she could remember very few times during her childhood when her mother and Joffrey disagreed on something.

"Did he?" she asked.

Tommen nodded, smiling. "I'm glad he did," he said, and that was perhaps the first time Myrcella had heard her brother admit that he was glad Joffrey had done anything for them. "He thought I ought to know how to protect myself, and anyway, it was very fun. Ser Loras is a good teacher, and he's not boring about it, the way the maesters always are. He make...made me laugh," he said, sobering again.

Myrcella bit her lip, reaching out and pulling her little brother into a hug. "Then I'm sorry he's gone," she said, and found herself truly meaning it, even if she had never met Ser Loras beyond seeing him in the occasional tourney.

Her brother shrugged, leaning into the touch for a moment before pulling back and turning his attention back to his cats. "I think the Queen was the one who wanted me to learn the sword, actually," he said, shrugging. "Even if I don't know why."

Myrcella's eyes narrowed, at that.

She'd heard very little about this queen, since returning to King's Landing, despite the way hre presence seemed to loom over everyone and everything around them, like a fog.

It seemed to be an unspoken rule, that no one was to speak openly about the Queen around the King, and Myrcella couldn’t bring herself to imagine what sort of woman Queen Margaery must have been, to cause Joffrey to mourn for her so, when Myrcella had never known him to love anyone but their mother.

And, if what Tommen had implied was true, for Joffrey to go against their mother about anything.

She wasn't certain that was the sort of woman anyone ought to be mourning, if Joffrey had actually loved her, but so far, she'd heard none speak ill of the woman, either, and Myrcella's curiosity was getting the better of her.

"But what was she like, this Queen Margaery?" Myrcella asked her youngest brother, who gave her a wide smile as she scratched Ser Pounce behind the ears, shoving his sword back into its sheath and setting it aside.

Gods, but she had missed Tommen, out of all of her family members. If only he could have come to Dorne with her. It sounded as if he had been cooped away in his chambers since her departure.

When Myrcella was little, she had never appreciated how neglected she and her brother had been. On her father's end, that was because he barely paid attention to any of his children, content with his drinking and his whoring, as her mother always put it, as well as the hunting he seemed almost obsessive with.

Myrcella had never understood her father's neglect of she or her brother, but she had accepted it, because she was a Princess and there were enough servants and nannies to take care of her and her brother.

But she hadn't understood her mother's neglect, not until she had gone to Dorne and seen what it was like for other princesses. She hadn't understood why her mother adored Joffrey, who spent his childhood butchering animals and whining about everything under the sun, while she and her brother were shunted to the back rooms of the royal apartments and left to amuse themselves.

She understood now that it was because her mother loved Joffrey best of all, but when she was a child, that had merely been the way things were. Her mother had neglected her or Tommen nearly as much as their father, but Myrcella recognized now that she had hardly been kind to either of them.

If there was one thing Myrcella regretted, about being sent away to Dorne and her future husband, it was that she had left Tommen all alone in this place, and she resented her mother for not seeming to realize how lonely the boy was, either.

He clung to Myrcella like a limpet, now that she had returned, hardly leaving her side. And while Myrcella might have found it a little annoying, considering that she was doing everything she could to sneak in some time with her husband whom her family so disapproved of, she supposed he made a good enough distraction for when she could not.

And she truly had missed her little brother.

"She was...very pretty," Tommen informed her, still smiling. "And kind."

Myrcella snorted at Tommen's description and doubted very much that anyone who had managed to so enrapture Joffrey as this woman had could really be described as kind, but she smiled and nodded nonetheless.

"Did you like her?" she asked her little brother, who glanced up at her with round, wide eyes that were perhaps the only thing she had missed of her family when she'd been sent away to Dorne.

Tommen shrugged one shoulder. "Didn't know her that much," he said honestly, which Myrcella was almost relieved to hear. "But she insisted on me getting another maester, when the Grandmaester kept falling asleep during my lessons, and she wanted the sword lessons, too, I think. But...I didn't dislike her."

Myrcella snorted. "Very informative, Tommen," she teased him, and Tommen blushed only a little.

"I don't know," he repeated. "I didn't spend much time with her. She was...Joffrey was very in love with her, and he didn't...I don't think he liked sharing her. With anyone."

Myrcella felt a shudder run down her back, at those words, and for a brief moment, she wondered if her brother was enamored with Margaery Tyrell precisely because she was his wife, and he hadn't had to share her with anyone. Wondered if her life in King's Landing had been as miserable as Sansa Stark's.

And then she shook such thoughts from her head, because it wouldn't do to let them show in front of Tommen. He was a very perceptive little boy, for all that their mother didn't seem to think so, and what he lacked in intellect at times, he certainly made up for in being able to read the people around him, she knew. It was one of the things he loved about him, for being so very different from Joffrey.

Gods, she had missed him. Him, most of all.

"And how are you?" she asked him, tone turning serious, and her brother blinked at her, before shrugging a little too innocently.

"Fine," he muttered, and Myrcella moved back to where he sat on the carpet.

"Are you?" she asked, reaching out and touching his cheek until he looked up and met her gaze.

"I..." he took a shuddering little breath, pushing Ser Pounce aside. The cat let out an indignant little yelp, before disappearing beneath the bed. "Missed you, Myrce," he said, and then he was clinging to her again.

Myrcella reached down, brushing her fingers through his hair. "I missed you, too," she admitted softly.

Her brother didn't let go of her, and Myrcella didn't really want him to.

"Are you staying, now?" he asked hoarsely, voice very soft.

Myrcella shook her head. "I don't know," she answered honestly. "Mother is convinced there is some danger to me staying in Dorne," she said. "But I don't know that that is the case."

She felt her brother swallow against her shoulder. "I don't want you to go," he said softly. "Not again. Uncle Tyrion's saying they're going to name me the Crown Prince soon, because Joffrey's still unmarried and doesn't have any heirs. I'm scared."

Myrcella swallowed hard, not wanting that burden for her little brother at all, even if he would make a far better king than her older brother.

"I think you would like it in Dorne," she said, staring at a point on the wall above her brother's head, before pulling back. "Would you like me to tell you all about it?"

Tommen bit his lip, and then nodded, fisting his fingers in the hairs of the carpet with a shallow little sigh.

Myrcella would do anything to keep him from looking like that again, she vowed. "Well, first of all, they don't have any silly rules about ladies there..."


	311. MARGAERY

"What did he want of you?" Arry demanded, the moment Margaery was returned to her cage and the pirate captain was gone.

Margaery shivered the moment the door closed behind him, unable to stop herself, now that he could no longer see her.

Something about the pirate captain had frightened her, deep to the bone, in a way that even Joffrey hadn't, at his worst. The thought of being alone with him again frightened her still, and yet Margaery couldn't help but think that the way she had just proved herself useful might have saved her from a far worse fate.

So she supposed she could endure the disturbingly unblinking stares as she read to him, so long as that was _all_ that she had to endure.

"He wanted me to read something for him, like he said," Margaery told him, feeling a little ruffled that she had to report to him at all, even if it was merely out of his concern. It was not as if they were truly man and wife, after all.

Arry raise a brow, clearly skeptical. "To read to him," he repeated blandly.

Margaery forced a smile. "What, she asked him, are you worried about a lady?" And instantly regretted the question, a moment later, as she saw him flinch and turn his back on her.

"Arry..." she tried, and then bit her tongue.

She had no reason, after all, to try so hard to befriend this man, beyond her own fear and loneliness, and the crippling worry that if he turned against her, he might betray her to their captors.

She still did not know this pirate captain enough to know how he might react to her true identity, but considering the way he had been staring at her in that cabin as she read to him, Margaery did not want to take her chances in attracting more of his attention than she already had.

Margaery sank down in her little cage, relieved only that her hands remained unbound, since her return to it, and let out a deep sigh.

Despite what she had told Arry, sitting in that room and reading for more than an hour on end had been nerve-wracking. Eventually, one of the other pirates had brought them food, food which she was expected to eat in front of her captor, though she felt his unsettling gaze upon her, and Margaery had barely managed to choke down the food and cough down the ale that was provided to her before she went back to her reading.

The only saving grace, in the whole ordeal, was that the captain had not asked for her name, which, thinking on it, was rather strange indeed.

He had wanted to know who she was, earlier. Had outright asked Arry, and seemed very suspicious of her roots as a noblewoman, but somehow, Margaery had thrown him off the scent.

She just...didn't know how she had done that, and didn't know how to replicate it.

She would prefer to keep her legs closed, if it came to that, for as long as possible, with a man as unsettling as this one. Would prefer a lot of things, when it came to keeping as far away from this soft spoken captain as possible.

But she also knew that her only chance of getting off this ship was in finding the one way to keep herself out of these cages for as long as possible.

Arry coughed, and she glanced up at him, fear plaguing her once more.

Not because she was worried that her one companion, strong though he appeared to be, might be sick and die on her, but because she rather didn't like the odds of his deciding to report what little he knew about her in exchange for some medicines from the pirates.

"Are you...are you ill?" she asked him, worrying her lower lip, and Arry let out a soft chuckle, laying his head back against the bars.

"You know," he said, conversationally, and she hated how light his voice seemed, "This is the second time recently that I've been kept in a cage like this. I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't the gods, trying to tell me something."

Margaery scoffed. "I don't think the gods stoop to such levels," she admitted, and hated the small, guilty pang that filled her, at those words.

No, she didn't think much of the gods, these days. She had prayed nearly daily since she was a child to them, as she had been taught to do, and yet here she was, her brothers dead and still without a child to call her own. A prince.

Instead, she was languishing away in a pirate ship. If the gods were trying to tell her something, they certainly had a sense of humor.

"Look..." she said finally, deciding not to ask what he had been imprisoned for recently, because it was better if she didn't get attached to this man who was as likely to live through this experience as she was. "I didn't mean to snap at you."

Still, it would be nice to have him on her side.

Gods, she was beginning to wonder if she herself had been the one smacked in the head by a bit of wood, rather than her brother, the way her thoughts seemed to be all jumbled up, lately, as if she didn't know what she wanted for the first time in her miserable life.

She resolutely did not think about how hungry she had felt for lemon cakes earlier, eating in the captain's cabin.

Arry snorted. "I don't doubt it," he said, and Margaery's eyes narrowed. She wished he would turn around, so that she could see his face again, to gauge what he was thinking. "I meant..." he cleared his throat. "Look, I know you ain't my wife, but it's still unsettling to think of these pirates...doing whatever to you, even if we hardly know each other."

Margaery gave the back of his head a harsh stare. "You're stuck in a cage," she told him, bluntly. "There is very little you can do to help me, whatever they decide they want me to do, whether it's read to them or..."

Arry interrupted her with a loud cough. "I know that," he said. "I just...don't much like the idea."

Margaery's forehead wrinkled. She knew why Joffrey would hate the idea, that he would hate the idea of anyone touching his wife without his permission, that she was his soul mate, and he would happily kill anyone who laid a hand on her.

She knew why her brothers would hate the idea, because they had grown up with her and they loved her. A part of her, a horrible part, even understood why Sansa had hated the things she had done with Elinor, before.

And her father would hate the idea that she had been ravaged and abused by a bunch of common pirates, even if he didn't seem to mind when her own husband did so.

But she barely knew Arry. The only thing they had in common was unfortunately being in a boat during a thunderstorm, and then having the misfortune of being kidnapped by pirates because of it.

There was no reason for him to sound so...concerned over her.

And it bothered her that she didn't know why he did.

"You ought to be more concerned with the things you can control," Margaery lectured him, wincing a little when she realized how like her grandmother she sounded. "I mean...have you thought of a way off this ship yet?'

Arry did turn around then, regarding her skeptically. "You're the only one out of the two of us that has managed to get out of these cages since we got here,' he told her. "i can't think of a reason for them to let me out, if they've no need of a blacksmith, either."

Margaery grunted. "They'll soon run out of things for me to read," she told him bluntly. "I intend to be off this ship, at that point."

Arry eyed her skeptically. "How?" he asked.

Margaery pursed her lips. "I...I don't know," she admitted, and hated how helpless it made her sound.

Arry grunted. "Well," he said. "I don't think..." he took a careful breath, and then another. "These pirates, m'lady, they don't play fair."

She eyed him. It was the first time he had called her 'm'lady' since she had returned. She found she rather didn't like it.

"Yes," she said dryly, "I am getting that impression."

He shook his head, and now he was eying her like he thought she was rather dense. "What I meant, m'lady, is that if you can find a way off this ship, without me, I think you should try. Throw yourself overboard if you have to, but don't sit around waiting for me if it only means that you'll-"

"Arry," she interrupted him placidly, "I think you just gave me an idea."

Or rather, what he'd tried to tell her to do had given her an idea, rather in the opposite vein than what he'd intended, she was sure.

Her brother had died for her, Margaery knew that. He had died so that she could live.

In a way, that meant she had killed him.

Just as she had all but killed Janek, and that maester who had examined her when she realized she had miscarried Ser Osmund's...the child.

Which meant that Margaery was no stranger to killing, even if she had yet to kill someone with her own bare hands, just yet.

But Arry had reminded her of something important. That she had once been willing to do whatever it took, to keep her throne.

She wasn't quite so certain that the throne was what was important, at the moment, but getting her revenge on Cersei for what had happened to her brother, even if it meant playing right into the other woman's hands - that was.

And if Margaery had to kill to accomplish the one thing, surely she could manage the other.

"What are you talking about?" Arry asked her blankly.

Margaery sent him a smile she certainly didn't feel. "How might I identify a blacksmith, without being told that they are one?" she asked him, and Arry stared at her as if he thought she'd gone a bit batty.

"M'lady-" he started, but Margaery cut him off.

"Do you want off this ship, or not?" she demanded, sitting a little taller in her cage, reminding herself that she was a queen, and that hundreds had already died for her.

One more was no great effort, surely.

Arry stared at her, clearly not understanding how being able to identify a blacksmith would help them with that purpose, before he finally shrugged, either deciding that Margaery had gone batty, or deciding that there might be some use in humoring her, after all, at least to distract her from their current situation.

Margaery forced back a smile as he spoke.

"Well," he said carefully, as if he didn't quite relish the opportunity to lecture a noblewoman, and Margaery wondered how many chances he'd had to do so, "Blacksmiths can't be scrawny, not really. My old...the old man I was apprenticed to, he used to say I was built like an ox, and that's why I was so good at the work. There's a lot of lifting, and working with hard materials, so's you need to be able to do the work."

Margaery nodded, encouraging him to continue when he paused and glanced at her, as if unsure whether he had yet bored her.

"And," he continued, clearly warming to his subject, "They can't be afraid of fire."

Margaery flinched, despite herself, and Arry seemed to realize what he had said.

"Oh, uhm, I'm sorry, m'lady," he stammered out. "I didn't mean to, not so soon after you..."

Margaery lifted a hand. "It's fine," she told him, because it had to be. It had to be, if she was going to get out of here.

Just like it had to be fine when her husband touched her each night.

For Loras, her mind chorused. For Loras. For Loras.

"Anyways," Arry continued, nervous now, "There's a lot of working in the flames. Sharpening the blade, molding it, most of it happens in there. Though usually you can use a wheel to sharpen a dull blade, and-"

"Besides the flames," Margaery rasped out. "I mean, on their body. I assume, broad shoulders and muscles?"

Arry grimaced, glancing down at himself. "I suppose so," he said, and Margaery sagged a little, fairly sure that description would include half the crew of this vessel. "Why?" he asked, and he sounded just a little suspicious, now, no doubt thinking of how she had tried to "thank" him earlier.

Margaery bit down her frustration. "Because that pirate said that he didn't need you," she reminded Arry. "Which means they already have a blacksmith."

Arry nodded, clearly not following her. "And so?" he asked. "I don't think my skills are quite good enough to replace someone they already know," he admitted.

Margaery snorted. "Yes," she said, "but they might be if these pirates suddenly find themselves without one altogether."


	312. CERSEI

Joffrey had declared tonight a night for celebration, because his artists, imported from all over the realm, or at least the realms that were still loyal and willing to do business with the Crown, had finished that fucking statue of Margaery Tyrell.

And now they were celebrating it, as if the great ugly thing, which did disturbingly resemble the girl, was something worth celebrating.

Still, Cersei painted on a happy smile and went to the celebration, trying not to chafe when she was invited to sit at her son's left hand rather than his right, because that was where Myrcella was sitting, in a place of honor beside her brother.

Cersei smiled at that, too. She could be happy, she supposed, that her family was finally reunited, even if that Highgarden Whore still possessed an annoyingly large part of her son's affections.

The girl was dead, and still she had her hold on Joffrey.

Cersei knew only way to handle that, and it seemed that Joffrey would not have it. He had eyes only for the Stark girl, her brother's wife, and she couldn’t have that, for obvious reasons.

Not the least of which was that the girl was becoming increasingly more difficult to control, and they already had an alliance with her now that she was married to Cersei's Imp of a brother, annoying though the dwarf was.

At least he still had some use to him.

At least Sansa was not the one sitting beside Joffrey, though Myrcella looked less than happy, and kept staring across the table. Cersei followed her gaze, eyes glittering when they fell upon Prince Trystane and his dazzling retinue.

Teeth on edge, Cersei reached for the goblet in front of her, glaring at it when she remembered that it was only water, and bitter, at that.

They were having a difficult time bringing imports into the city, the way the smallfolk were rioting. All but prisoners within their own castle.

And all because of that bitch's statue.

Her mouth set into a hard line, Cersei barely noticed as Joffrey gave some speech about his dearly departed wife, and clapped mindlessly along with the rest of the crowd, as she was meant to, eyes never wavering as they glanced between her daughter and the Martell boy.

She hated the way her daughter looked at this Trystane. As if he was her sun.

As if she truly loved him.

And the boy, in turn, looked back at Myrcella like a sweet stick he wanted to devour in front of everyone here, further proving Cersei's prudence in keeping the two of them as apart as she could manage.

Jaime, disturbingly, seemed to actually enjoy the boy's presence, and more often than not she saw them together, training in the field.

The boy seemed to have his uncle's propensity for a spear, and Cersei gritted her teeth each time she saw it near her brother, as she watched them from an upstairs window, not wishing to be seen watching either.

She'd had much practice pretending not to watch her brother over the years, after all.

Trystane did not seem a cruel boy. He never lashed out against Jaime during their sparring sessions, and seemed intensely focused when they were fighting. Cersei had never seen him look at another woman twice, though he stared longingly at her daughter every time he caught sight of her, few times though those were.

Jaime said Princess Arianne had relayed her father's wishes that the boy take his uncle's place on the Small Council, as if a child had any place there at all.

Cersei had outright refused, even knowing that Tyrion would overrule her should Jaime go to him, but so far, her brother didn't seem to have done so, a fact she was glad for.

Jaime.

She'd missed her lover, while he had been away at Dorne, and before that, Dragonstone.

Dragonstone, which had fallen to Euron Greyjoy in her brother's absence, but Cersei could not even bring herself to care about that. She was considering finding a delicate way of sending Garlan Tyrell to oversee that fighting, because with the Tyrell fortune these days, she might just be rid of him as well, but she thought that would be too risky.

Still, she was glad Tyrion seemed distracted with Stannis and with these sparrows, because it meant that he had yet to send Jaime back into the fighting, and he could remain here in King's Landing, where he belonged.

Where they could finally all be together again, as a family.

Her brother was eating with the other Kingsguard; in formal events such as this one, he sometimes did so, though just as often he was found sitting at the King's table, with his family. He was still a Lannister, after all.

He looked resplendent, Cersei thought, cocking her head as she eyed her brother up and down. He was still wearing that white cloak, which she had always thought he looked handsome in, and his blond hair, shorn short now ever since he had returned from that horrible time as Robb Stark's prisoner, was golden in the lighting of the Great Hall.

She wanted him, Cersei thought. Even now, she wanted to drag him back to her chambers and have her way with him, because there was no one to stop them, anymore.

Tyrion might think he stood in the way of her happiness, but he didn't see what she did. That his days were numbered, and that they would be numbered even shorter if he tried to part her and Jaime again.

He had never been a part of their family, after all.

And then Cersei's eyes narrowed, for she was watching her brother closely, after all, and she frowned when she saw him throw back his head and laugh.

Laugh as that great woman whom he had brought back with him from his captivity, declaring her his companion and savior, said something to him, smiling brightly as she did.

The smile almost made her look pretty.

Cersei's hand fisted around her glass.

The eating was near finished at that point, and Cersei realized she had barely touched her food. She had spent much of the meal ogling her brother, and with that she had noticed how many times he had laughed at things that Tarth woman had said, how many times he reached out to touch her hand or rubbed shoulders with her as if it were perfectly naturally to do so. Had noticed that despite not being a Kingsguard at all, Brienne of Tarth seemed awfully comfortable at their table.

Her eyes narrowed.

In fact, the woman seemed awfully comfortable here in King's Landing. She had been here since before Joffrey's wedding, after all, with no real purpose to her stay, save that she had thrown in with the wrong camp before and didn't seem to have anyone else to serve but Cersei's brother, now.

Cersei shuddered at the mental image that thought brought to her, shaking her head.

The woman wouldn't be serving her brother for much longer, not if she could help it. She remembered Brienne had gone with Jaime to fight at Dragonstone; perhaps she could be prevailed upon to do so again, this time alone.

And perhaps a stray Lannister arrow could find her, when she did, Cersei thought, a vindictive smile touching her features as she stood from her seat, along with all of the other guests.

It was time to dance, and the servants quickly pushed back their tables to prepare the room. Cersei spared a scathing glance towards the Stark girl as Joffrey rushed to her side and held out his hand, even as descended upon her brother.

It would not be strange to see them dancing together, after all; they had done so even when Robert lived, and Jaime was a Kingsguard. Cersei had danced with all of the Kingsguard at some public function or another.

And just now, she didn't care if tongues did wag.

Her son was king, Myrcella was home, the Whore of Highgarden was dead, and Cersei didn't think she had been happier in some time.

She had just reached her brother when he held out his hand to Brienne of Tarth, not even glancing in Cersei's direction.

She did not let the white hot fury consume her until Brienne took that hand, allowed Jaime to lead her out onto the dancing floor with the other dancers. She did not let her face heat with anger until she saw the near halting steps Brienne danced with, as if she wasn't quite comfortable in her own skin, before all of these people.

She looked ridiculous, Cersei thought vindictively, dancing before all of these people dressed in what barely counted as women's clothing, a short tunic and long trousers that better fit Jaime than this woman.

Cersei gritted her teeth, and hated the way she blended into the crowd around.

Hated that when she turned her head in the opposite direction, it was to see Trystane Martell drag her daughter onto the dancing floor, as well.

"Careful, Sister," the voice that would always drag her down said to her left, and Cersei spun on her impish brother in annoyance. "You might pop something, the way you're straining."

Cersei colored, and then took a deep breath. "I don't wish to talk to you tonight," she told him, for she had no desire to hear him gloat over the small things, not when she was _winning_. "Go away."

Tyrion snorted. "I thought it might be more prudent to offer you a dance," he said, holding out his hand to her, and Cersei's breath caught in her throat as she noticed several courtiers glancing their way. "Seeing as both of our usual partners have been stolen already."

Cersei gritted her teeth, taking her brother's hand with bad grace and leading him out onto the floor, hating the way she had to bend down to make this anywhere near comfortable.

She felt like she was dancing with Tommen.

She rather wished she was, instead.

"Your whore isn't here, then?" Cersei asked, to cover her own irritation. She'd far more prefer to see the misery on her brother's face, after all.

Tyrion grimaced. "I don't know what you're talking about, Sister," he said, and obviously didn't know that he had never been as good of a liar as he always seemed to think he was.

Cersei had always known him better than that, far too well for him to lie to her. He had been lying all his life, ever since he had learned what happened to their mother and refused to take the blame for it.

She knew when he was lying.

"Hm," she hummed, glancing towards Sansa. "And you can't seem to keep your wife from following that example," she said.

Tyrion stiffened, glaring up at her. "I hardly think you ought to be giving me a lecture on how women should keep their legs closed, dear sis," he quipped, and Cersei ground her teeth.

Jaime spun Brienne in the middle of the dance floor, and Cersei's eyes were not the only ones on the pair.

She was winning, she reminded herself.

"What are you going to do about those sparrows?" Cersei asked. "I am curious."

Trystane blew in Myrcella's ear, as he swept her past Cersei and Tyrion.

Tyrion shrugged his shoulders. "They do seem unduly distracted with sin. Perhaps I'll feed you to them, and they'll leave the rest of us alone for a little while longer."

Cersei ignored the words. "If you just had kept Joffrey from building that fucking statue, we wouldn't be in this mess."

"Careful, Sis," Tyrion drawled. "I understand we're here tonight to celebrate that fucking statue."

Cersei pulled abruptly away from her brother. "I'm tired," she told him coldly, and her brother gave her a mocking little bow as she moved away from him, annoyance filling her.

The imp would never change, she told herself. Every time she had a victory, he would always be there, over her shoulder, ready to ruin it.

She couldn't let him get to her.

And that was when her attentions alighted upon Ser Arys Oakheart, the Kingsguard who had accompanied Myrcella to Dorne upon her betrothal to Trystane Martell, swearing to Cersei that he would keep the girl safe.

Cersei had wanted to send...anyone else, instead, but Tyrion had insisted upon Ser Arys.

She noticed that the man wasn't dancing with anyone, was merely standing at the edge of the crowd, glancing out over it and looking almost...guilty.

And damn right he should feel so, Cersei thought, squaring her shoulders as she moved towards him.

"Ser Arys," Cersei smiled prettily at him as she held out her arm, upon reaching him. The man startled, glancing up at her in clear surprise.

Yes, she was astounded by his abilities as a knight.

Joffrey glanced between them, and then shrugged, turning his attentions back to his poor aunt by marriage. "I wonder if you might take a turn with me out in the hall, while we continue to celebrate."

The Kingsguard went very pale, before stepping forward and taking the arm she offered. "Of course, Your Grace," he said.

Cersei felt her brother's eyes on them as well, and turned toward him with a bright smile...only to find him standing dangerously close to that great, tall bitch, Brienne of Tarth.

They weren't dancing, not any longer, but they were still far too close for Cersei's own comfort, and her brother was drinking.

She could count on one hand the number of times her brother had drank with another woman present.

Her smile froze on her face, but her brother wasn't looking at her anymore at all, was engaged in some rather lively conversation with the woman, who was smiling just as if she didn't have a care in the world, and didn’t understand a single thing about the politics of King's Landing, and how dangerous her tread was.

Cersei would teach her, of course. Just as soon as she was finished with Ser Arys.

She turned her back on her brother and the festivities of the rather lively dinner. She didn't know what they were celebrating really; she thought she had heard something about Joffrey being glad to slaughter all of those smallfolk who had made such a stink about that ridiculous statue he was so keen on, but she couldn't be sure.

Cersei could feel the fury within her building, every time she looked at the Kingsguard whom she had entrusted with her daughter's life, the day Tyrion had sent her little girl away from her.

She would never forgive her impish brother for that, just as she would never forgive this man for allowing the marriage to happen at all.

A marriage he had stood by and done nothing to stop, without the permission of the Crown for it to go forward.

She didn't speak until they were alone, out in the hallway, a silent shadow following them, as Cersei had known it would.

It. He. Whatever it was.

Qyburn had been keen on showing it off to her, and the moment Cersei saw a demonstration of its abilities, she hadn't much cared how he'd managed the deed.

"Ser Arys," Cersei said, smiling at him now that they were alone in the empty corridor, its dark shadows descending over the both of them. "I wanted to extend my thanks to you, fro ensuring my daughter the Princess' safety, while she resided in Dorne."

The man dipped into a shallow bow. "Your Grace," he said. "It was my honor-"

"You are not the knight I would have chosen for the task, had I a choice in the matter," Cersei continued, still smiling, though colder now. "But I thank you, all the same."

The knight seemed a bit more wary of her now, as well he should. "I did all that I could to ensure that safety, Your Grace," he said.

And with those words, Cersei lost the tight control she'd had on her anger ever since seeing Ser Arys arrive in King's Landing, safe and looking just as healthy as the day he had left.

No excuses, there.

"Did you?" Cersei asked, raising a brow, and the man flinched at the cold implication in those words, glancing at her now as he should have been from the beginning; as if she were a predator, indeed.

Cersei remembered the story she had told Tommen, the day she had thought Stannis Baratheon was about to kill them all, of her being the fierce lioness ready to protect her children from anything.

She had meant those words, then.

"Interesting," she continued, and now her smile was entirely gone. "So you think you have done your duty, in regards to my daughter?" she demanded, and the shadows in the hallway seemed to creep closer.

Ser Arys stopped walking, turning to face her, then. "Your Grace-"

"You let them marry her off like a brood mare," Cersei said, through gritted teeth, and Ser Arys stiffened, where he stood before her.

"Your Grace..."

"You were supposed to protect her," Cersei continued, voice going shrill, "And instead you allowed them to marry her off to that boy, without a word of protest, knowing that we had not given such a permission! Where was your protection then?"

Ser Arys took a deep breath. "I know, Your Grace, and if you would allow me to explain-"

"To explain?" Cersei demanded, her voice growing louder. "You think you can offer an explanation for your part in treason, Ser Arys?"

The man grimaced. "No, Your Grace," he said tiredly. "But the Martells were kind to Princess Myrcella. I knew they would not hurt her, and I assumed that they would never go through with the wedding, without the permission of the Crown. Had I known-"

"And you didn’t think to write and warn us, if you weren't going to step in between her and a rapist's bed?" Cersei snapped, spinning away from him in disgust, before she did something unfortunate, like clawing the bastard's eyes out herself.

She should never have allowed her daughter to go to Dorne, Cersei realized. She should have died herself before allowing her brother to do such a horrible thing to her darling child, and now Myrcella was paying the price for it.

She had not failed to notice how withdrawn the girl had been, since returning to King's Landing. How she barely said a word to any of her relatives save for Tommen these days, and had not had a word of complaint against her husband's chambers being far from hers.

Her daughter was clearly as unhappy with the marriage as Cersei, and someone had to pay for that.

She wasn't foolish enough to think that declaring war on the Martells once more would help, and besides, the Tyrells were already handling that. And she didn't think that killing Prince Trystane would, either, no matter how the idea appealed to her.

But this bastard of a man, this coward who had allowed those events to go forward without dying first, this one, she could punish.

"It all happened very quickly, Your Grace," Ser Arys told her, "And the Princess, she seemed content with the match-"

"Content?" Cersei snapped, turning back to him and jabbing a finger in the Kingsguard's face. "Even if my daughter was content to disobey her family and marry the boy, you did not have our permission for the wedding to take place. Does that mean nothing to you? And even if it did take place, you should have guarded her door to keep that barbarian from raping her!"

Now, Ser Arys was frowning, and she thought perhaps he had heard the soft tread of footsteps nearing them.

He certainly had not heard the sound of breathing.

"Your Grace, if it pleases you..."

"Please?" Cersei echoed. "Did my daughter beg you in such a way, when she was to be married against her will, and that of her mother's, of her brother's and king's? You should have died before you allowed them to commit such treason against your charge, knight!"

Ser Arys grimaced. "I know, Your Grace," he said, stopping her in her fury for just a moment.

She blinked at him. "What?" she demanded.

He grimaced. "I know that I failed," he told her. "And I know that I can never repay Your Grace or His Grace the King for my failure to do as the Crown demanded towards the Princess-"

Cersei's teeth clicked together. "And I suppose you have nothing to say to defend yourself?" she demanded harshly.

The man grimaced again. "Your Grace, the Princess Arianne, she...convinced me-"

Cersei cut him off with a scoff, the details of this man's betrayal becoming all too clear to her. "So you allowed yourself to be distracted by some Dornish cunt, rather than to do your duty?" she demanded, rolling her eyes, not at all bothered by how shrill her voice had become.

The knight flinched. "Your Grace, I know that I can never make amends for breaking my oaths to the Kingsguard, but..."

"No," Cersei said, holding up a hand. "No, you do not get to justify yourself to me, not after hearing such things."

Her brother was wrong. The white cloaks were not the high order of knights he had always thought them to be. Jaime was perhaps the only good one amongst them, save for Ser Barristan, but then, he had been rather too steeped in loyalty to the Baratheon cause, rather than her son's, and he'd had to go.

So, in the end, not as good of a knight as he ought to be.

Ser Arys paled as the loud thudding of footsteps came up behind him, but he was a knight, and he turned to meet them as a knight should, head on, hand on the hilt of his sword.

Cersei pursed her lips. She had no doubt as to who would win this fight, but the fact that the man was putting his back between her, the sister of the Kingslayer, and whoever this figure was, amused her more than it should.

She had been about to order him to lower his sword, as a good Kingsguard ought to obey his Queen, but now, she thought she would rather like to see how this fight was.

After all, she had not yet seen her new creature paired against a true knight.

"Ser Arys," she said, in a prim voice as the giant stepped forward, whole body encased in golden armor and a white cloak, Ser Arys paling a little at the sight of him and drawing his sword the rest of the way, "Meet the newest member of the Kingsguard, and your replacement, Ser Robert Strong."

Ser Arys spun around, then, staring at her. "My…replacement, Your Grace?" he repeated.

Cersei's smile was cold. "You failed the Princess, Ser Arys. You should have fallen on your own sword rather than returned with my brother."

And then she stepped back, because there was still a celebration going on in the main hall, and it would not due to get too much blood on her gown.

It was not a red one tonight, after all, but a pale blue, and it would be noticed, if she walked back to the great hall covered in blood.

Ser Arys took a deep breath, and then lowered his sword. "If that is what the King demands of my failure-"

Ser Arys never got the chance to complete whatever pretty speech he clearly had prepared, Cersei thought, with a wicked smile, as the creature now known as Ser Robert Strong stepped forward and bashed Ser Arys' head against the wall.

Once, and then again, and again, before the man had even the chance to bring his sword up to defend himself, the blood splattering across his white cloak and onto the floor, and, a little, onto the gown that Cersei wore.

Well, perhaps more than a little.

Ser Robert smashed what remained of Ser Arys' head against the wall one more time, before letting him fall to the ground in a mashed up pulp, and Cersei glanced distastefully down at the body of the man who had not suffered enough, for what he had done to her daughter.

Still, it was enjoyable enough, to watch. He deserved more, but then, she did have a dance to get back to. A brother to pry from the arms of a wicked bitch seeking to separate them.

"Cersei, I was wondering where you-"

Jaime's voice abruptly fell silent as he took in the scene before him, coming up behind her. He glanced first at the blood splattering her gown, then at the dead man on the ground, then up at Ser Gregor, looming over even him.

Cersei had once thought her brother would be the best knight in all of the realms. It seemed she had found an even more worthy protector, however.

And then Jaime shook his head, and rushed forward, taking her dainty hands into his own and examining them, and then her face. And that was nice. A welcome change, after the way he had swayed on the dance floor with Brienne of Tarth. "What happened?" he demanded, clear concern in his voice.

She knew how deep that concern ran, just now. Knew the hold she had over her brother, that he would immediately assume her side rather than that of one of his brothers in arms, the men who had all taken an oath which he had always taken so much more seriously than the rest of them, it would seem.

All for Cersei, of course.

Cersei pursed her lips, and then pressed them into a smile. "Justice," she told her brother, and tried not to note the way he looked so concerned, at her smile. "He failed us, as a Kingsguard, and this was justice."

Jaime blinked at her, and then abruptly let go of her hands. "Ser Arys..."

"Betrayed us, when he allowed Myrcella to be wed," Cersei informed him, wiping her hands off on her gown, and finding that this only made the situation worse. "I have rectified the issue."

Jaime was staring at her, features drawn in shock as he took an actual step back from her, as if he hadn't done worse things during his times at war.

And he should make no mistake, they were still very much at war.

"Cersei..." he breathed, and she didn't like the tone she heard in that voice.

As if he was judging her for protecting their family.

She had been judged by everyone in her life for protecting their family, every day. Had heard the horrified whispers of the courtiers, had heard the rumors of the smallfolk. Had seen Stannis Baratheon's accusations, and the look of disgust on Ned Stark's face when she told him the truth about her and Jaime.

But she had never once regretted doing whatever she had to do to protect their family.

And Jaime damn well wasn't going to start judging her for it, now.

Cersei lifted her chin and swept past him, arm brushing against him as she went, but her brother didn't seem to notice.

No, instead he was staring at the bloodstains on the hem of her gown.

Cersei ignored him, then, walking proudly back into the feasting hall, where she promptly ignored all of the other stares, as well.


	313. SANSA

Sansa was dreaming.

She knew that, even as she stood on the glistening snowy floor of the forest outside of Winterfell, staring up at the heart tree which belonged there, demanding of the old gods to know why they had stood by and done nothing as everyone in her family suffered.

Still, that didn’t stop the tears from streaming down her face, knotting in her throat and filling her nose with mucus that scooped down her chin. It didn't stop her knees from buckling underneath her weight, nor the sharp, cold sensation of wet snow from slapping against them, as they hit the ground.

It didn't stop the horrible feeling in her chest, as if she couldn't breathe at all and could at the same time breathe entirely too much, for someone who certainly shouldn't be alive while the rest of her family was dead.

Dead, dead, dead.

A part of Sansa wondered how a stupid girl like herself had managed to live so long at all, but she shook that traitorous thought from her head.

Suddenly, a motion to her left caught her eye, and Sansa turned, found her last meal clawing its way up her throat as, in front of her, Megga burned in the air, suspended above the snow, her limbs twitching as she screamed in agony.

She wasn't just screaming though, the way Margaery had been in the last such dream that Sansa'd had. No, she was screaming words, demands, wanting to know where Sansa was, why she hadn't rescued her.

 _I'm coming_ , Sansa tried to say, but she couldn't be heard above the screams.

Instead, she cowered in the snow as her clothing soaked, and bent her head to pray before the tree until the screams quieted, and the fire became nothing more than a quiet crackle.

She glanced up, and suddenly the heart tree was not a tree at all, but the woman from the marketplace that horrible day, who had told Margaery that she would live to be old and grey, had told Loras to avoid the sea, and who had told Sansa that she would one day see Winterfell again.

Sansa had been the only one to take her seriously, she knew, and she had been the greater fool for doing so, for clearly the woman had been having a great laugh at their expense.

After all, even if she had gotten something right about that ship, Margaery was dead, and so clearly she had been lying about the rest of it.

"You lied," Sansa gasped out, not taking a moment to consider why the heart tree had turned into that fortune teller, only knowing that it had. "Why would you lie like that?"

The fortune teller peered imperiously down at her, and then seemed to recognize her, even from as tall above Sansa as she stood, tall as a tree, and her lips pulled into a horrific smile. "Lied?" she asked, grinning. "What did I lie about, Lady of Winterfell?"

Sansa shook her head, struggling to her feet and hating how this didn't make her any taller, to this other woman. "You...you told me so many promises, promises I wanted to believe, but..."

"But?" the woman leaned down, then, and Sansa saw that, out of her fingers were protruding the red flowers of the heart tree. Sansa blinked at them, mesmerized for a moment before she remembered her fury.

"Margaery is dead, and you promised that she would live to be grey.” she cried. "You promised, and you lied about it! What cause did you have to do that?"

The fortune teller stared at her, and then spread her arms wide, and now they were growing into roots, long and wide and brown, and the woman's eyes were hard and bright at the same time. "I can't understand you," she said, from a long way off, sounding as if she dearly wished that she could when Sansa knew that to be a lie, as well.

Sansa glared at her, and spoke louder. "You lied! You told me that Margaery would live happily, that she would..." she shook her head, trying to think of the woman's exact words. Funny; she couldn't remember them, just now. She was only filled with the horrible feeling that... "Her hair never turned grey. You said that it would," she breathed. "And you warned Loras about the sea, but not Margaery?"

The fortune teller shook her head, expression a bit sad, now. "I don't know what you're saying," she said, sounding sad, too. "You should try talking, like a tree. Normal people can't understand barking."

Her voice was garbled, as if it came from underwater.

Sansa blinked at her. "What?" she scoffed, too incredulous to think about her anger, for just a moment.

And then she looked down at her white paws, and _stared_.

"I-" the sound came out, a started howl, and the fortune teller shook her head and pursed her lips, clearly despairing of Sansa's ability to speak like a tree.

She turned, and suddenly her roots were coming out of the ground, allowing her to walk away with broad steps, standing tall over Winterfell as she passed it, and then beyond that, towards...

Towards, Sansa never found out what, because suddenly someone was shaking her awake, and Sansa found herself blinking up in terror as, for a moment, the fortune teller's face merged with Shae's, above her bed.

She jerked back, and Shae held up her hands, looking more worried than concerned. "Sansa? You're ready?" she glanced nervously towards the closed door of Sansa's chambers, and it took Sansa a moment to remember why.

She struggled lethargically to her feet, remembered that today was the day. They had been arguing about this, of course, and for a while, Sansa had thought that Shae would win, but somehow, she hadn't.

Perhaps she understood Sansa's crippling need to do one good thing, if she could manage it.

 _You should try talking_ , the fortune teller's voice whispered in her ear, and Sansa shivered as she got up and had Shae help her dress while they spoke.

"Have you found anything?" Sansa whispered to Shae where they stood in front of her mirror, all too aware that Tyrion was in the next room.

Shae finished tying up her dress with a sigh, pulling away from her. "I've spoken to all of the servants I could find," she said, "though I fear they're beginning to suspect me of something nefarious, just now." She shrugged. "They say that there have been half a dozen young women sent to the Black Cells, Sansa. No one knows more than that, because they're all afraid that if they are overcurious, they will be next."

As a part of her had suspected.

And Sansa understood that fear, she did. She knew that she had barely avoided the same fate, for she was sure that was what had happened to Megga, now. And she had avoided that fate specifically because she wasn't a servant.

But Megga, while professing not to be her friend...well, Sansa had considered her to be, whether Megga felt the same way or not.

"Then..." Sansa took a shuddering breath. "Then you know what we have to do. We agreed."

Shae's lips pursed. "Sansa, I'll ask around some more-"

That's not good enough," Sansa blurted out, running a hand through her hair and ignoring the concerned look Shae sent her in the mirror. "Shae, every time I see that hulking monstrosity who has been added to the Kingsguard, I think about her. I can't stop thinking about her. Every night, in my nightmares, she's there."

Shae blinked, stepping forward. "You didn't tell me that," and there was something of a mixture of concern and disapproval in her tone.

Sansa shrugged, pulling away and hugging herself. "I didn't think to," she said honestly, because that wasn't the worst part of her nightmares, these days.

These days, she dreamt about faces that peeled off skin, about empty cages of gold, of Margaery, smiling so sadly as she jumped out of a window.

Compared to all of those, she didn't know if it was important, to dream about Megga, being consumed by the same fire that had killed Margaery. Didn't know if that was just another product of her nightmares, if now that she had seen Ser Robert Strong, her subconscious was replacing Margaery with Megga.

Still, the dreams frightened her. She barely slept, and what little she did eat in the evenings always seemed to come back up again.

Tyrion had demanded she be seen by a maester, but even before the man said that there was nothing wrong with her save a bit of malnutrition and a distinct lack of sleep, Sansa had known it would do no good.

There was something terribly wrong with her, and she didn't think it had anything to do with her health.

Margaery was dead, and she couldn't accept that. Couldn't think about it at all, really, not since that fateful banquet with Joffrey.

She was perfect, he'd said, and he hadn't meant perfect for Sansa, but his perfect wife and she knew that Margaery had played very different people throughout her life in order to survive, but she couldn't stop thinking about that.

Couldn't stop thinking about how Margaery was always playing a part, save for when she was with Sansa, in those sweet moments they had stolen together.

Would it have been kinder to Sansa's poor, roiling emotions remember her otherwise? Would it have been kinder if Sansa had never gotten beneath Margaery's skin and known the real woman there?

She shook her head.

There was nothing she could do for Margaery, now. The other girl was dead, and Sansa had not gotten the chance to say goodbye.

But she had yet to know what had happened to Megga, and she wasn't going to allow the other girl to die if there was anything she could do to help it, no matter how broken and desperate to die that woman in the Black Cells had been.

And Sansa...might not have thought she could do anything about it before, but, horrible though Margaery's death had been, it had awarded her some modicum of desperation.

She had nothing left to lose, and she was damn well going to do something about that. Joffrey had his eye on her, and while Sansa knew all too well how dangerous that was, the short return of Ser Dontos in her life had reminded her that there were some powers she still had at court.

And if Megga truly was alive, she was damn well going to use them to help her, if she could.

"Sansa..." Shae looked rather hesitant, and that told Sansa before the other woman spoke what she was going to say. "There is another way we could find out if Lady Megga is in the Black Cells."

Sansa stared at her for a moment, and then grimaced. "I..."

She supposed that somewhere along the way, she truly had come to trust Shae, had come to see the woman as something like a friend, where she had never expected to like her, in the beginning.

Shae had never been anything but absolutely kind to her, and Sansa appreciated that greatly. Appreciated that Shae had told her the truth about her past, and offered to do anything Sansa needed, so long as Sansa didn't go wild.

But Sansa had already gone wild, just a bit, and what Shae was suggesting...well, she trusted Shae.

She didn't know if she felt the same about Tyrion.

Sansa could not deny that her husband had been nothing like she had expected, when they were first wed. The night of their wedding, she had been pleasantly surprised that he didn't turn her against the bed and rape her, as he was full within his rights to do as a husband.

And since then, he had never been anything but kind to her. Had even agreed not to get involved in her affairs, because she didn't want him to be a husband, not really. She had not expected that when she blurted out her demands, not truly.

But ever since then, Sansa was not certain how she felt about his silence, his absence from her life.

She...didn't miss him. Couldn't.

There was nothing to miss, because truly, there was nothing between them but a shared understanding of how horrible the rest of his family was, and that they both cared for Shae, to some extent.

Missing him...That was merely her loneliness speaking, the feelings that had dredged up with what had happened to Margaery.

"No," Sansa said, lifting her chin.

Shae took a deep breath, clearly spoiling for an argument, but Sansa lifted a hand.

"I'm trusting you with this, Shae,” she said. "But if what I suspect is the truth, if Lady Megga truly is a prisoner of the Lannisters, Tyrion can't know about it, and that isn't just because of my relationship with him. If he finds out..." she shook her head. "If he finds out, then it will necessarily become a problem between House Lannister and House Tyrell, and they might take it as enough of an insult to act out against House Lannister."

Shae stared at her for a long moment, and then sank down onto Sansa's bed. Sansa blinked at her, sat shakily when Shae patted the mattress beside her.

She reached out, brushing Sansa's hair behind her cheek. "Sansa," she said, voice very gentle, "Do you honestly expect me to believe that you care about the relations between House Tyrell and House Lannister?"

Sansa took a shaky breath, deflating at the flat out accusation. "I..."

"Sansa," Shae said again, the word almost imploring. "I told you, you can't do this on your own. And I want to help you, but I've run out of avenues to do that, unless you wish to brave going down to the Black Cells again. You are the wife of the Hand of the King. If he doesn't know what is going on in this fortress, then at least he can protect you if you decide to traipse down to the Black Cells on your own."

Sansa shivered despite herself.

She had gone down, after, of course. She had gone down with Megga to investigate what was happening there, and now Megga was gone, no doubt trapped away as Sansa had been, before that horrible trial.

She very much did not want to brave going down there once more if it was a lost cause, if Megga truly wasn't there.

But she owed the other girl that, didn't she? And it might be easier than going to Tyrion, whose help she had proudly told him she didn't want, not at all.

She didn't think she could stomach the thought of going back to him on her knees and asking for help in this matter, or any other one.

She shook her head, sitting up a little straighter. "I feel like we've been having this conversation too many times, Shae," she said tiredly. "He can't even protect me from the King; how is he supposed to protect me from a man who can bring the dead back to life?"

Shae went white. "Ser Robert..."

"Is Gregor Clegane," Sansa said hoarsely, wanting to bury her face in her hands and hide away from the horror of it.

But she wasn't able to do that, not anymore. She had done that all the time she had been with Margaery, and before, and that had gotten her nothing but more death.

She may as well embrace it, now.

Shae's forehead wrinkled, and she looked more skeptical than afraid, Sansa thought, which was definitely not how she should be feeling, not with the danger they were all in, not if Cersei's pet maester could restore the dead to life. "How...?"

Sansa shook her head. "I don't know," she admitted. "But he is. Quyburn, he somehow...somehow brought the man back."

She swallowed, thinking of the being she and Megga had encountered down in the Cells, of the girl who had clearly been abused by Qyburn and his creature before they had found her. Senelle, Megga had said her name was.

And now Megga was in the same position as she, withering away in the Black Cells, and Sansa was helpless up here, doing nothing for her, the rest of the Tyrells gone and not knowing where she even was.

But Sansa did. Sansa did, and she couldn't stop thinking about what was happening to Megga down there, if she was even still alive...

Shae shuddered. "Gods..." she whispered, and Sansa silently echoed the sentiment.

"So you see why I'm worried," Sansa said. "If Cersei's maester can accomplish that, surely he could do anything, and Joffrey doesn't care. Neither of them would listen to Tyrion about it, and Tyrion can't do anything to help us, not truly. Shae, we have to find Megga now, on our own, before..."

Shae blinked at her. "Before what, Sansa?" she asked, and her tone was absurdly gentle.

Sansa shook her head, swallowing hard.

 _Before I am imprisoned beside her for treason_ , she thought, but didn't say the words.

"When Lady Megga and I went down to the Black Cells," she said carefully, slowly, "we found a woman down there. One whom Maester Quyburn-"

"He isn't a maester," Shae said softly, and Sansa shot her a glare she didn't truly feel, because seriously, that wasn't the issue just now, was it?

"He was experimenting on her,' she said hoarsely. "She...she was covered in blood, and it was horrible, Shae. She asked us...asked us to kill her, and I was so frightened. I can't let that happen to Megga."

Sweet Megga, so wild and free, couldn't end up as broken and despondent as that woman had been. Sansa would not allow it.

Shae gave her another long look, pursing her lips. "Then we must do what we can to free her," she said hoarsely, but there was a determination in her tone that made Sansa blink. "Whatever we must."

Sansa swallowed hard, and suddenly Shae's arms were around her, holding her close, and Sansa leaned into the gentle touch, her breathing ragged.

Eventually, she pulled back, because she knew that if they spent too much time in here, Tyrion would become worried or suspicious and come knocking on her door, but never stepping inside of it, because he could be a gentleman so much that sometimes it infuriated her.

Shae gave her a long look. "All right?" she asked, and Sansa shook her head.

No, she thought. She hadn't been all right in a long time, and that letter for Stannis was still looming over her head, unanswered. The longer it went unanswered, the more terrified she felt, that it had been intercepted by the Lannisters and soon enough, Joffrey was going to call for her head, the way he had called for her father's.

She took a deep breath. "We should go now," she blurted out, glancing out of the corner of her eyes at Shae.

Shae's eyes widened in turn, and she glanced over her shoulder, as if even saying something dangerous would bring Tyron running. "Sansa..."

"Don't you think?" Sansa asked hoarsely. "We already know where she is, and I can't, Shae I can't...I can't lose anyone else. I just...I can't."

Shae gave her another long look, and then took a deep breath. "Sansa..."

"We already told Tyrion that we were going to tea with the Queen Mother and the Princess," Sansa blurted out. "No one will think twice if we are not there because I am sick."

Shae crossed her arms over her chest. "Or they will come running, thinking you have escaped King's Landing, and find you snooping in the Black Cells, instead, and decide to leave you down there," she pointed out, voice going a little shrill, and Sansa winced.

Still, she straightened her shoulders and somehow managed to look down her nose at Shae. "Look," she blurted, "I am going down there whether you will come with me or not. I...Shae, you said we would do whatever we can to free her. And...I have to know. I have to know if she's down there, if she's still alive."

Shae grimaced. "Just because the servants are saying there are people down there, Sansa," she said carefully, "Does not mean that Lady Megga is not dead in a ditch somewhere on Cersei's orders, or that she did not already return to Highgarden, like the Tyrell girls said."

But Sansa shook her head, because she knew Cersei. She knew that Megga had been investigating that pet of Cersei's, and that Cersei didn't let people off easy for perceived betrayals.

That was why Margaery was likely at the bottom of the sea somewhere, and Sansa could not forget that as she wondered about Megga's fate, now.

She hadn't been able to save Margaery. She would do what she could to save Megga, though.

"You won't relent on this, will you?" Shae demanded, pursing her lips. "I could go to Tyrion right now. Sansa, this is dangerous, and I know you are worried for your friend, but if anyone caught us..."

"I'm going," Sansa repeated. "Whether you come with me or report me is your own choice, but I"m going."

Shae met her eyes for a long moment, and then sighed, dipping her head. "Fine," she said, which was not at all what Sansa had expected to hear from her, "Fine. But the moment I smell danger, you will trust me and leave, do you hear me?" she asked.

Sansa's heart skipped a beat, more surprised that the other woman had agreed with her than anything. "Yes," she breathed. "Yes, I'll do it. Whatever you want. Just...we should go now, don't you think?"

Shae gave her another long look, and then sighed again. "Yes," she said. "All right. I will tell someone that you are too sick to attend the tea, and you had better hope that Tyrion doesn't hear that we didn't go."

Sansa almost wanted to hug her.

Out of everything happening in her life - Margaery's death, Joffrey's sudden renewed interest in her, these Sparrows, the lack of a response from Stannis - this was one thing that could go right, she thought. One thing, and she was glad that Shae was not standing in her way for it.

They managed to make their way past Tyrion without much trouble, and then Shae was telling Sansa to meet her at the corridor where Varys had taken her out to Oberyn Martell's ship.

It did not occur to Sansa to wonder how Shae knew exactly which corridor that had been, but she made her way there all the same, adrenaline coursing through her too quickly to focus on such minute things.

No doubt, Shae had merely suspected, given that she had known where Sansa was at the time, in Margaery's chambers, and how to get there from those chambers, though Sansa had not even realized that such a secret corridor had existed before Lord Varys had dragged her through it.

Still, she found herself standing in front of where she thought she remembered it being, hugging herself and shivering as she hid in the shadows and hoped that no one would walk past.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when Shae returned, still giving her that worried look that a part of Sansa was now beginning to resent.

"Sansa, are you sure about this?" Shae asked, for what felt like the umpteenth time. "We could go to Tyrion..."

"I already told you why we can't," Sansa whispered harshly to the other woman, exasperation bleeding into her tone. Shae could be the voice of reason when she wanted to, but just now, Sansa thought there was no turning back, and continuing to argue about this was faintly ridiculous, given where they were standing.

Margaery would not have argued over it. She would have understood the risks, and embraced them anyway. She loved her ladies like sisters.

The truth, she knew, was that if she went to Tyrion, he would wonder why her need to find Lady Megga was suddenly so urgent. Shae would not, and so she wouldn't object, but Tyrion would.

He'd seen something in her, that day she had threatened to go to the King when he tried to forbid her from seeing Margaery again, and whatever it was, her husband no longer saw her as someone above making plots of her own.

She couldn't afford for him to become even slightly suspicious of her, Sansa decided.

Shae finally nodded. "Fine," she said, tight lipped. "Come along. This way.”

And then she was dragging Sansa down a corridor that Sansa had never seen before, between two doors which shouldn't have been there at all, for they seemed to go into nothing but empty walls.

Still, Sansa didn't protest, for Shae was a servant who had spent a great deal of time running about the Keep, no doubt figuring out where all of the secret passageways that Sansa had never known existed were.

Besides, if it got them down to the Black Cells without being seen, so much the better.

They walked in silence, Shae producing a scarf somewhere along the way to cover Sansa's head, and all of this reminded Sansa terribly of the time she had snuck down to the Black Cells to see her husband.

Things had been so very different then, she thought. She had been terrified to do so, had thought she was being entirely foolish, at the time.

Now, she was still terrified, but she could also feel a firm, cold resolve rushing through her.

Even if Stannis had yet to answer her letter, she did not know how much longer she would remain in King’s Landing, and she wasn't going to leave Megga to the tender mercies of Cersei and her dead man walking if she could help it.

When they made it to the mouth of the Black Cells, and Sansa found herself staring down at the looming entrance, she shuddered, reminded far too well of her own time spent here, not coming to see her husband.

Shae caught it at once, of course. "We don't have to go down there, Sansa," she said gently. "If you want, I can..."

"No," Sansa said, a little too quickly, she knew, but that couldn't be helped. She was reminded far too well of the time when Megga had asked her to come down to the Black Cells with her, because she knew that it would be too dangerous for her to try something like that on her own.

Sansa didn't want Shae trying something like that on her own, and especially for a girl she had never professed to like.

If Megga was even there.

Which, she had to be. She just...she had to be.

"We do it together," Sansa said, quietly.

Shae still went first, ahead of her.

The oppressive halls of the Black Cells seemed to cave in around her the further Sansa walked, but she tried not to think about that, tried not to react to the memories surging up inside of her, of too long spent in the dark, of the only sounds being that of her breathing and the times Oberyn Martell had tried to distract her before he'd....he'd...

"Sansa," Shae said quietly, placing a hand on her arm.

Sansa's head jerked up. "I'm fine," she promised, the words ringing false, but it turned out that was not what Shae had meant at all.

"Someone's coming," she said, pushing Sansa flat against the wall. "A guard, sounds like."

Sansa had not even heard the sound of rattling chainmail, which filled the corridor a moment later. She breathed a sigh of relief that Shae had insisted on coming, after all.

They managed to evade the guard, who turned down another hall at the last instant, and that was when Sansa realized the main problem at hand.

Even if they did find Megga down here, Margaery and Tyrion had never managed to sneak Sansa out of here, and she didn't think anyone else had ever managed, either. They wouldn't be able to just walk her back out of here, and they certainly wouldn't be able to get a set of keys to free her, in any case.

Shae was right about one thing. They might have managed some of that with Tyrion's assistance, if only Sansa was not so stubborn.

But...no. She wasn't going to allow herself to think like that. There were far more important issues at hand, after all.

They managed to shuffle their way through the corridors of the Black Cells without being caught, somehow, glancing in at each cell, Sansa feeling a horrible despair in the pit of her stomach as each cell did not reveal Megga or anyone else familiar, but rather some vagabond looking creature, no doubt consigned for death down here.

You can't save them all, she told herself. You don't even know if you can save Megga.

She shook her head to clear it, reminded of the sound of her own retching, while she had been kept down here, with a little shiver.

"Sansa..." Shae breathed, and there was a warning note that had Sansa looking up again, wondering if they were encountering yet another guard.

But it wasn't a guard, not this time.

Instead, Shae was on tip toe in front of the slot that allowed her to look into one of the cells, and even in the failing torchlight, Sansa could see how very pale her face was.

Sansa's feet moved forward of their own accord - _I love you, Sansa Stark_ \- and she nearly pushed Shae aside, glancing through the little window herself.

And gasped.

"My gods," Sansa breathed, staring in horror at the figure sitting in the cell in front of her.

Until this moment, she hadn't been certain, that Megga was really down here. That Olenna would lie to Alla about what had happened to Megga, would lie about a pregnancy and then bring all of those girls back to Highgarden, where it would be evident that she had lied.

But clearly, she had, and for no reason that Sansa could discern, if she knew that Megga was down here and had done nothing to help her, nothing at all.

Because there, sitting on the floor of a filthy cell and wearing rags that made Sansa gag, staring up at Sansa with blearing, bemused eyes, was a figure who could only be Megga Tyrell, even if she was hardly recognizable so dirty, and without the finery which had defined her place at Margaery's side.

Sansa wondered if that was what she had looked like, to the outside observers like Margaery and Tyrion, when she had spent her time in the Black Cells. If she had looked that...ragged, or if that was a byproduct of a far worse fate.

Of a woman, sitting in a cell, begging them to kill her, because that fate would be kinder than leaving her to the mercies of Qyburn once more.

Sansa glanced back at Shae, saw that the other woman had recognized her as well, where, for a moment Sansa had been worried that she wouldn’t be able to recognize Megga at all.

"Megga?" she said, and the words came out more like a tainted whisper. Sansa was the first to look away.

She found she couldn’t meet Megga's gaze, no matter how she tried.

The girl didn't seem to notice. Instead, she skittered back, throwing herself against the far wall of the cell.

Still, it was obvious that she recognized Sansa, even with that reaction, from the way her eyes flitted back to Sansa almost immediately, and she began to rub her no doubt cold arms in obvious fear.

"Megga," Sansa repeated, more gently this time, as Shae took up a lookout position behind her.

It had been cruel, Sansa thought suddenly, to come here without the ability to offer Megga any form of escape. She realized that now, that she had always felt the same when Tyrion and Margaery came to visit her down here.

Megga didn't blink, and Sansa felt her stomach turn.

This girl, whom she recognized but also did not, subdued and frightened as she was, lying in her own filth, was so very different from the vibrant, happy and risk taking young girl Sansa remembered that it almost seemed impossible for her to be the same girl, not at all.

Something was horribly wrong here, and a part of Sansa did not want to investigate it further, even if that meant leaving Megga to her fate. But she knew she would never be able to forgive herself for doing such a thing.

"Do you...do you know me?" she whispered hoarsely, and found that she didn't know what she would do if the other girl didn't answer in the affirmative.

"Get out," Megga breathed, and there was terror in her eyes. The sight made Sansa flinch, and she took a step back, involuntarily, ignoring the concerned gaze she felt at her side.

"Sansa..." Shae's voice was soft, and oddly hesitant.

Sansa glanced back at her, saw a bit of Megga's own fear reflected in Shae's eyes, and for a moment, she allowed herself to think of what Shae had tried to warn her about before. Of how if they were caught, Sansa might not be harmed, but there was no telling what might happen to Shae, nd surely they should go to Tyrion about this.

Oh, she hadn't said that in so many words, of course, but Sansa had been able to read between the lines, and she felt rather nervous, just thinking it.

Because that would be her fault, too.

Somehow, Shae had become almost as important to her as Margaery had been, and she didn't want to lose the other woman, too. Not so soon after what had happened to Margaery.

But she couldn't in good conscience leave Megga down here, not now that she knew what had become of the other girl.

She turned back to the window, took a deep breath, then another. "Megga?" she whispered, leaning in as close as she dared, with the way the other girl had plastered herself against the far wall so quickly. "Do you recognize me? Please?"

She didn't know what she would do if Megga did not.

Megga blinked at her, once, then again.

"Do you know how you came to be down here?" Sansa asked her hoarsely. "Was it...was it Cersei?"

Of course it was Cersei, she thought, blushing a little. Who else would have done this?

Megga didn't respond.

"Megga..." Sansa took a deep breath. "Megga, I'm so sorry for this. I'm so terribly..."

She never got the chance to finish whatever weak apologies she might have managed, because that was the moment when Megga struck, lashing out like a rabid beast.

"Go!" Megga screamed at her, throwing herself against the little hatch in the door so suddenly that Sansa yelped and jumped back, even if the door was far too heavy for someone as skinny as Megga currently was, when she had always been so plump before, to break down. "Go!"

Shae was yanking Sansa along before Sansa realized her own feet were moving.

"Wait," Sansa cried, because she couldn't just leave the other girl, she couldn’t, but Shae ignored her protests easily enough.

"Sansa, we need to go," she hissed in Sansa's ear. "There are guards coming."

Sansa swallowed, torn as she glanced back at Megga. She had promised herself that she would do what she could to free the other girl, and now she felt like she was abandoning her all over again.

"We'll come back for you,' Sansa vowed, meeting Megga's vacant stare. "I promise."

"Sansa!" Shae hissed, and Sansa nearly tumbled down the hallway after her. Sansa nodded, wordlessly, and allowed the other woman to pull her away.


	314. TYRION

"He's done what?" Tyrion demanded of the High Septon who had bothered to come all of the way to the Keep to speak with him privately, without the prying eyes of the other Septons or those ridiculous fanatics, and then lifted a hand. "For fuck's sake," he said.

The High Septon looked mildly perturbed at the language, but said nothing as Tyrion stood there, chewing on his bottom lip.

That was the difference between a man Tyrion had installed as a pawn, and a fanatic who was happy to condemn anything the King did.

Gods help them all if this so called High Sparrow ever learned of this.

He had come to visit Tyrion in the Keep, insisting that the matter he needed to speak with the Hand of the King about was urgent enough that Tyrion should not even go to the meeting of the Small Council that had been set up for this time, and Tyrion hadn't quite believed him until the man opened his mouth.

"You will return to the Sept at once, and tell His Grace that the matter is impossible," he informed the High Septon. "That the Faith will not stand for it, and that he would do best to set his eyes elsewhere."

The High Septon gulped. "Yes, of course, my lord. I suspected that would be your answer." Still, he looked uncomfortable, and Tyrion could well imagine why, given the recent influx of slaughters in the capitol of late.

Joffrey wouldn’t be stupid enough to kill the only religious leader still on his side though, surely.

Then again, he could no longer put anything past his nephew, these days.

Tyrion nodded absently. "I will handle things from my end, you can be assured of that," he said, and the High Septon nodded, and turned, walking from the room.

Tyrion sighed, long and low, and pinched the bridge of his nose. He could use a good, stiff drink, right about now.

Unfortunately, his bastard of a nephew could never allow for a moment's peace, and that was how he found himself hurrying to his sister's chambers, instead.

"We need to talk," Tyrion said, barging into Cersei's chambers just as the guard outside the door opened it.

She lifted her head, glaring at him over the desk she sat at, scribbling away. No doubt planning another murder, Tyrion thought darkly.

"What do you want, Brother?" she demanded, raising an eyebrow at him. "Do you come to tell me about yet another slaughter that my son has caused in the streets?"

She said it as if she blamed Tyrion personally for the way the people were now maligning the King.

Tyrion grimaced. "The people are rioting, Cersei. Something needs to be done about them. At least your son has the presence of mind to realize that, even if he doesn't go about it in the right way."

Cersei stared at him. "What happened to my naive little brother, the one who could never touch a whore without thinking of the one you married, the one who always thinks he is doing what is right, and allows that to guide his actions, foolish though they be?"

She sounded almost...smug, and Tyrion, for a moment, didn't quite understand what it was that she was saying.

"I could ask the same of my sister," he said softly, and Cersei scribbled something more on the parchment before her. "Besides," he said coldly, "That is not what we need to speak about."

Cersei lifted her head. "Oh?"

"Your son is romancing Sansa Stark again," he said, and Cersei blinked at him, looking bemused. Of course, she’d seen the way the brat had kissed her in front of everyone, but evidently, neither of them had truly understood the half of it.

Tyrion knew the boy, coward though he was, could be more than forward with his “pets,” but Tyrion had certainly never expected him to go behind everyone’s back and try something like this for Sansa Stark, and certainly not so quickly after the loss of Margaery, whom Tyrion had begun to suspect he genuinely liked.

"He seems to have moved on quickly from his dear, beloved bride."

"I would hardly call the games he plays with that foolish girl 'romancing,' Brother, but then I suppose that in a marriage like yours, she would develop a warped view of such things," Cersei said dryly, and Tyrion stared at her, disgusted.

"Are you so far gone, Sister, that you can't imagine the problem to arise from this?" Tyrion asked, and Cersei blinked at him.

"I can't imagine what you're referring to," she said coldly. "Joffrey has always had his games with the Lady Sansa, and you have made it quite clear where you stand on them. As I told you before, if you do not like what the King is doing, then perhaps you should do something about it."

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose, helping himself to the seat in front of Cersei. She gave him an annoyed look, but said nothing.

"The High Septon came to me today," he said, and that got her attention. "He said that the King had come to him just this morning, and asked him whether he had the power to annul a marriage of over a year, so long as it there was proof that it had not been consummated."

Cersei slammed down the quill she was holding.

"That cannot be allowed to happen," she gritted out.

Tyrion smiled. "I'm glad that for once you've seen sense, sweet sister," he told her, and Cersei glared at him.

"The King cannot be seen to marry a girl of a sullied reputation, nor a traitor's daughter," she said. Then she pursed her lips. “Nor your wife.”

Tyrion’s smile was thin. “I suppose even you don’t go in for that sort of thing,” he muttered, and Cersei glowered at him.

“How many people know of this?” she demanded.

“Just you, I, and the High Septon, whom I have prevailed upon to speak sense to the King,” Tyrion said, and then snorted at his own words.

Cersei looked like she was getting ready to break one of her own teeth. And…strangely hurt, Tyrion thought, blinking. "If he wishes a wife, then surely he should have come to me on the matter. There are plenty of young women whom I could suggest, of better stock than her."

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "He doesn’t want a wife, Cersei,” he told her bluntly. “He wants to cause as much damage as he can get away with.”

Cersei looked away, and didn’t bother to deny it.

Tyrion thought of the way she’d had that Kingsguard, the one Tyrion had sent with Myrcella to Dorne, slaughtered in the middle of a celebration, and wondered if she even knew what he meant.

“I told the High Septon to refuse the King, on the grounds that the marriage in question is consummated," he told Cersei.

She raised a brow, looking almost amused, now. "Is it?"

Tyrion shifted in his chair. "I hardly think that is your concern, Cersei, but as it stands, she is my wife."

Cersei gave him another look, and then harrumphed.

"The High Septon is happy enough to go along with my suggestion," Tyrion said.

"Yes," Cersei said dryly, "Because you have him in your pocket," she muttered.

"No," Tyrion said, "Because your son has managed to piss off both the fanatics and the septons, with this new statue he is having built."

Cersei scoffed. "The statue you allowed to be built,” she gritted out.

Tyrion gnawed on the inside of his cheek. “Will you support me in this matter?”

Cersei eyed him a moment longer. “Yes,” she said finally, and Tyrion wasn’t sure whether to be surprised or not, by those words.

Marrying one’s aunt by marriage would hardly be considered incest, of course, and so long as it was not, Tyrion almost could see Cersei wanting to continue to spoil her son unashamedly. But with the way the Sparrows were reacting to every little thing the King did recently, they both knew they would be treading on thin ice, with such an idea.

Joffrey had to be stopped, and Tyrion was the only one to do it at this point, he knew that.

It helped, in a way, that doing so would also spare his wife, little though she thought of him, from the pain of becoming Joffrey’s bride.

He knew that she had loathed the thought of marrying the Imp. He had not been entirely happy to marry her, though for completely different reasons. And while he held some hope that she no longer saw him as a monster because of who he was, but rather because of the family he had been born into, he knew that she did not trust him totally.

Shae had been more than capable of letting him know that.

But if he could spare her from this, from once more finding herself belonging to Joffrey, he would do it.

He wondered what that said about him, that he had been weakly standing by as Hand of the King until this moment.

Granted, he knew that Cersei had seen to his appointment, and while he still didn’t understand why she had done so, he also knew that she could take away that appointment at any moment.

At least, at the moment, their interests were aligned. He could count on one hand the number of times that had been so.

Cersei seemed to be thinking along similar lines. "Well, inform the High Septon that if he can prove the marriage to be consummated, then something will be done about the statue at once."

Tyrion gave her a thin smile. "I already have,” he said in answer to the first part, though of course he did not mention the statue. He was rather surprised that she had, and wondered what sort of influence she thought she still had over her monster of a son, that she thought she could convince the King to take it down.

Cersei slammed her hands down on the parchment. "Then what is it you have come here for?"

"I hoped to understand each other," Tyrion said. "My wife is not marrying Joffrey. I am glad that we are both clear on that. No matter what needs to be done to ensure that."

The warning hung in the air: Joffrey would not be pleased by the loss of his statue, or the loss of his plaything, and they both knew it. What remained was to determine how willing Cersei was to work against her own son, when he had never known her to do so in the past.

Cersei gritted her teeth. He wondered if she was remembering her time as Robert’s wife, or if she was purely motivated by the Sparrows.

He had a horrible feeling, though, that there was something else which was motivating her altogether, something which had caused her to agree with him so quickly, without even the token fight he had been expecting.

The thought made him wince, because suddenly, now that he was thinking on it, he knew exactly what her motivation truly was.

Cersei wasn’t, after all, the sort of woman to care about religious fanatics until they were pounding down her door; that was why the people had revolted in Flea Bottom, and why they were doing so now.

_If he wishes a wife, then surely he should have come to me on the matter._

Tyrion opened his mouth to voice his suspicions, and then decided it would be better to wait before getting into yet another argument with her.

At least, to wait until they had solved this one. He hardly wanted Cersei deciding she was angry enough over their lack of agreement in a wife to take Joffrey’s side and turn the Sparrows against them, after all.

Tyrion just hoped she didn’t act before then.

He knew, of course, as well as she that the King needed to find a new wife, and that the easiest way to get his mind off of Sansa would be to do what they had done before: find him one he rather liked.

And while Tyrion had his doubts that they would be able to find a girl as able at manipulating Joffrey as the late Margaery had been, he knew finding a wife for him would take careful consideration, which was why he had yet to suggest it as a way to distract the King.

He had also thought, for a few moments, to spare the boy some time to grieve his late wife, but it seemed that even Joffrey didn’t care for the time to do so.

Cersei, he had noticed, had been trying to ease her son into the idea for some time, all to no avail, beyond this sudden interest in Sansa.

Gods, he was starting to feel a migraine coming on.

"Of course," she agreed. "Well then, I see that my work is clear."


	315. SANSA

Joffrey had called all of the nobles to him this morning, and according to Shae, had even sent a guard to the Tower of the Hand, specifically requesting that Sansa be present.

That, of course, made her nervous. All she could think about was that damned letter she had sent, and horror filled her at the idea that someone had found it, that it had been returned to Joffrey, and he was specifically requesting her presence that she might go to her death.

The thought was exhilarating.

She didn't quite know what was happening with her, Sansa thought idly. Something had changed, deep within her, from the moment she had learned of Margaery's death, and she knew that things would never be the same again.

She craved the danger of returning to the Black Cells to find Megga now, as well as the danger of writing that letter, for she felt that she had nothing left to lose.

But it frightened her, a little bit, as well.

She had only left the Black Cells earlier because Shae had heard the guards coming, and hadn't wanted to get Shae into trouble. If Shae hadn't been there, there was a part of Sansa which thought that perhaps she wouldn’t have left at all, would have braved the guards, as well.

That frightened her more than words could express.

But she was beginning to wonder if it was all for naught. Stannis Baratheon had yet to return her letter, had yet to respond in any way, and while Sansa supposed that might have meant he had received her letter and did not want to endanger her, she worried that it also meant he hadn't, or that he had, and he simply hadn't cared.

But Sansa knew that her letter was not meaningless. If the Lannisters saw it, they would punish her for finally speaking out against their imprisonment of her, and if Stannis showed it to the North, well...

She knew that the North would remember. They had rallied around the Boltons because they had married the Bolton bastard to this girl pretending to be Arya, she knew that, Ned's little girl.

The title chafed, when Sansa knew that it wasn't the truth. That whoever that poor girl was, she wasn't Arya Stark.

Sansa felt rather guilty, endangering that girl who was nothing more than a pawn with the contents of her letter to Stannis, and she supposed that a month ago, she might not even have written it.

But, oddly enough, as she had heard Joffrey speak about Ser Dantos' death and wondered if it had anything to do with his coming to see her, she remembered something Lady Olenna had told her.

That Oberyn Martell would not be the first to die for her, because she was a lady, and a Stark, and that was merely the way things were.

Sansa had not wanted to accept those words at the time, but she had wanted Margaery.

She was beginning to accept them, now.

Because if Stannis had a letter from Sansa, one proclaiming her support, as the last living Stark daughter, for King Stannis Baratheon, First of His Name, even as she remained a prisoner of the Lannisters, if that letter explained just who this 'Arya' was, the North would no longer rally behind what remained of the Boltons forces.

She had to believe that.

Stannis Baratheon already had Winterfell, and while Sansa was annoyed that it was no longer in her name, even if that name was merely used by the Lannisters, she'd come to terms with it, as well.

Because the best revenge would be to watch someone else take everything the Lannisters had held dear, even if one of those things was her home.

She remembered what the fortune teller had said, after all. She couldn't forget it, after what had happened to Margaery, to Loras.

She would make it home again.

Which meant that whoever held Winterfell just now didn't matter, as long as they weren't in bed with the Lannisters.

And Joffrey would find out eventually that she had written such a letter. His fury when he did...Sansa relished it, just a bit.

She knew there was little enough she could do, in her current position. But that? That, she could relish, throwing a wrench in the Lannisters' schemes of holding all of Westeros, one day.

So if she had to keep smiling and enduring Joffrey's attentions, she would.

She just wished that Stannis Baratheon would send back some sort of response, so that she could know he had gotten her letter.

She shook her head, and forced such thoughts from her mind.

An empty doll, she thought, and smiled as she listened to her king ramble.

That is, until she was actually paying attention to the words coming out of Joffrey's mouth.

Then, despite her attempts at nonchalance, Sansa felt herself growing very pale.

"The gods have punished me by killing my innocent wife, for not fulfilling my vow to the Lady Sansa, and allowing her to marry my uncle when I had made such a sacred vow," Joffrey announced morosely, and Sansa froze, where she stood.

White noise filled her mind. She froze, eyes going very wide as she listened to the King's words, as she saw Shae stiffen beside her and then reach out, heard her softly calling Sansa's name in worry.

Sansa couldn't bring herself to respond. Couldn't bring herself to think at all.

No. No, no, no.

No, this wasn't supposed to happen.

She remembered the day when the Tyrells had rode into King's Landing after the Battle of Blackwater, how relieved she had been when they had offered up Margaery as a wife to the King.

How she had wanted to smile, before she remembered that she had to look sad before all of these people, that she had lost her beloved.

Sansa had known she would never totally be free of Joffrey until she was gone from this place, if she did manage to get Stannis to help her, but she had at least thought that she could be free of this one thing.

That she would never again have to call Joffrey her beloved betrothed.

"No one can know the wills and whims of the gods, my love. The High Septon himself has announced-" Cersei began gently, placing a hand on his arm, but he threw her off.

"I have spoken to the High Septon," Joffrey snapped. "He tells me that such a marriage cannot be endorsed by the Faith of the Seven, since she is married to another."

Cersei's brows furrowed. "Yes, my love," she said. "And the High Septon ought to know, surely."

Sansa gritted her teeth, having a horrible feeling that Joffrey wasn't finished yet. He certainly wouldn't have brought it up, if he was.

Joffrey sent his mother a shark's smile. "Yes, he ought to.  _But_  he agrees with me, as does the Faith, that because I made a sacred oath to marry Sansa, he believes that going back on that oath could have been cause for my...for the Queen's late death."

Sansa choked on air.

"Your Grace," Cersei said, pursing her lips and glaring out into the crowd. It took Sansa a moment to realize that she was looking in Tyrion's direction.

"I am the King. If anyone should know the will of the gods, it is me," Joffrey said, and then leered at Sansa.

Somehow, even though this entire conversation was about her, Sansa couldn't bring herself to speak up, to say more than a word.

Cersei's features pinched together as she attempted to come up with some sort of argument for that, but Tyrion beat her to it.

"Unfortunately, Your Grace, the Lady Sansa is already married," he spoke up from the crowd, moving forward until he stood before the Iron Throne.

Strangely, Sansa thought, her eyes narrowing, he looked as though he had already practiced these words, and that had Sansa glancing back at Cersei in bemusement.

"To a husband who has failed to give her a son," Joffrey shot back at him. "Clearly an indication of the gods' anger at such a marriage. Yes," he stared off into the distance, as if he could see the gods themselves. "I can see their anger now."

Tyrion pinched the bridge of his nose. He looked dangerously close to rolling his eyes. Sansa thought that perhaps if the situation were not so...disturbing, he just might have. "Your Grace, what has been consummated in the eyes of the gods cannot be torn apart, not even for a King, the High Septon is clear on that, even if this...matter of the vow be the case. Even you must know this."

Joffrey leered. "Has it?" he asked, and then turned his eyes on Sansa and smirked. "Tell me, Lady Sansa, has your lord husband really fucked you yet, or did you make that up along with your protestations of love for me?"

Sansa's mouth opened and closed like a fish, and she could feel her cheeks growing hot.

"How dare you," Tyrion gritted out, lifting his chin. "I do believe we've had a rather...enlightening conversation about this subject matter before, Your Grace. Would you like to return to it?"

Joffrey gritted his teeth. "Perhaps if the Hand of the King stopped threatening his king, treacherously, I might add, and put his efforts towards attempting to win the war we are sorely losing against Stannis Baratheon, he would have my respect, Uncle."

Tyrion clenched his fists. "Then at the very least, you might respect the sanctity of a marriage done in the name of the Faith which you serve," he said coldly, and Cersei cleared her throat, then, giving her brother a warning look.

Yes, Sansa thought, panic filling her. Somehow, Tyrion and Cersei had already known that this was going to happen, had known Joffrey was going to suggest...this, and Tyrion had done nothing to warn her. Had said nothing.

"Perhaps this conversation is one better continued in private," Cersei said loudly, and Sansa felt a bit ill, wondering if she would even be allowed to enter into that conversation, if it was behind closed doors. She had a feeling as to what that answer would be.

Tyrion coughed. "Perhaps it should," he said, shooting Cersei a look of annoyance even as Joffrey stood, jaw twitching.

"Fine," he gritted out. "But I wish for the Lady Sansa to accompany us."

Sansa blinked, where she stood beside Shae, and she felt all eyes suddenly upon her.

"She ought to have some say in her fate, should she not?" he asked, winking at Sansa. Winking at her.

Tyrion glared at him. "I don't remember that being a problem when she was married to me by your previous Hand, Your Grace," he reminded the King.

"And perhaps that is the problem, Uncle," Joffrey said. "She is, after all, a woman grown, and the Head of her own House, these days. She ought to have had some say in whom she married. I pity that she did not, for my own wife would never have been married against her will."

For some reason, Sansa realized, those words made Tyrion go very pale.

Sansa herself was trying not to scoff.

"I will go with you, Your Grace," she said, loudly enough to be overheard over whatever it was Tyrion was about to say.

It wouldn't matter, she knew. Whether Joffrey decided he wanted to marry her or not, it wouldn't matter.

She was not only a married woman, but she was certainly not a virgin, and besides, her time was slowly ticking down, until the moment the Lannisters found out about her betrayal. If Tyrion did not disavow her the moment the truth came out, that she was not a virgin, when half of King's Landing had already guessed that he had never touched her. Or, even if he did, if Joffrey and Cersei did not believe either of them.

Joffrey raised his brows, looking terribly pleased with himself, and held out his hand for her.

Tyrion gritted his teeth.

Cersei glared; at Sansa, she found, blinking somewhat in surprise. She couldn't think of a reason why the woman might disagree with her son; after all, this was another chance to torment her, and she was hardly Margaery.

And Cersei wouldn’t have to worry about finding another wife that would be able to control Joffrey, as well.

Still, Sansa walked forward and took the King's hand.

An empty doll, she reminded herself. If the King wanted to know whether she could become his wife, she had no say in the matter whatsoever.

At least, not until Stannis actually responded to her.

In a brief moment of panic, as her fingers touched Joffrey's, she wondered if her letter had simply never reached Stannis. If some raven had merely lost it, and she was never going to get the response she had been waiting for.

The panic built as Joffrey's eyes roved down her form, and he smirked.

Tyrion wouldn't allow this to happen, Sansa thought desperately. No, he hadn't warned her that it would, but if he had known ahead of time, he must have some sort of plan. He must have a way out of this.

He must.

She gritted her teeth while trying to pretend that she wasn't, and followed the King out of the throne room, Tyrion and Cersei walking along behind them.

Sansa thought that when they had left the throne room, Tyrion and Cersei would want to have this discussion - however they thought they would be able to convince Joffrey not to do what he wanted, when neither of them had seemed to have managed it before - somewhere a little more private than in the corridor behind the throne room.

The moment they were there, however, and the door shut behind them, Tyrion raised his voice.

"Your Grace!" he snapped, and Sansa grimaced as Joffrey abruptly let go of her hand. "Why in the seven hells would you announce that before the entire court?"

Cersei grimaced.

Joffrey crossed his arms over his chest. "I am the King," he repeated, and gods, even Sansa was getting tired of hearing that, at this point.

Tyrion took a step forward, stabbing a finger at his nephew. "You may be the King," he snapped, "but when the smallfolk come storming down this Keep to kill you for heresy, you will also be the first fool to die."

Joffrey gritted his teeth. "You can't..."

Cersei reached out, touching her son's arm. "My love..."

He whirled on her. "You were the one who insisted upon my finding a new wife to replace my beloved Queen, Mother," he snapped. "And now you don't like my choice?"

She gritted her teeth. "This...was not exactly what I meant," she said sourly, glancing once more at Sansa.

Sansa bit the inside of her cheek, and said nothing.

"And in any case, you cannot marry Sansa," Tyrion repeated.

Joffrey grinned. "I don't see why not." And then, all of the sudden, horribly, he was looking right at Sansa. "Do you love me, Lady Sansa?" Joffrey asked. "Truly?"

Cersei sucked in a breath. Tyrion groaned.

"I...You are my King," Sansa said quickly, glancing between the two of them desperately, for she had certainly never thought she would be looking to Cersei for help. The woman, though, at least seemed partially interested in stopping this...travesty from going forward. She felt tears stinging at her eyes, for she knew that if she answered anything else, it would only invite the King's fury, even if her husband was the Hand of the King.

Even if he had somehow known, before, she knew that there was nothing her husband could truly do about this. Nothing at all.

Her voice was very small when she continued, "I could do nothing less."

Joffrey grinned, turning back to his mother and uncle. "There, you see? She'd much rather be with me than the Imp."

"That was hardly a declaration of intent, Your Grace," Tyrion said dryly, eyes meeting Sansa's. She glanced away. Joffrey ignored him.

Cersei cleared her throat, shooting Sansa a glare. "There is a problem with that, my love," she told Joffrey, who turned to her, looking almost like a little boy, crestfallen that he could not have what he wanted. "The marriage could be consummated, as they have both implied, in which case, you cannot marry her. The Queen must be a virgin, after all, and cannot be the product of a divorced marriage."

Joffrey raised an eyebrow at Sansa. "Well, my lady?" he asked her. "Are you?"

Sansa gulped, feeling fear rising up her gullet.

She was not, she really wasn't, but that was hardly because of her husband.

And, inexplicably, she turned to her lord husband in desperation.

Tyrion, perhaps more inexplicably, shook his head at her, subtly, behind Joffrey's.

Sansa licked her lips. "No, my lord," she said quietly. "I...My husband has done his duty by me, in the long months since our marriage. I have told you as much, my lord, if it pleases you."

Joffrey glared at her, and suddenly his grip on her wrist was punishing. "Did he?" he demanded, eyes darkening.

"Your Grace..." Tyrion began, but Joffrey held a hand up, and he fell silent.

"We'll see about that," Joffrey snapped, and Sansa whimpered, at the grip on her wrist.

"Your Grace," Tyrion said coldly, "you will unhand my wife."

Joffrey did so, spinning on his uncle. "And you," he said coldly, "I don't suppose you'll have anything to object to, when the Lady Sansa submits to an examination. To prove her...maidenhood."

Damn him, he almost sounded embarrassed, saying that.

Tyrion gritted his teeth. "I don't think we should submit Lady Sansa to the indecency-"

"No, the King is correct," Cersei interrupted, giving her brother a look Sansa couldn't interpret, but she felt her veins turning to ice, all the same. "The Lady Sansa should submit to the examination."

Tyrion squinted at her, and then, all at once, seemed to deflate.

"If...If the Lady Sansa is agreeable to it-" he said, trying and failing to meet Sansa's eyes; she could feel him looking at her, and she didn't quite dare meet his eyes in turn.

"I should think you would want to know the truth about your wife," Joffrey said, a sly grin twisting his features.

"I know the truth about her," Tyrion said archly, still looking directly at Sansa. "I don't see why she should have to submit to the indignity of an examination, when we too have proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that she is, in fact, my wife."

Joffrey rolled his eyes. "You're not objecting to it, are you, Lady Sansa?" he asked.

Tyrion clenched his fists.

Sansa's mouth went very dry, but she knew the answer that she had to give.

"Of course not, my lord," she told Joffrey. "I have nothing to hide."

Joffrey's forehead wrinkled, and he looked at her for a long moment in bemusement, before smirking again. "Perhaps I can sit in on the...examination," he said, and Tyrion let out a sound that might have actually belonged to a lion, then.

"I think not, Your Grace."

Joffrey pouted. "Very well," he said finally, and Sansa deflated, just a little.


	316. MARGAERY

Margaery blinked down at the parchment below her, tried carefully not to betray a reaction because she could feel the pirate captain's eyes on her still, from where he sat across from her now, whittling away at a piece of wood with a knife that was far too sharp for her liking.

Read the words again, just to be certain of what she was actually reading.

He'd been doing that all day today, not at all bothered with doing whatever it was pirates actually did in between attacking ships or villages full of treasure, she thought, bitterly. Apparently, it was nothing more or less than making one captive of his as uncomfortable as possible.

She wondered if this was what Sansa had felt like, as a bug underneath Joffrey's shoe, perfectly aware that he could bring it down on her at any moment, and wondering why he did not.

She hated the feeling, very much so.

But this, what she was reading on this page, the words blurring together, she had been at them so long...

This was important somehow, she knew that. She just wished she knew what it meant.

"You know," Margaery started, as conversationally as possible, sliding the piece of parchment she had currently paused on below the one underneath it, hopefully smoothly enough that the captain had not noticed, "This might go better for you in the future if you know how to read yourself."

The pirate lifted his eyes to her once more, and she almost regretted saying anything. But he would have noticed eventually, she knew, if she was not reading aloud anymore.

The whittling stopped.

She bit back a sigh of relief.

"I would think you would not be so eager to outlive your usefulness, my lady," he told her, and Margaery's smile vanished as she allowed a bit of pretend fear onto her features, at those words.

She had known what he was about to say, of course, had expected it.

She'd learned something of her husband's habits, after all, and in some ways, this pirate captain seemed little different from him, even if in others he was the complete opposite.

Still, she bit back a smile, because at least she was distracting him from her attempts to reread those words without being noticed.

"Oh, I'm not," she told him, "But it does take rather a long time to learn to read, after all." She tried to affect bored indifference, and didn't quite think she managed it. "You must have things to do, even a degenerate such as yourself, that are more important."

The pirate eyed her for a long moment, and then went back to his whittling. "Keep reading," he snapped at her. "Perhaps I'll just keep you here forever, and you can read everything we come across."

Margaery felt a chill of fear run through her, at those words.

_Everything we come across._

She wondered how many more towns full of innocent people he meant, how many ships full of merchants and their wares. She wondered how many he had killed in the village where Arry had lived; she hadn't quite worked up the courage to ask the boy, or to wonder whether he'd had people he cared about, there.

There had to be a moment when the man before her slipped up, she reassured herself. Yes, she had given up hope that anyone was coming to rescue her now, but she would have to rescue herself, and that meant allowing her captors to become complacent enough to get sloppy.

All it would take was just one trip to a port, and she could scream to anyone who would listen who she was, could escape their bonds and swim to freedom, if she had to. All it would take was making sure the blacksmith on this ship was disposed of, so that Arry could come out of his cage and make the transition easier.

But she had to get to that point of trust, first, lest the pirates suspect her immediately.

Margaery was all too aware that perhaps the easiest way of achieving that trust that would be to bed the man in front of her. He seemed eager enough to protect her from the eyes of his men, and charmed enough by her to happily bed her.

She could make it work, even if she was tired of bedding men she had no interest in, and perhaps the pirate captain would slip up even faster, if she did so.

But, as she'd noted, she was tired of bedding men for nothing more than their use.

"Of course," she said, not caring that the words were shaky, before she went back to reading the page beneath the one she'd hidden away. "Twenty gold dragons sent from Sunspear for the purpose of rebuilding the bridge-"

"Hah," the pirate laughed, then, and Margaery felt a cold shiver, at the sound. She hated his laugh almost as much as she hated Joffrey's, just now. "Little good it did them."

Margaery lifted her head. "Oh?" she asked, and tried to show some hurt, at the thought of her own village being destroyed in such a way.

She was not quite certain she succeeded, from the way the pirate was looking at her.

She knew that he didn't believe her story, either of her being married to Arry nor of her being from the village they had just attacked.

But he had yet to question the polite fiction, and she would uphold it as long as she could, for she thought it rather amused him, that she thought she could continue lying to him, and as long as he didn't know what she was lying about, she was safe. Amused him, the same way having a noblewoman read to him about everything they had supposedly stolen from her village amused him.

Better he think her a liar than a queen, after all.

The captain laughed again. "That was the first thing to burn," he informed her, and this time, Margaery didn't have to fake the way she paled, at his words.

For a moment, he just studied her, and then he went back to his whittling.

She knew that she needed to get a handle on her emotions. What had happened to the ship she had been on - to her brother - it had been horrible, and she had no doubt that she would have nightmares about it for the rest of her life, but she needed to stop reacting so strongly, every time someone mentioned fire, every time she thought about the flames.

She had to control herself, if she was ever going to get out of here.

And, to that end, Margaery went back to reading, her words slower now, as she tried to read the page now on top of her pile, all the while lifting the one below it to read those words in her head.

The captain sent her an inquisitive gaze.

Margaery shrugged, grimacing. "The words on this page," she lied, "They're a bit...smudged."

They weren't, and if he bothered to get up and look, he would realize that, but the captain didn't seem to care, going back to his carving and ordering her to continue reading, a moment later.

"Twenty gold dragons," she repeated, "For..."

She lifted the page below it, and read those confusing words, one more time, still uncertain what they meant.

 _Send to Sunspear: Tyrell forces sighted moving away from the Dornish Marshes, instead seem to be moving towards_ \- The lettering on this page was smudged, much to her annoyance, almost as if it had stopped in a great hurry.

Margaery glanced up at her captor and barely withheld a sigh. She had no doubt as to why the words had stopped so suddenly, and Margaery was becoming beyond frustrated, the longer she stayed here, the longer she kept reading words she didn't understand.

She knew why the Tyrell forces had been in Dorne once again, after all. Knew that her father had tasked her brother with sending them to wreak revenge on the Martells for what he thought was the murder of Willas.

And she knew that, whatever his ambitious inclinations, her father was no more likely to forget a grudge which wounded so deeply than Cersei Lannister was, which meant she didn't understand why the Tyrell forces might suddenly be leaving, and she wanted very much to know where the fuck they were going.

She sighed, reaching up and rubbing at her forehead, ignoring the captain's eyes on her, uncertain how he even managed to carve and watch her so closely at the same time.

She was hardly getting anywhere, with her little plot of finding out which crewmember was, in fact, the ship's blacksmith.

Arry had been less than enthused with her idea of pushing him overboard - though she hadn't quite admitted the truth of that to him, even then - she could see that quite clearly. She wasn't certain if that was because he didn't think she could do it, or if he couldn't stomach the thought of murder himself, despite the way she had seen him reach for his knife when they were first taken by the pirates.

But she couldn't be bothered with that. She had managed to cajole out of him a bit more information about blacksmiths - "Though I'm not sure how much it'll help, knowing what sorts of calluses they have on their fingers, unless you're close enough to..." - after much managing, and now had her choices narrowed down to several of the men only.

So far, she'd only spent time in the presence of the captain, or the men he had escort her to and from his cabin in what she assumed was every day. She couldn't be sure, where she and Arry were kept beneath the hold, after all.

And she had examined each of their fingers, where they held her arms as they dragged her along, none of them daring to make another innuendo towards her the way that first guard had, when he figured out that she and Arry were 'married.'

This was the seventh day she had been brought to read to the captain, and the words were almost gone, and she was still no closer to discovering their way off of this ship than she had been.

She knew that Arry's words had had some sense, when he told her to escape however she could, and damn him, if she had to.

But she also knew that the pirates might just as well turn around and scoop her out of the sea, and then the captain sitting before her might finally stop the polite fiction, if she did so, and rape her.

And even if she did escape, there was no telling who she might run into, after that. She would rather prefer having a protector of some sort, if she managed it at all.

She supposed that even if it did sound horribly as if the Tyrells were leaving Dorne for good, as if her one chance of being happened upon by her brother's army, however unlikely it had been, was very much gone, it did not mean that they had actually left Dorne.

For all she knew, the note might be saying that they had left the Dornish Marshes and were descending into Sunspear as the man wrote those things, though something in her rather doubted that, even if her father's leaving Dorne for good felt terribly against everything he had ever stood for.

Still, something told Margaery that she was missing something, and she very much hated that she did not know what that was.

Glancing up at the pirate, Margaery wondered if she was missing more than something. She still hadn’t left this room, after all, every time she had left her cage, and she had no real idea how to convince this captain to allow that.

Margaery hated not having control over at least something.


	317. TYRION

Tyrion grimaced at the sharp cry of pain he heard in the other room, glancing at Joffrey where the boy paced in front of him, a sharp smirk on his features.

Oddly enough, the smirk almost reminded Tyrion of Margaery.

They had been standing there, waiting, for some time, and Tyrion was growing irritated the longer they waited.

He felt a great swell of pity for Sansa, where she lay on the other side of that door, undergoing her examination at the hands of septas specially chosen for the task.

He hadn't wanted this for his little wife. He had tried to protect her from it, in fact, but he knew as well as Cersei did that this was the only way to convince Joffrey to turn his attentions elsewhere. The boy was single-mindedly determined once he decided upon something, and he seemed to have decided that he wanted Sansa to wife.

But he hadn’t thought that Joffrey would move so quickly, and clearly, neither had Cersei. Nor had either of them thought that he would be able to persuade the High Septon, who sat currently in Tyrion’s pocket, to his own way of thinking, regarding that fucking vow, if nothing else.

The vow wasn’t enough to be grounds for an annulment of Tyrion’s marriage, of course, but it just might be enough to garner sympathy from the smallfolk, for their King, over the loss of his queen.

Or, it would have been, had the Sparrows not currently been riling them up.

Tyrion had thought the High Septon would remain on their side, had thought he would actually have time to form a plan to get Joffrey off of this newest obsession, and at the very least to warn Sansa.

The most that he and his sister had managed was that Sansa was most definitely not a virgin – though Cersei did not need to know more than that – and that a test of her maidenhead ought to prove that, and therefore prove to Joffrey that he could not take her for a wife.

But Tyrion knew that such a test could be...invasive, and he had hoped to give Sansa some forewarning of it, to ease her into the subject of Joffrey’s renewed obsession with her, without throwing on her the news that Joffrey once more wanted to take her for a bride.

He knew, lately, how terrified his wife was of remaining in King’s Landing. He did not want her to have to suffer unduly, or to do something they would all regret.

And yet, here they were, and Tyrion could have kicked himself, for allowing the boy to outthink him so quickly. It had barely been a day since the brat’s first visit with the High Septon.

For a moment, Tyrion allowed himself to wonder if the boy really did believe what he had said, that the gods had punished him for not marrying Sansa as he'd made the oath to do by killing Margaery.

But, no, he shook his head. Joffrey wasn't even religious, as he claimed to be. That had jut been his excuse, for his newest obsession. Or, perhaps, oldest was the better word.

Tyrion grimaced as Sansa let out another sound of pain from the other room, and turned away, glancing towards Cersei, whose face was entirely blank throughout the proceedings.

She had been the one to insist on this examination. To insist on proving to Joffrey that Lady Sansa's maidenhead had been broken due to a successful marriage, and the septas in the other room were proving just that.

Tyrion wondered if Cersei had given orders for the septas to ensure that maidenhead was broken, if they found something that might instead peak Joffrey's interest. He wouldn't put it past his sister.

It could be useful, Cersei’s ruthlessness, when they were working on the same side, as rarely as they did so.

They waited for some time longer, and then the door opened, and one of the septas who had volunteered for the examination stepped into the room, curtseying before the King and the Queen Mother.

Whatever the curtsey seemed to mean, it made Cersei tense.

"The Lady Sansa Lannister's maidenhead has been broken," the septa told the King, who stared at her, looking rather dumbfounded. "Her marriage has been consummated."

Joffrey blinked, blinked again. "Check it again," he ordered finally, and the septa blinked, then curtseyed.

"Your Grace-"

"Check it again!" Joffrey roared.

The septa curtseyed again, and then hurried off to do his bidding.

Cersei was staring at Tyrion with something not unlike suspicion, while Joffrey was still outright disbelieving.

Tyrion knew that Cersei did not want his marriage to Sansa annulled so that Joffrey could sweep her up anymore than he did, though her motives were less altruistic than his own.

Cersei wanted her son to marry someone more controllable than Sansa. Yes, the girl was certainly vulnerable to Cersei's manipulations as well as Joffrey's, but Tyrion knew that Cersei wanted more than that.

They already had Sansa's claim to Winterfell through Tyrion, and Cersei wanted someone for her son who was very much loyal to House Lannister, if anyone at all, as Joffrey seemed to determined to make himself a new wife, just now.

Having a girl who was the Head of her own House, however loyal she claimed to be, just wasn’t in the cards, to Cersei’s mind.

And, of course, there was another matter. Margaery had claimed to be a maiden when she married Joffrey, and while there had been much debate about whether or not that was the case, one thing had been certain; her husband was dead, and so there was no real issue with her marrying Joffrey.

Sansa's husband would very much still be alive, gods willing, and while they could claim that the marriage was unconsummated, word would get out, Tyrion knew. He had a bit of a reputation, and while he had not touched his wife, it was clear someone had.

The septa had just confirmed it. Sansa had never been much of a horseback rider, after all.

Her marriage to Joffrey would not be so easily accepted, especially not when she was married to a member of his family. The gods did not approve of that anymore than they approved of the Targaryens' habit of marrying siblings.

A different septa returned this time, still looking nervous. "Your Grace..." she chewed on her lower lip. "We have checked three times, now. The Lady's maidenhead has been broken, and her...nether regions appear to have been very much...fulfilled by consummation. She is undoubtedly not a virgin."

"Sometimes, I am told, a maiden's maidenhead is destroyed while riding," Joffrey said suddenly, rubbing a hand over his lip. "My lady Margaery told me as such, when we were wed, and Grandmaester Pycelle confirmed this. Sansa must have done much riding in that barbaric Winterfell, before she came to the capitol."

"Your Grace," Tyrion interrupted smoothly, not stopping to think about the fact that Margaery had convinced him she was a virgin because she enjoyed horseback riding, "Sansa's maidenhead is gone because she is not a maiden, not for any other reason. Our marriage was consummated, as my lord father demanded it be, upon the first night of our wedding."

Joffrey glowered at him. "Then the bitch shouldn't have been stringing me along," he snapped, and Tyrion grimaced at the anger in his tone, as if Sansa really had been stringing him along when Tyrion had seen how frightened she was, of late. "So she's barren, then," he said finally, dismissively waving a hand. "She'll be of no use to me."

Tyrion groaned. "Then may I tell her that she can go, Your Grace?"

Joffrey shrugged. "Get rid of her; I don't care," he said, and then turned and stalked from the room.

Tyrion was about to go to his lady wife, when Cersei's voice stopped him in the doorway, and he closed his eyes, breathing in heavily.

"You did not consummate that marriage," Cersei snapped, and he turned back around.

He knew then that she had never believed that he had, when he had suggested to her that they get Sansa to have this test done, in order to get rid of Joffrey’s legitimate interest. That she had always expected one of the septas to break Sansa’s maidenhead themselves, if it came to that. Tyrion’s assurances had clearly meant nothing to her.

Tyrion's lips quirked, and he glanced around. "Careful, Sister," he told her, "One doesn't know what ears might hear you out in these wide corridors."

Cersei's teeth clicked together. "And Sansa Stark has not been known as much of a rider; for all that it was Margaery Tyrell's...passion. Who stole her maidenhead from House Lannister, dear brother?"

He grinned, glad that at least he could annoy Cersei with the knowledge that yet another thing had been stolen from this House she pretended to care so much about.

"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about, Sister," he told her, before dipping his head and starting a cheerful whistle. "She is my wife, after all, and I made sure that the deed was done."

Cersei glared at him. "You're lying," she hissed out.

Tyrion raised a brow. "And here I thought you were the one who helped me convince the High Septon not to bow to our king's wishes unless there was every proof that my marriage to Lady Sansa had been consummated. You didn't want Joffrey to have her anymore than I."

Cersei sniffed. "You may have your spies watching me, brother, but do not doubt that mine watch you as well."

Tyrion gave her a mocking little bow, and turned on his way.

Shae had been right, he reflected with a little chuckle. Sansa Stark certainly wouldn't begrudge them the time they spent together in his bed so long as she was allowed to remain in Good Queen Marg's.

He frowned, for that was certainly a thing of the past now.

Unbidden, he thought of Tysha, of that whore who had gone where whores go, and he didn't at all like the comparison, in his mind.

His father had not said that the whore was dead, he reminded himself. He had never said that.

"Then you should find your son a new wife, Sister," Tyrion said in the doorway, "Before he gets too distracted with mine."


End file.
